Google has decided to kill its Trusted Contacts app, which offered you a way to track select friends and loved ones, even if they failed to respond to you.

The app was certainly useful. It could potentially save lives during a disaster. However, as reported by The Verge, it appears that Google has decided that the Location Sharing feature in Google Maps makes Trusted Contacts redundant.

Using Google Maps Instead of Trusted Contacts

Unfortunately, while Google Maps does offer the ability to track the location of your friends and family, it doesn't do it as well as the Trusted Contacts app.

Instead of the ability to constantly see the location of the loved one, even without their response, Google Maps requires them to broadcast their location to you for you to know where they are. If they're physically unable to use their device, though, this could end up being useless.

Still, using Google Maps is certainly better than nothing, and it's pretty easy to set up location sharing.

First, you'll need to tap your profile picture in Google Maps, then click Location Sharing. Next, click New Share. To actually provide someone with your location, you'll need to have their Gmail address in your contacts. As long as you do, you'll want to choose how long you'd like to share your location, then click the person with whom you'd like to share. Finally, tap Share.

If the person doesn't have a Gmail account, you can still share your location with them. Instead of clicking on a name from your contacts, you need to click Copy to clipboard, and you'll get a shareable link to send to friends or loved ones. With this method, you can choose to share your location for 72 hours or less.

When Will Trusted Contacts Go Away?

Google is giving users of Trusted Contacts a little time to make the transition to Google Maps, as the company sent out an email to users announcing a December 1, 2020 end date. You can continue to use the app until that date, but after that, the functionality offered by Trusted Contacts will no longer work.

You will not be able to install the app if it's not currently on your device, though.

Anyone who used Trusted Contacts can go to the Trusted Contacts dashboard to download your contacts through December 1, 2020.

Hopefully, Google pushes the functionality offered by the Trusted Contacts app to Maps to create an experience that more closely resembles that of the original app.

Of course, it's quite possible that not many people were using Trusted Contacts in the first place, which could be part of the reason Google is killing it.