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Map posters & route art

Cartograph

Turn a place into a map print, a GPS-art route, a fair meeting point or a true-size map.

Launch Cartograph → Tutorials

Cartograph turns your own OpenStreetMap extract into a print-ready city map poster (SVG, vector PDF, PNG), snaps a heart, star or self-drawn shape to its streets as a GPS-art route with GPX export, finds the fairest meeting point for up to twelve people, and moves countries across a Mercator world map to show their true size. Everything runs in your browser: no map, tile or routing server is contacted, and the OpenStreetMap attribution is on every export.

Free · runs in your browser · no sign-up · Version 1.0.0

Cartograph poster tab with a cream map poster of Vaduz and the style panel

Screenshots

Features

  • City map posters

    Roads by class, paths, railways, rivers, lakes, parks, woods and optional buildings, framed as a rectangle or circle with title, subtitle and coordinates.

  • Six original styles

    Paper, Midnight, Blueprint, Terracotta, Mono and Forest — on A4 to A2, 30 × 40, 50 × 70 cm, US Letter or a 30 × 30 cm square, portrait or landscape.

  • Your own OpenStreetMap data

    Open .osm XML, .osm.pbf or GeoJSON extracts from your own export, Geofabrik or BBBike. Cartograph reads them locally and never downloads map data itself.

  • Print files

    True-size SVG, vector PDF with embedded fonts for Arabic, Cyrillic, Greek and Devanagari titles, and PNG at 150 or 300 dpi.

  • GPS-art routes

    Place a heart, star, circle, square, triangle, arrow or zigzag, and Cartograph snaps it to the streets with its own shortest-path routing.

  • Draw your own shape

    Sketch any outline with the mouse, a pen or a finger, then move, scale and rotate it until the streets fit.

  • GPX for your watch

    Download the route as GPX for running and cycling apps, with its length, how closely it follows the shape and the gaps it had to leave.

  • Meet halfway

    The geodesic midpoint, the fairest point (nobody travels further than needed) and the least total distance for 2–12 people, in any coordinate format.

  • Meeting places by road

    With a map loaded, Cartograph also finds the fairest meeting place along the walkable or rideable roads.

  • True size of countries

    Drag a country across a Mercator world map: its true shape stays, and Cartograph shows how big it really is and how big it looks.

  • Private and offline

    Your extracts, routes and meeting places stay in this browser. Share links leave out your map file and everyone’s places.

  • Projects, undo and share links

    Autosave with recent projects, undo and redo, project files with the map included, share links and optional Google Drive saving.

  • Keyboard and screen readers

    Arrow keys move the poster centre or the shape, plus and minus zoom, number keys switch tabs; every control is labelled, and single-key shortcuts can be switched off.

  • API and MCP tools

    Map poster, route art, meet halfway and true size are also usefulweb tools with a JSON API and MCP, using the same engine as the app.

Templates

Start from a ready-made project and change it to fit.

Built-in tools

Cartograph uses these tools. Each one also has its own page and works on its own, in the browser, through the JSON API and through MCP.

For AI agents

Cartograph runs on a deterministic engine. The same functions are available as tools with a JSON API and MCP, so scripts and AI agents get exactly the results the app shows.

Build a project through the API, then open it in the app with a link to https://cartograph.usefulweb.app/app#project=<base64url JSON>.

Import & export

Import

  • OpenStreetMap XML (.osm)
  • OpenStreetMap PBF (.osm.pbf, zlib)
  • GeoJSON with OSM tags
  • GPX track (poster overlay)
  • Cartograph project (.cartograph.json)
  • Share link (#project=)

Export

  • Poster SVG (true size)
  • Poster PDF (vector)
  • Poster PNG (150 or 300 dpi)
  • Route GPX
  • Route and meeting points as GeoJSON
  • True-size map SVG and moved outline GeoJSON
  • Cartograph project (.cartograph.json)
  • Share link

Keyboard shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts in Cartograph
KeysAction
1 … 4Switch to Poster, Route art, Meet halfway or True size
Arrow keysMove the poster centre, the shape or the moved country (Shift: larger steps)
+ / −Show a smaller or larger area (poster), make the shape larger or smaller (route art)
[ / ]Rotate the shape or the moved country
EnterSnap the shape to the roads (route art)
Ctrl + ZUndo
Ctrl + Shift + ZRedo
Ctrl + SSave project file
Ctrl + OOpen project file
?Show keyboard shortcuts (single-key shortcuts can be switched off there)

Frequently asked questions

Where does the map data come from?

From an OpenStreetMap extract you provide: an .osm file exported from openstreetmap.org (Export → a small area), an .osm.pbf download from Geofabrik or BBBike, or GeoJSON with OSM tags. The built-in Vaduz sample is a small OpenStreetMap excerpt. Cartograph never calls Overpass, a tile server or a routing service.

May I print and sell my posters?

OpenStreetMap data is licensed under the ODbL: you may print, give away and sell posters as long as the attribution “© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL” stays on them — Cartograph prints it on every export. The design choices are yours; the Cartograph styles are original and free to use.

How large an extract can I open?

City and county extracts work well. Cartograph reads up to about 8 million nodes; for a country-size .osm.pbf, cut out your area first (for example with osmium extract) so the browser stays fast.

How does GPS art routing work without a routing service?

Cartograph builds the road graph from your extract, samples the shape into waypoints, snaps each one to the nearest street and joins them with its own A* shortest paths that prefer streets close to the drawing. It reports how much of the shape the route follows within 25 m.

Is the meeting point based on travel time?

No. The midpoint, fairest point and least total distance use straight-line (geodesic) distances. With a map loaded you can add the fairest meeting place along walkable or rideable roads; traffic, public transport and travel times are not modelled.

Why does Greenland look so big on most maps?

Web maps use the Mercator projection, which enlarges areas by sec² of the latitude — four times at 60°. Cartograph moves the true outline and shows both the true area and how big it looks on the Mercator map.

What do share links contain?

Only the settings: poster style and area, route shape and place, the true-size choice and the name of the built-in sample. Your own map file and the meeting group’s places are never put into a link.

Can I use non-Latin titles?

Yes. Titles in Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic and Devanagari scripts are embedded as Noto font subsets in the PDF. Chinese, Japanese and Korean titles appear in the SVG and PNG, but not yet in the PDF.

Limitations

What Cartograph does not do (yet):

  • Cartograph does not search places or download map data: you need an OpenStreetMap extract of your area (only the Vaduz sample is built in).
  • Posters draw roads, paths, railways, water, green areas and buildings, but no street names, labels, contour lines or hill shading; coastlines are drawn as lines, so the sea is not filled.
  • GPS-art routes depend on the streets in the extract; access tags are taken as mapped, and closures, private grounds and safety are not known. Always check a route on site.
  • Meeting points use straight-line distances; the road variant uses distance along roads, not travel time, traffic or public transport.
  • True-size outlines are Natural Earth 1:110m: small countries and islands are missing, and coastlines are generalised.
  • PDF titles in Chinese, Japanese or Korean are not embedded yet (use SVG or PNG for those).
  • Large extracts (hundreds of thousands of features) make the poster preview slower on phones.

Tutorials

Learn Cartograph step by step.

  1. Your first city map posterOpen the Vaduz sample, choose a paper, a colour style and the layers, set the title and download a print-ready PDF poster from Cartograph.Beginner 6 min
  2. Use your own OpenStreetMap dataDownload an OpenStreetMap extract of your town (.osm, .osm.pbf or GeoJSON), open it in Cartograph, keep the right area and add a GPX track to your poster.Beginner 7 min
  3. GPS art routes on real streetsPlace a heart or a star on the map, let Cartograph snap it to walkable or rideable streets with its own routing, read the quality figures and download the route as GPX.Beginner 7 min
  4. Draw your own route shapeSketch any outline on the map with the mouse, a pen or a finger, place and scale it, and let Cartograph turn it into a GPS-art route along the streets.Intermediate 5 min
  5. Meet halfway – a fair point for everyoneEnter two to twelve places in any coordinate format and compare the geodesic midpoint, the fairest point and the least total distance, optionally along the roads of your map.Beginner 6 min
  6. The true size of countriesMove a country across a Mercator world map with its real shape and see how big it really is, how big it looks at home and how it compares with another country.Beginner 5 min
  7. Export, print, share and automatePrint Cartograph posters at true size, save and share projects, hand files to other premium apps, and create posters, routes and comparisons through the JSON API and MCP.Intermediate 6 min

Ready to try it?

Launch Cartograph →

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