A printable map maker for handouts, reports and guidebooks

Set the page size before you design

Choose A2, A3, A4, A5, A6 or US Letter, switch between portrait and landscape, or type a custom width and height in millimetres. The editor draws a print frame at that size, so you compose against the real page instead of a browser window.

For a map that goes inside a document, size the page to the space it will fill. A4 with 25 mm margins leaves a 160 mm text column, and US Letter with one-inch margins leaves 165 mm. A 160 × 110 mm custom page drops into either without scaling. The map print size guide lists the pixel dimensions for every common size.

• A2–A6 presets
• US Letter
• Portrait or landscape
• Custom millimetres

Make the map readable on paper

Print Map Studio has 12 styles, from Paper and Porcelain to Graphite, Night Ink, Blueprint and Alpine. Each sets the colours for land, water, roads, parks, buildings, boundaries, transit and labels, and the palette editor lets you shift tone, contrast and detail or replace any of them.

Labels come in local names plus 6 languages: English, German, French, Italian, Spanish and Chinese. Text scales from 50% to 200%. Street names that look fine on screen often print too small on an A5 page, so a text scale of 120–130% is a sensible start for handouts.

If the document will be photocopied in black and white, pick Graphite or Porcelain and give each route a dashed or solid line, so they stay distinct without colour.

• 12 map styles
• Local names plus 6 languages
• 50–200% text scale
• 7 detail toggles

Add routes, places and boundaries

Draw routes as straight lines, arcs or road-following directions, drop single places, or paste up to 300 rows of coordinates into the place spreadsheet. Shade countries and first-level regions from the boundary catalogue, draw your own shapes, or add travel-time areas for 5 to 60 minutes by car, bike or on foot.

Recorded tracks come in through the GPX map maker as editable layers. Every route, place and shape can be styled, reordered, hidden or duplicated, and places can use your own PNG, JPEG or SVG marker, such as a company logo.

• Routes and waypoints
• Places and markers
• Countries and regions
• GPX, KML, GeoJSON

Add a scale bar, grid and compass

Reference maps need the small cartographic details that posters leave out. Add a metric or imperial scale bar from 10 to 100 mm wide, a coordinate grid at any interval from 0.01° to 90° with labelled lines, and a north compass as an arrow or a rose. Each sits in the corner you choose and is sized in millimetres, so it prints exactly as large as you set it.

Pick a round grid interval that suits the area: 0.01° on a town plan, 0.1° on a regional map. For a printed map people will use to find a venue, a location QR code that opens Google Maps does more than a grid.

• Metric or imperial scale
• Labelled coordinate grid
• Arrow or rose compass
• Location QR code

Place the map in Word, InDesign or a print shop file

PDF keeps the exact page size, with routes, places, shapes, the grid and the scale bar as vectors over a 300 DPI basemap. It places cleanly in InDesign, Affinity Publisher and Illustrator, and most print shops accept it as it is.

PNG is a 300 DPI image with its DPI written into the file, so Word and InDesign place a 160 mm map at 160 mm. Layered SVG and layered PSD keep each layer separate for a designer to finish. The layered export page compares all four formats.

Every export carries a small credit for OpenStreetMap, OpenMapTiles and OpenFreeMap in the bottom margin, or in a slim strip under the map when the margins are zero. Files are made in your browser and download straight away, with no watermark.

• Flat image
• Exact page
• Vector groups
• Smart Objects