Continuing with its innovations, Google has updated the Google Maps which comes as a treat for the stargazers. The new fun update allows one to virtually visit all planets and moons of our solar system.
Google Maps has now added to its line-up imagery of Pluto, Venus and several moons – a total of 16 celestial bodies.
It enables a visit to Saturn's natural satellites such as Enceladus, Dione or Iapetus, Rhea and Mimas as well as Jupiter's Europa and Ganymede.
While Google has long offered detailed imagery of Mars and the Earth’s Moon, these were not directly accessible from the Maps interface.
Earth as seen from Google Maps
To access the new imagery, one can just zoom out from terrestrial Google Maps view until you hit outer space.
One can also visit the International Space Station, which also joined Google's Street View program.
Mars as seen from Google Maps
The company stated that it worked with astronomical artist Bjorn Jonsson, who assembled the maps of planets and moons to its service, by working with imagery from US space agency NASA and the European Space Agency.
The Google team polished the images collected and sent by missions from NASA, ESA, and other agencies and stitched them together to generate high-resolution mosaics of those bodies.
International Space Station as seen from Google Maps
