Lake Ontario is now listed as “Lake America” on Google Maps in the United States. Google updated the name of the easternmost Great Lake late Saturday, just days after President Donald Trump ordered the change in official U.S. government databases.
President Trump signed the executive order Thursday amid an ongoing tariff dispute with Canada, whose most populous province is Ontario. The move follows a similar order issued in January 2025 to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America during a broader dispute with U.S. trading partners in the region.
Google, Apple, Microsoft and other mapping companies adopted the name “Gulf of America” after the U.S. Department of the Interior updated its official records several weeks after Trump’s order. As a result, it was not surprising when the official records were updated to reflect the new name for the lake. Google’s digital maps soon followed.
Apple Maps and Bing Maps had not yet reflected the change as of Sunday morning, although they may update their maps later. The federal government’s Geographic Names Information System database still displayed “Lake Ontario,” with a notice stating that the map was being updated to reflect the name change.
Google and other private mapping providers are not legally required to use official geographic names, but they typically rely on government databases such as GNIS. The name displayed on a map may also depend on the user’s location.
“People using Maps in the United States will see ‘Lake America,’ people in Canada will continue to see ‘Lake Ontario,’ and people outside the United States and Canada will see both names,” Google said in an statement. “These updates follow our long-standing policy for waters with different names in different countries and are starting to roll out now.”
President Trump’s efforts to rename geographic landmarks have sparked debate among open-source mapping communities, including OpenStreetMap. The platform’s mapping data is used by companies such as Uber and Lyft. OpenStreetMap recognizes both U.S. and international names, allowing organizations to choose which name to display.
MapQuest, another major mapping provider, said in a social media post responding to Trump’s order: “We will not make any changes.”
Source: www.wired.com