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Google My Maps Alternatives

The 5 best alternatives for Google My Maps

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By Juhil Mendpara | Updated Sep 4 2022

Google My Maps is limiting in so many ways. For example,

  • You cannot remove surrounding markers from your custom Google map, which makes the map unpleasant to look at, especially when you want to highlight your location.
  • You cannot cluster your markers right from the interface.
  • In fact, for anything besides adding a marker, drawing a line, or adding directions, you’ll need to import code (in the form of GPX or KML file).

These alternatives for Google My Maps take you past those limits:

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1. Atlist

Atlist does everything aesthetically right that Google My Maps doesn’t. For instance:

  • You can add custom colors to your markers. For example, we use #0F4CF4 (blue) for this site; if we were to embed a map, we could use our brand color for the markers to give a streamlined brand look.
  • You can customize modals : When you click on a marker, a window with information about the location appears (example: name, images, link, etc.). That’s a modal window. With Atlist, you can customize the positioning, fonts, and overall look of it.
  • You can group locations : For example, if you have two restaurants in Stratford and three in Toronto, create groups to distinguish by city.
  • You can change map styles : You can customize how many roads, landmarks, labels, and icons show on your map with Atlist.

Besides, Atlist is super easy-to-use for all kinds of users, unlike Google My Maps that demand customers know to code for anything other than basic functionalities.

Try Atlist

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2. Mapme

If Atlist is the Apple of creating custom maps, Mapme is the Samsung.

Mapme has a lot of functionalities: more base map styles, many UI styles, content layout templates, markers clustering, lines and shapes drawing tool, etc. And the resulting maps look way better than Google My Maps maps; not as good as Atlist, though, because Mapme’s modals and map style customizations are limited.

Plus, I found some UI elements of Mapme a bit annoying. For example, when you click “Add location,” it opens a new window, where you can’t see the locations you’ve already added:

Mapeme UI on clicking

Mapeme UI on clicking "Add location."

Try MapMe →

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3. Maptive

Maptive is excellent for mapping tools like the heat map generator, geographic boundary tool, radius map tool, drawing tool, route planner, etc.

As for the looks and feels of it. the Maptive interface is a bit clunky. Also, the maps generated using its default elements (like one of Maptive’s markers) don’t look “modern.”

Maptive markers

Maptive markers

Try Maptive →

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4. Place.Guru

If you want to show a lot of description in your map locations, Place.guru is fantastic. You can add descriptions, tags, contact details, social media links, personas, opening hours, photos & videos, and more on custom map locations created with Place.guru.

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5. MapHub

MapHub is pretty much Google My Maps but with a better interface to create custom maps.The only major functionality differences I found were:

  • You can add text on your map wherever you want
  • MapHub has a polygon tool.
  • It has more base maps (sourced from Thunderforest, Mapbox, ESRI, CartoDB, and OpenTopoMap).

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