Yandex Maps adds AI search across menus and services, with recommendations right on the map

Yandex has added a new AI feature to Yandex Maps that helps choose places not only by address or rating, but also by specific query. Now the service can suggest where nearby there really is the dish you need, cosmetic procedure, or medical service, and then immediately show suitable points on the map.

How the selection works

The new scenario is built into the AI chat of Yandex Maps. The user can write something like: "Recommend a restaurant with risotto on Pavelskaya" — and the system will start searching not by one field in the establishment's card, but immediately by multiple sources. It analyzes the place description, visitor reviews, the "Menu" section, and even photographs, if they can clarify what exactly the organization offers.

Because of this, the answer is not general, but tied to the real content of the card. If a match is found immediately in the menu and in reviews, AI shows a more confident answer: with price, rating, and brief explanation of why this place ended up in the search results. That is, the service tries not just to rank restaurants, but to argue the recommendation.

This is an important shift for a mapping application: it begins to behave not like a catalog of points, but like an assistant that can parse a query in natural language and cross-reference it with details inside the database.

"Although risotto is not listed in the menu, users often note it in reviews".

This formulation shows another feature of the function: the model distinguishes between confirmed and indirect signals. If the needed item is not listed officially, but regularly appears in user reviews, the service does not hide this difference, but explicitly marks it in the answer. For the user, this is more useful than simply getting a list of establishments without context and having to manually check each card.

Where the function will be useful

The scenario is not limited to restaurants. Yandex immediately shows that AI search is designed for service categories where people care not about an abstract "good organization", but about the presence of a specific service. This makes the function practical for everyday tasks, when you need to quickly filter out dozens of similar cards and not waste time on calls or visiting websites.

• Restaurant search by specific dish or menu item
• Choosing a salon by individual procedure, such as hardware manicure
• Searching for hair salons by specific service like bangs trimming
• Finding a clinic by tests, ultrasound and other medical services
• Comparing options taking into account location on the map and route

After the answer, AI shows on the map only those organizations that match the query. This is an important detail: the user not only reads a text recommendation, but immediately sees where relevant places are located — on the way home, near work, or in the right neighborhood. In effect, "Maps" combine conversational search, catalog filtering, and geographic context in one step.

Why this for Yandex

For Yandex, this is a logical development of local search. Regular filters on maps work well when the query is formalized: open now, has parking, rating above 4.5.

But when a person is looking for something more vivid and concrete — for example, "a place with good risotto" or "a salon that does lymphatic drainage massage" — classic filters quickly hit the limits of data structure. An AI layer allows you to use not only formal attributes, but also unstructured content. The service already has the scale for such experiments.

According to the company, the web version and mobile app of Yandex Maps are used monthly by 95 million people. If the new feature takes hold in real usage, it could noticeably change audience behavior: less manual browsing of cards, fewer tab switching, and more queries right away in the format of a regular phrase. For businesses inside maps, this is also a signal — menus, service lists, reviews, and photographs become even more important, because they are exactly what begins to directly influence AI recommendations.

What this means

Yandex Maps takes another step from a navigation service to a personal local assistant. If the function works stably, users will start looking for places not by dry filters, but by ordinary language — and those companies will win that have better filled cards and more clearly described services.