I would like to request an improvement regarding the Distance column availability and its data requirements.
Currently, to use the Distance column, developers are strictly required to use a specialized Location column type, which is unfortunately locked behind the Business Plan.
Even if we already have the exact Latitude and Longitude numerical coordinates stored in our tables, Glide doesn’t allow us to run a basic point-to-point distance calculation on the Maker Plan
Calculating the distance between two mathematical coordinates (or between the user’s current device location and a row’s coordinates) is a very fundamental math operation. It doesn’t require heavy cloud-based address geocoding.
Glide should easily be able to calculate this directly on the client-side/device using the user’s GPS and the raw coordinates already present in the table, without forcing a premium Location column type. Locking such a basic user-experience tool behind a high-tier plan severely limits directory and travel-based MVPs.
Thanks for the feedback! You are right, the Distance column is indeed available. However, I’ve been having trouble getting the User's Current Location to trigger and fetch coordinates properly in my app. Interestingly, when I asked Glide AI about this, it specifically suggested the method I posted earlier. It seems Glide AI gave me incorrect or outdated information. I will look into my location actions/permissions and try again. Thank you for pointing this out!
Thank you so much for the support! I finally figured it out.
My mistake was that I kept searching for ‘Get Current Location’ inside the data columns and button actions. I completely missed that it has been redesigned as a dedicated Location Component inside the screen layout options.
Once I added the component and mapped it to my Users table, it started working beautifully on my Maker Plan. Thanks again to this amazing community for pointing me in the right direction!