The Genius Way To Check When It's The Best Time To Visit The Grocery Store

Few things are worse when you're trying to shop for groceries than aisles packed with people and extremely long checkout lines. Not only do crowds make it difficult when you just want to grab a few things and get out, but they can also make it hard to find parking and are more likely to leave aisles picked over. Although some weekdays are worse than others for grocery shopping, there is a trick you can use to get around crowds no matter what day it is. 

To determine the best times to shop at your local grocery store, look no further than the world's most popular search engine, Google. Yep, Google implemented a handy tool in 2015 that displays how busy a location is at any given time of the day. To access it, you only need to type in the name of the store you want to visit on your phone or computer and scroll down until you see a bar chart that says "popular times." This chart will list all the store's hours along with how busy it usually is and how busy it is currently using live data. This feature can also be accessed using the Google Maps app. On the app, once you type in the location's name, simply scroll down past the basic info and reviews to find the time chart. 

Using this chart can help you see when your local store is busiest and what it's currently like so you can better plan your shopping trip. While some times are always going to be the worst, especially when it comes to buying fresh produce, Google's popular times chart will give you much more insight into when the best times are to shop without having to fight the crowds. 

Although Google's popular Times chart is extremely useful for planning your shopping trips, its accuracy begs the question of how it all works. Well, it all comes down to location tracking and information storage, which many people might find nefarious but, in this instance, is rather harmless. 

According to Google, a location's popular times are determined using data collected from users who have opted into Google Location History, a setting that is turned off by default. When turned on, this service collects data using a person's mobile phone to track where they are and how long they stay in a location. When enough people have visited a business with Location History turned on, Google creates a chart of it and uses live data to determine how busy a place is in real-time. Now, being tracked by a massive corporation like Google might sound a bit dystopian, but it really does come in handy for avoiding massive crowds at your favorite grocery stores, which is something most aren't complaining about.