Despite not receiving updates in years, Google Earth VR (2016) on Steam is still one of the most useful and immersive ways to interact with the company’s 3D version of planet Earth, Street View and all. There are already a few apps on Quest that tap into Google’s free-to-use Maps APIs, but none that are doing it at the scale of EarthQuest.
Released on Quest in September 2023, EarthQuest promises “almost every identifiable city on earth is in realistic 3D,” going toe-to-toe with Google’s own Earth VR app on Steam by bringing 3D areas available on earth.google.com to the Quest-native app.
One of the most obvious comparisons on Quest right now is Wooorld (2022), which similarly incorporates all of the 2D and 3D data you’d find on Google Earth VR, albeit with a much more limited rendering area. Wooorld is similarly centered around a social component which lets you tour around with friends and strangers (also available on EarthQuest), but includes co-op GeoGuessr-style games which use Street View.
Something you certainly won’t find on Google Earth VR or Wooorld is EarthQuest’s integration of ChatGPT, letting you interact with an AI companion on your virtual global trek while helping you navigate the user interface, ask questions about your surroundings, teleport you anywhere you want go, and speak to you in practically any language ChatGPT can digest and speak.
You can check out the full feature list over on EarthQuest’s website for more. You’ll also find EarthQuest on Quest for $5 via the Store, SideQuest, and the apk files direct from developer Boectrum.
