How to search for food, night shelters in Google Maps

Google has so far added locations of relief centres for 30 cities across India.

The central and state governments have set up food and night shelters across the country to help those affected by the pandemic. (REUTERS)

Google Maps made it easier to find food shelters and night shelters in India for those affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Google said it is working with state and central governments to provide locations for these relief centres.

Google has so far added locations for 30 cities across India. At present, users can search for these relief centres in English. But the company is working on bringing support for Hindi and other regional languages as well. It will also add more shelters in more cities soon.

Addresses of the relief centres will be available in Google Maps, but users can search for it through Google Search and Assistant as well.

How to search for food shelters, night shelters on Google Maps

Open Google Maps and type "Food shelters in" or "Night shelters in". 

The same query can be typed in Google Search as well. And the Search results will show Google Maps with the shelter locations.

Users can also ask Google Assistant with the same query.

Working closely with @mygovindia, we are now surfacing locations of food shelters & night shelters on Google Maps, Search and Google Assistant, to help migrant workers & affected people across cities.

Please help this reach those who need it most.@PMOIndia @GoI_MeitY @rsprasad pic.twitter.com/g9LwYfikrW

— Google India (@GoogleIndia) April 6, 2020

Google has added these shelter locations on Maps for smartphones and smart feature phones running on KaiOS. Google also plans to roll out quick-access shortcuts that will appear beneath the search bar on Google Maps. It also plans to add food and night shelters pins on Google Maps by default so the user sees it as soon as they open the app.

The Delhi government had also launched a dedicated map on Google Maps with locations of all the food and night shelters. Users can follow this link to access the map where locations are pinned.