Open and read your Google Maps Timeline export

All of the formats Google currently ships. Timeline.json from the on-device export (the one with semanticSegments), Records.json from Takeout (raw GPS points with latitudeE7 and longitudeE7), the older monthly files such as 2023_JANUARY.json (timelineObjects), the CSV export offered in Europe, and the Takeout ZIP itself without unpacking it. Files are identified by what is inside them, not by their name, because Google names them in your phone's language.

Since Google moved Timeline onto the phone, the export comes from the Google Maps app: tap your profile picture, choose Your Timeline, open the three-dot menu, then Location and privacy settings, then Export Timeline data. Older histories are still available from takeout.google.com under Location History (Timeline).

Yes. Every vehicle journey in your history becomes a row with the date, start and end time, where you left from, where you arrived, the distance and the duration, plus an empty purpose column to fill in. You enter your own rate per mile or kilometre. It is a record-keeping tool, so check the current rate with the IRS and confirm which journeys qualify.

Almost always because Timeline was never switched on for that Google account, so Google has nothing to export. Drop the archive in anyway: this page reads the Settings.json inside it and tells you exactly what it says, including whether Timeline is on, whether any of your devices ever reported a location, and how long Google keeps history. Note that recording only starts when you switch it on, so there is no way to recover where you went before that.

Less time than most people expect. The retention window is a setting on your account, and the current default is three months rather than the ten years people often assume. Your own value is written in the Settings.json inside your export, and this page reads it out for you.

No. Your file is read inside your browser tab and the results stay in that tab. Nothing about your history is sent to us, which is also why we cannot recover your files later. The map does load its background imagery from a third-party basemap provider, so that provider can see roughly which area is on screen, but never your file or your history.

Yes. The file is read as a stream rather than loaded into memory all at once, so a decade of history is processed in pieces with a real progress percentage. Reading happens on a background thread, so the page keeps responding while it works. Very large archives are best handled on a desktop browser.

The files. Reading your export is free: you get the interactive map, your statistics year by year, a sample of your most visited places and the first rows of your mileage report, plus a watermarked preview of the poster. Paying unlocks the complete data as files you keep: mileage-report.csv and .pdf with every journey, timeline-places.csv, timeline-trips.csv, timeline.gpx, timeline.kml, timeline.geojson, a year report with your routes drawn as a map, and the poster without the watermark at print resolution. All of them are generated in your browser.

Stripe sends you straight back to this page and your downloads are ready. Your timeline is still there, so you never have to load your export a second time. Save the files while the page is open: we keep no copy of your data on any server, so there is nothing for us to regenerate later.

Records.json contains only timestamped coordinates. It has no notion of a visit, a journey or a mode of transport, so those are worked out from the data: stops are found where you stayed in one place long enough, journeys are what happened between them, and the mode is estimated from average speed. Exports in the other formats carry Google's own labels and are used as-is.