The Places blog
Plain-English guides to finding places, reading coordinates, measuring distance, time zones and more — written to answer the questions people actually search for.
From Coordinates to an Address: How Reverse Geocoding Works You have a latitude and longitude pair from a photo, a dropped pin, or a device log, and you need a real address. Here's how reverse geocoding turns coordinates into a street, city, and postal code, and why the answer is sometimes crisp and sometimes empty.
Latitude vs Longitude: How to Read Coordinates Without Mixing Them Up A plain-English guide to reading a coordinate pair: why latitude always comes first, what the N/S/E/W letters and plus/minus signs really mean, and how to catch the most common (and most dramatic) mistake — swapping latitude and longitude.
How to Find the GPS Coordinates of Any Address or Place A practical, step-by-step guide to finding the GPS coordinates of any address or place: searching by name vs address, reading latitude and longitude, decimal degrees vs DMS, and copying or sharing them without errors.
DMS vs Decimal Degrees: Convert Coordinate Formats Without Errors The same spot can be written as 40°44'54.8"N or 40.748556 — and a tool that wants one will reject the other. Here is the exact formula to convert between DMS, DDM, and decimal degrees by hand, the sign rule that decides North from South, and why a valid coordinate gets refused.
What Country Am I In? Reading Calling Codes, Currency and Country Facts A plain-English guide to figuring out which country a place is in, then reading its quick facts: what a "+44" calling code means, currency and currency codes, ISO 2- and 3-letter country codes, capitals, official languages, and driving side.
How to Share Your Exact Location: Coordinates, Pins and Links Someone is waiting for you and you want to send "here, exactly here." This guide covers when a map link works, when raw coordinates win, how to send your spot over plain SMS with no app, and the privacy difference between a one-time share and a live, moving dot.
Sharing a Place With No Street Address: Plus Codes, what3words and Coordinates How to name and share a place that has no street address: a plain-English comparison of raw GPS coordinates, Google Plus Codes, and what3words, covering precision, openness, offline behavior, and how to turn a pin into something you can text.
Why Is My GPS Location Wrong? Understanding Coordinate Accuracy Your phone says you're in the river, the dot drifts a block behind you, then jumps streets. GPS is an estimate, not a measurement. Here's why it goes wrong, how accurate phone GPS really is, and the fixes that work.
How Far Is It? Measuring the Distance Between Two Cities A plain-English guide to the distance between two cities: as-the-crow-flies (great-circle) vs driving distance, why map apps give different numbers, the haversine idea, bearings, and which figure to trust for flights versus road trips.
How High Above Sea Level Am I? Elevation and Altitude Explained Ask your phone how high you are above the sea and two devices can disagree by tens of metres. Here's what elevation really measures, how it differs from altitude, why GPS and barometric heights diverge, and where the number actually matters — hiking, gradients, and floods.
Best Time to Call Across Time Zones: Finding an Overlap That Works Knowing the time difference is the easy part. This guide shows how to find a call slot that's genuinely reasonable on every end: the working-hours overlap method, the daylight-saving traps that quietly break recurring meetings, and how to write an invite that survives forwarding.
How Long Will It Take? Estimating Driving Time Between Two Cities A practical guide to estimating driving time between two cities: the time = distance / speed method, choosing a realistic average speed for highway versus city roads, adding rest and fuel stops, and why live map ETAs differ.
Postal Codes Explained: ZIP, PIN, Postcodes and What They Reveal A plain-English guide to postal codes: how ZIP, PIN, and postcodes differ across countries, what they can and can't reveal about where someone is, and the privacy trade-offs of sharing one.
What Time Is It There? Time Zones and UTC Offsets Made Simple A plain-English guide to time zones: what UTC and offsets mean, why IANA names beat abbreviations like EST, how daylight saving shifts the difference, and how to find the local time before a call or trip.