Google Bard can now obtain your precise location to give you more relevant local results. The generative AI tool Bard will use the location details of your device to show results specific to your locality whenever relevant.
Following this update, opening the Bard website (bard.google.com) shows a prompt titled “Bard is more relevant with location”. It states that the service already uses location info from your “Google Account’s home and work addresses and your IP address,” which you can manage following these instructions. But if you want to get more relevant responses from the AI tool, you can give it access to your device’s precise location. The prompt also notes that you can change your location settings at any time.
You can choose to dismiss the prompt and continue using Bard as you already do. But if you select the “Use precise location” button, the website will ask for location access. “Precise location helps Bard provide more relevant responses about restaurants near you and many other things about your area,” Google explains. That is how Google Search delivers results more local to you. No wonder the company wants to give Bard similar powers. After all, people are seeing it as the future of search.
Bard notes your location details at the bottom of the left panel, under the light/dark theme button (tap the hamburger menu on the top left on mobile). It tells you how the info is derived (your IP address, places, or the device itself). The service will use your device’s location only if you’ve given it access to the precise location, though. If you dismissed the aforementioned prompt, you can click/tap on the “Update location” button to bring up the location permission dialogue box.
This location update follows a host of Google Bard updates in May
This is the first update for Google Bard in June. It follows a host of updates last month. As you can see on Google’s official Bard update tracker here, the service received support for Google Workspace accounts early in May. It was followed by the addition of Japanese and Korean languages as the service reached users in more than 180 countries and territories. Google also added support for light/dark themes and enabled users to export content generated by Bard to Google Docs and Gmail complete with formatting. Bard recently gained more concise summaries, improved course citations, and support for images as well.