Google says it may have accidentally deleted your Google Maps Timeline data

Google recently changed the way the Timeline feature works in Google Maps, transitioning to on-device storage of your previous movements. Unfortunately, some users reported earlier this month that their Timeline data vanished altogether. Now, Google has apparently issued an email to affected people.

Redditor sweepernosweeping reported that Google sent them an email confirming that it accidentally deleted Timeline data for some people:

Hi <real name>,

We briefly experienced a technical issue that caused the deletion of Timeline data for some people. We’re reaching out as your account may have been impacted.

If you have encrypted backups enabled, you may be able to restore your data. Make sure that you have the latest version of Google Maps, then go to your Timeline. Tap the cloud icon ( ) near the top of your screen, and choose a backup to import your data. If you did not have backups turned on, unfortunately you will not be able to recover lost data.

We understand that this can be frustrating if you use Timeline to remember places that you’ve visited, and we are taking steps to improve our systems for the future.

The Timeline Team

The user noted that they checked their Timeline data and discovered that they only had the last two weeks of data. Unfortunately, it sounds like they weren’t able to restore a backup.

Several other users also chimed in to confirm receipt of the email, with some reporting that they could restore their data from a cloud backup. However, others reported that the backup only restored the last few weeks of data, or that they didn’t have a backup at all.

Needless to say, you might want to enable Timeline data backups on your phone right now if you’re concerned about this issue, as it isn’t enabled by default. I also noticed that my Pixel 7 Pro only had a few weeks of data, but my vivo X200 Pro had my entire Timeline history, ostensibly because I chose the latter as my main Timeline device. So keep that in mind if you’ve got two or more phones and want to enable backups.

We’ve asked Google about this email and the enclosed steps and will update our article as soon as the company responds to us. Nevertheless, this is another disappointing turn of events regarding Google’s Timeline migration process.