You can now send your location to a friend directly through Facebook’s Messenger app, the company announced Thursday. You can also send a different location, say, a prospective meeting point.
Head of Product for Messenger Stan Chudnovsky said in a blog post that Facebook has been working on the feature over the last few months.
“To get started, just tap the More icon or the location pin at the bottom of your screen,” Chudnovsky wrote. “If you want to tell a friend which restaurant to meet you at, search for the restaurant and send a map of where it is. If you’re running late, send a map of where you are to your friend to let him or her know how far away you are.”
Facebook’s blog post says users’ location data isn’t compromised with the new feature:
As always, Messenger doesn’t get any location information from your device unless you enable location services for the app.
Messenger does not get location information from your device in the background—only each time you select a location and tap Send when you use the Messenger app. We are not requesting any new permissions for your information.
WhatsApp, a messaging app Facebook acquired last year in a $22 billion deal, has long had a similar location-sharing feature.