New My Maps features make it easier to share maps, update datasets, and more
By Patrik Blohmé, Product Manager, Google Earth and Google My Maps
When Google launched My Maps in 2007 to help people create and work with maps online, we were excited to see that people discovered how easy it is to make maps for just about anything. Since then, we have seen impactful maps like wildfire resources to COVID-19 neighborhood support services. Recently we’ve also seen My Maps created to help support Ukraine citizens in need.
Over time, we’ve also heard from our community of My Maps users about the features they’d most like to see added to the product to improve their map making, and have have been hard at work for the past year bringing some of the most requested features to life. Keep reading to learn more about the latest updates to My Maps.
Better spreadsheet integration with “Reimport and Merge”
Many great My Maps start with a spreadsheet. While people have been able to import data from Google Sheets and CSV (comma-separated values) files to My Maps to visualize datasets, any changes to the data in the original spreadsheet would not be reflected on the My Map. That meant you would have to build a new map every time the original spreadsheet changed. That added a lot of time to the map-making process, and slowed down publishing.
With the addition of reimport and merge options to My Maps, this workflow has been improved. Now you can easily append, remove, match, and replace items in map layers from a spreadsheet, and retain the categorical styling of the map layer, or match existing items to preserve individual styles and added media.
We’re excited to roll out this capability, which will help anyone who’s using Google Sheets while creating maps, or working with continuously updating data, e.g. from forms.
Improved interoperability
It’s always been possible to import different geospatial formats — such as data from KML, CSV, and GPX files, as well as Google Sheets to create rich and customizable My Maps. To improve My Maps interoperability with other geospatial tools, we’ve also recently launched support for WKT (Well-known text) for vector geometry objects, as well as the ability to export your data as CSV, e.g. for use in other tools to easily generate charts and graphs.
- View in Google Earth: My Maps users can now view their maps in Google Earth to see additional rich context from Earth’s 3D and satellite imagery. This is helpful for illustrating elevation and 3D features within the mapping area, to add more context to the map — for instance, seeing how an area is sloped around a wildfire map, or how tall the neighborhood is around the map area.
- WKT Import: WKT stands for “Well Known Text,” which is a text syntax that represents geometries such as points, lines, and polygons. WKT is not a file format per se, but is the format in which a geometry can be represented inside of a CSV column.
- CSV Export: We recently launched CSV export, which enables you to take your My Maps data into other software platforms or sheets to easily generate charts and graphs. Click on the overflow menu next to any layer and select export data to download a CSV file.
Sharing your maps with others
At the height of the pandemic, My Maps users around the world created maps to share information about support services in London, free meals and food banks in Glasgow, and even the locations of rainbow window pictures across New York. The maps brought communities closer, while sharing information out beyond communities to help people stay safe.
We’ve added features that improve map-sharing for users:
- Timestamps: Every My Maps map now has a timestamp to help understand how recently the map was updated. This can be particularly important during a dynamically unfolding situation, such as communicating during a crisis.
- Personalized embed headers: Map creators can now personalize their My Map embeds on their website to better match their brands and identities. To take advantage of this, grab the embed code for your My Maps and experiment with changing the hex value in the embed code to add colors and website URLs.
We hope you enjoy these new features and make use of them in your map-making. Please keep giving us feedback on the features you need to create impactful and shareable maps.
