See places and change your view

You can use Google Earth to travel the world and explore new places. You’ll see exotic cities, landmarks in 3D, and buildings up close.

Learn how to see places up close in Street View.

Notes:

Not all Google Earth locations can be seen in 3D.
To learn where the map images come from, see how Google creates 3D Earth data.

See places using Google Chrome

Using Google Chrome on your computer, open Google Earth.
Choose an action:
- Look for a specific place: Click Search .
- Move around: Click and drag with your mouse.
- Zoom in and out: In the bottom right, use +/- (or right click and drag the mouse).
- Look around your location: Hold Ctrl + click and drag the screen.

Turn on latitude & longitude gridlines

You can turn on gridlines to learn about geographic coordinates and get your approximate location on the Earth’s surface.

You can also see the 5 major circles of latitude (Equator, Arctic Circle, Antarctic Circle, Tropic of Cancer, and Tropic of Capricorn), and the Prime Meridian.

Using Google Chrome on your computer, open Google Earth.
On the left, click Map Style .
Turn on Enable Gridlines.

Show 3D imagery

You can use “Enable 3D Buildings” to turn 3D buildings and trees on or off. Turning off 3D buildings may show newer imagery and increase overall performance of Google Earth.

Using Google Chrome on your computer, open Google Earth.
On the left, click Map Style .
Turn Enable 3D buildings on or off.

Troubleshoot places loading slowly

Sometimes, places take time to show in Google Earth. If you're waiting for a place to load, check the bottom right to see how much of the image has loaded.

To see images more quickly, try changing your memory settings:

On your computer, open Google Earth.
On the left, click Menu Settings.
Under "Memory cache size," choose a size:
- To make images load more quickly, increase the cache size.
  Note: To increase the size, you’ll need a fast computer.
- If you have a slower computer, you can lower the cache size and make images load more slowly.
  Note: This may make Google Earth run more smoothly.
Click Save.

Change the view

Switch between top-down view and orbiting 3D view: In the bottom right, click 3D . If you are already in 3D view, you’ll see 2D instead.
Face North: In the bottom right, click the compass. Double-click the compass to make it bigger. Then, click and drag the compass to tilt or rotate the screen.
Fly to your current location: In the bottom right, click My Location .
Rotate the map: On the bottom right, double-click the compass. Then, click and drag the compass edges to rotate the screen.
Tilt the map: On the bottom right, double-click the compass. Then, click and drag the center of the compass to tilt up and down.
Return to the default Google Earth view: In the bottom right, click the globe. To move across the world, zoom in then click and drag the globe.

Choose how much info to see

At the top, click Menu .
Click Map Style .
Choose a view:
- Clean: Imagery only -- no borders, labels or roads.
- Exploration: Imagery plus most places of interest, like borders, labels, and roads.
- Everything: All of the above plus landmarks, businesses, public transit, and more.
- Custom: Choose which features you want to see when you use Google Earth.