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Google Earth Celebrates 20th Anniversary With Historical Street View

Leo Migdal
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google earth celebrates 20th anniversary with historical street view

Google Earth has transformed the way people explore and understand the world from its viral launch to its role in scientific discovery and environmental planning. To celebrate its 20th anniversary, Google Earth looks back at some of the most significant moments in its history and highlights how it remains an essential tool for millions worldwide. This year marks the 20th anniversary of Google Earth, a tool that began as a novel way to explore satellite imagery and has grown into a platform with global reach and scientific significance. Launched in 2005, Google Earth captured the public’s imagination almost immediately, reaching 100 million downloads in its first week. Since then, it has evolved beyond a virtual globe to become a multifaceted resource for education, research, emergency response, environmental planning, and historical preservation, as well as a canvas for storytelling. “When we launched Google Earth 20 years ago, our mission was simple, yet powerful: give people a new way to understand our world.

Since then, millions of people have been asking Earth questions, big and small, about the planet where we live. It helps us uncover new insights, tell powerful stories, and see the world — and our impact on it — in a whole new light,” Google Earth says. In honor of its two-decade milestone, Google has introduced a new feature: historical Street View imagery directly within Google Earth. This addition enables users to scroll through time and view how places have evolved, a fitting tribute to a platform that has always sought to deepen our understanding of the world, both past and... Looking back, Google Earth’s impact stretches far beyond casual browsing. In 2005, just months after its launch, Google partnered with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to provide real-time imagery to aid emergency responders during Hurricane Katrina.

In the years that followed, scientists utilized the tool to discover previously undocumented coral reefs off Australia’s coast and to aid in locating fossil sites, which ultimately led to the identification of a new... We’re taking a look back at the major launches, moments and milestones that made Google Earth what it is today. Google Earth is celebrating 20 years of helping people explore the world. You can now access historical Street View imagery within Google Earth. Professionals can also use new features to evaluate building designs and access city-level insights. Google Earth is 20 years old and it helps people see the world.

It has lots of pictures from planes, satellites, and even the street. People use it to learn about the Earth and help their communities. Now, you can even see old Street View pictures on Google Earth. Okay, here are three haiku summarizing the Google Earth article, mentioning relevant Google products and services: Earth turns twenty now, Google Earth, Street View expands, History unfolds. With its 20th anniversary update, Google Earth brings historical Street View timelines to the platform for a more detailed view of urban evolution.

There’s a peculiar thrill in peering at a familiar street corner and realizing it looked completely different just a few years ago. Whether it’s the disappearance of a local shop, the rise of a gleaming new skyscraper, or the slow regrowth of a forest patch, witnessing these transformations can feel like digital time travel. Google is leaning into that fascination: in celebration of Google Earth’s 20th anniversary, the platform now brings historical Street View imagery into its fold, letting anyone “rewind” street scenes directly within Earth’s globe-spanning interface. Simultaneously, Google is rolling out AI-driven environmental insights for professional users, spotlighting tree canopy coverage and land surface temperatures. Together, these updates aim to deepen our understanding of how places evolve over time and how they might be shaped for the future. Since its launch in 2005, Google Earth has invited users to soar above cities, oceans, and remote landscapes, revealing secrets from the comfort of a desktop or mobile screen.

Over the years, Google added functionality like historical satellite and aerial imagery—which until last year was confined to the Earth Pro desktop app—but now, historical Street View is joining the party. Previously, if you wanted to scroll through past Street View captures, you’d switch back to Google Maps, where a timeline slider appears when you’re in Street View mode. Now, that same capability is available in Google Earth: click into Street View, and you’ll be able to browse imagery from different years to see how a particular block or landmark has changed over... This integration is more than a novelty: it unifies the “big-picture” view of satellite/aerial imagery with the intimate, street-level snapshots. Imagine tracing the evolution of a waterfront development by toggling between overhead satellite imagery from, say, 2010 to 2025, then diving into Street View timelines to inspect construction phases, changes in storefronts, or shifts... By embedding historical Street View in Earth, Google is encouraging a holistic exploration of place-based change: from the macro to the micro.

Last year, a social media trend saw users virtually time-traveling via Google Maps to revisit childhood homes, track the emergence of new buildings, or simply marvel at “then vs. now” juxtapositions. That viral curiosity revealed a hunger for personal and collective memory through geospatial visualization—and Google is responding by making that experience more seamless in Earth. For casual explorers, it’s pure delight: you might revisit the street where you attended college, observe the growth of a neighborhood, or compare seasonal changes at a national park entrance. For educators and storytellers, the feature can serve as a visual aid: history classes can use it to illustrate urban growth or decay; environmental studies might show coastal erosion or reforestation; cultural pieces can... Plus, a look at history from a bird's eye view

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Over the last 20 years, Google Earth has enabled us to explore the globe through billions of images from aerial photography, satellite imagery, Street View, and 3D images. The globe explorer debuted a few months after Google Maps, but is more than just a way to get you from point A to point B. Google claims that in the last year alone, Google Earth has been searched over 2 billion times. Affiliate links on Android Authority may earn us a commission.

Learn more. YouTube isn’t the only one celebrating its 20-year anniversary; Google Earth has been around for just as long. To celebrate the two-decade milestone, Google Earth is getting a feature for viewing the past and another that will provide insights about the planet. Back in 2014, Google rolled out a feature called historical street view in Maps for desktop. This feature gathers street views from past collections to show you how a place has changed over the years. While it has long been a staple for Maps, the company has announced that this feature is now also available on Google Earth.

The video below shows an example of how the city of Houston has changed over the years. In addition to historical street view, Google Earth will also be launching AI-driven insights in the coming weeks. Unlike historical street view, this feature is only for professional users in the US. If you’re a professional user, you’ll be able to use this feature to access new datasets about the planet. For example, you could use the tool to learn about tree canopy coverage for cities, showing which parts of the city have the most shade. Knowing which areas would benefit the most from a cooling solution could help with urban planning.

Thank you for being part of our community. Read our Comment Policy before posting. Google Earth wowed everyone 20 years ago, and it’s still pretty cool. After 20 years, being able to look at any corner of the planet in Google Earth doesn’t seem that impressive, but it was a revolution in 2005. Google Earth has gone through a lot of changes in that time, and Google has some more lined up for the service’s 20th anniversary. Soon, Google Earth will help you travel back in time with historic Street View integration, and pro users will get some new “AI-driven insights”—of course Google can’t update a product without adding at least...

Google Earth began its life as a clunky desktop client, but that didn’t stop it from being downloaded 100 million times in the first week. Today, Google Earth is available on the web, in mobile apps, and in the Google Earth Pro desktop app. However you access Earth, you’ll find a blast from the past. For the service’s 20th anniversary, Google was inspired by a social media trend from last year in which people shared historical images of locations in Google Maps. Now, Google Earth is getting a “time travel” interface where you can see historical Street View images from almost any location. While this part isn’t new, Google is also using the 20th anniversary as an opportunity to surface its 3D timelapse feature.

These animations use satellite data to show how an area has changed from a higher vantage point. They’re just as cool as when they were announced in 2021. Google is celebrating Google Earth's 20th anniversary by providing historical Street View photos. You can explore how places have changed over time. Google says it was inspired by a social media trend last year, when people were sharing historical images of Google Maps to compare how places look now compared to many years ago. In 1999, a company called Keyhole, Inc was created by the people at Intrinsic Graphics.

They designed a software featuring a zoomable earth, with various map data. It was called Keyhole EarthViewer. Google acquired the company in 2004, and released Google Earth for desktop in 2005. At that time, it was downloaded over 100 million times in its first week. Users were awed by the ability to explore landmarks, cities, etc. It is used by scientists, researches, and has even helped support rescue efforts, relief operations during natural disasters like hurricanes.

Twenty years later, the service is now used widely across Android, iOS, and desktop platforms, and provided detailed information sourced from aerial photography, satellite imagery, Street View and 3D visuals. In 2024, Google Earth was used over 2 billion times. Google released a timelapse feature in 2021, to show how Earth has changed in the past 30 years. Now it has curated different timelapses to help users see what 20 years of urban changes looks like from space. Want to see the world's energy sources? How about a look at how landscapes have changed over the past 2 decades.

Head to Google Earth and start exploring the world from your device. To mark its 20th anniversary, Google Earth now allows users to explore the globe from a wider range of viewpoints, providing both bird’s eye and street level perspectives. This update aims to give a richer, more immersive experience to anyone seeking to discover the world from multiple angles. In addition, Google Earth will soon introduce historic Street View integration. This upcoming feature will let users virtually travel back in time, enabling them to see locations as they appeared in previous years. The new capability is set to expand the platform’s relevance for educational, research, and casual exploration purposes.

For professional advanced subscribers, Google Earth is also preparing to roll out AI-driven insights in the coming weeks via its web and mobile platforms. These new AI layers will allow users to analyze key factors such as average surface temperature or tree canopy coverage within specific areas, supporting advanced use cases in urban planning and construction. Google Earth offers detailed satellite imagery for exploring Earth's landscapes and urban areas. It includes features like street panning and viewing, Google Drive integration, and an ad-free experience. Rated 4.1, it provides offline access to maps. Users often consider alternatives for similar functionalities.

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