For everyone who makes travel videos: there's a new Creator Tool on ENDE.APP. Travel Map Animator turns your route into an animated map. You set a few points, a small 3D vehicle drives the route, the place signs pop up, and the camera flies along. At the end you download an MP4, ready for YouTube, Reels or TikTok.
It all runs in your browser, it's free, and you don't need an account. There's no watermark in the video either. Go straight to Travel Map Animator.
Why another map tool?
Animated maps belong in almost every travel video. They show where you've been and how you got there. But making good maps is tedious. That's exactly what I wanted to change.
Two rules came before everything else while I was building it. First: it has to be simple, with good defaults instead of lots of sliders. Second: the result has to look good, with smooth camera moves, a tilted map and clean signs. Many map animations look flat. This one should feel like a little world your vehicle drives through.
Three steps to your video
- Set the route: Click on the map or search for a place. Each point is a stop with a pause or a waypoint that only shapes the route. You can also load a GPX file from a navigation device, a tracking app or a sports watch.
- Add the details: Choose vehicle, sign, pause and camera for each point. The live view instantly shows you the frame that goes into the video.
- Export: Pick format, resolution and frame rate, and your browser renders the MP4.
More 3D, less flat
This is where most of the work went:
- Eight vehicles in 3D: Car, motorbike, camper van, bicycle, on foot, train, boat and plane. A different one can take over at any point. At the handover, the old one shrinks away and the new one pops up.
- Real driving feel: The vehicles turn in the direction of travel, lean into curves and stay steady even on winding roads. The boat pulls a wake behind it, and flights arc across the map.
- Signs in the landscape: The signs stand on posts in the map, like real things.
- Camera: An overview of the whole route, follow along with north up, or chase the vehicle from behind at an angle. The motion is cinematic, balanced or sporty.
- Start and end: Begin from the globe, with an orbit or by zooming in. At the end, the view pulls back out to the globe. The vehicle pops up or drops from the sky.
27 signs and your photos
Place signs, road signs like roadworks or a station, breaks with coffee, a tent or a picnic basket: there are 27 signs in total. You set size, rotation and lead time for each sign.
Your own photos go on the map too. Either as a photo sign in a circle or a square, or as a gallery at a stop. There, up to ten photos play during the pause, out of the point, as instant photos or in speech bubbles. The photos stay on your computer the whole time.
13 map styles
Five standard maps and eight custom themes: Old atlas, Blueprint, Neon night, Pastel, Desert, Arctic, Golden hour and Forest. With the terrain relief, you see mountains and valleys.
You decide what's on the map. You show or hide place names, roads, borders, water and sights. Names appear in the local language or in one of 16 languages. If you want, you can add a compass and a distance counter to the picture.
Made for long trips
Several routes fit into one project, for example one per travel day. At the end point, one click starts the next scene. Just load your GPX tracks, and the tool picks up the pauses from the GPX times, coffee sign included. You can also save your route back out as GPX.
Exports come in 16:9, 9:16 or 1:1, in Full HD or 4K, at 24 to 60 frames per second. You save projects as a file or in your Google Drive, and Ctrl+Z undoes steps.
Free, even for commercial videos
Travel Map Animator costs nothing, and there's no watermark in the video. You can publish your videos, commercially too. The map data comes from OpenStreetMap, so “© OpenMapTiles © OpenStreetMap” goes in the end credits or the description. With terrain, add “Elevation: Mapzen Terrain Tiles” as well. You copy the text in the tool with one click.
The tool runs on a computer in Chrome, Edge, Brave, Opera and Vivaldi. It doesn't work on phones or tablets.
And the music for your travel video? You'll find it right here on ENDE.APP, royalty-free.
Try it out
Start Travel Map Animator: set the first point and watch your vehicle set off.
Is something missing, or do you have an idea? Write to me through the contact page. The tool keeps growing.