Changelog
Featured maps on your dashboard
Your dashboard now shows a few featured maps from around squidmaps, for ideas of what to make. Each visit shows a different handful.
Maps now show in Claude
Maps made with the squidmaps MCP server now appear in Claude conversations, as a picture of the map. Before, Claude left an empty space where the map should be. Choose the picture, or Open in squidmaps, to explore the map and add it to your account.
Keep working on a map with your AI assistant
When an AI assistant makes you a map, you can now ask it for changes. It changes the same map at the same link, and if you have the link open, you see the change. You can also add the squidmaps MCP server to Claude, ChatGPT and other assistants, and see the map right in the conversation.
A new page for broken links
Links that lead nowhere now wash up on Null Island, at 0°, 0°, with a way back home. Its buoy bobs offshore, and the squid swims after your pointer. Click the sea to search for the missing page yourself.
A tour of the editor, waiting in your account
New accounts now start with a map called Hello, World!: a tour of the editor drawn on the map itself, with examples of points, lines, areas and text. Click anything on it to see how it’s made, then change it or delete it. More in Get started.
Updated terms and privacy policy
squidmaps is now run by SQUIDMAPS, LLC. We’ve updated the terms and privacy policy to match, and to explain how copyright complaints, content removal and future changes to the terms work.
Report a map
Published maps have a “Report this map” link at the bottom of their panel. If a map shows private information, harasses someone or infringes your copyright, use it to email us the map’s link and what’s wrong.
Plans we're considering, and new beta limits
squidmaps is still free during the beta. You can now have up to 15 maps (up from 5). Each map can have up to 500 features and 1 MB of data, and you get 50 MB of images across all your maps. Maps already over these limits keep everything they have, but can’t grow.
The pricing page shows the plans we’re considering after the beta. Press “I’d use this” on any feature that’s coming later to tell us what to build first, and tell us what you’d pay for at the bottom of the page.
Cleaner outlines on selected lines
A selected line with sharp turns now gets one smooth outline around the whole line, instead of a separate outline around each segment.
Better for keyboards and screen readers
The editor and published maps now show where keyboard focus is. In the editor’s feature list, the arrow keys move between features, Alt+↑ and Alt+↓ reorder them, and F2 renames a folder. On published maps, a feature’s card or panel takes focus when it opens, and visitors can list a map’s features from the keyboard even when its feature list is off. Dialogs are announced by name, and some low-contrast gray text is darker.
Single-key shortcuts (1–8, / and ?) can be turned off in Keyboard shortcuts, in the map’s menu, for people who use speech input.
Gray out the map around an area
Select an area and choose Add inverse mask to cover everything outside it, so the place you’re mapping stands out. The mask is an area like any other, so you can restyle it. See Drawing features.
Alt text for images
Give a feature’s images alt text, a short description of what each one shows. Visitors to your published map who use a screen reader hear it in place of the image. Click an image in the feature’s Images section to write it; it reaches your published map the next time you publish. See Tooltips and popups.
A feature list and search for published maps
Published maps can now list their features by folder, with a checkbox to hide each folder, and offer a search box. Visitors click a feature to go to it on the map. Both are off until you turn them on under Map panel, in the right panel or in Preview. See Map settings.
Buffers are new features
Buffer now adds the buffer as a new feature, named for its size and the original (“1 km buffer of Harbor”) and listed below it, instead of reshaping the original. To reshape it as before, check Replace the original. Buffering also works again after getting stuck on a spinner.
Drag the map from anywhere
You can now drag the map starting over an area or a line, not just over empty map. Before, pressing on a shape kept the map from moving.
Join us on Discord
squidmaps now has a Discord, where you can ask questions and talk maps with the developer and other beta testers. Find the invite in the Beta feedback popup and on your dashboard.
Pick a style before you draw
When you pick the point, line or area tool, the right panel now shows the style of what you’re about to draw, so you can choose a marker or an emoji before placing it, or copy one from a feature on the map with the eyedropper. New features also start with the style you used last: after you make one point a 🍕, the next point you add is a 🍕 too. See Styling data.
Clearer about what's public when you join
When you join, the welcome page now says plainly that your username and name are public, shown on your profile and on the maps you publish. Your name starts out filled in for you, so change it there to whatever you’d like people to see, or later in your profile.
Circles and rectangles keep their shape
Circles and rectangles are now their own kinds of shape. Drag a rectangle’s corners or sides to resize it, or the handle above it to turn it, and drag the handles on a circle’s edge to change its size. They stay a rectangle and a circle. You can type a circle’s radius in any unit (“1.5 km”), fine-tune it with a slider, and line up its center with the crosshair. To move corners one at a time, choose Convert to area. See Drawing.
Edit your maps on your phone
The editor now works on phones. The map sits on top, with search above it and the drawing tools along its bottom. Below it, your map’s features and its settings are in tabs, and tapping a feature opens its style. Tap to add points, and tap out lines and areas, then press Done. Before, phones showed the desktop editor, shrunk to fit.
The home page’s Sign in link now shows on phones too.
A crosshair for drawing
While you’re drawing a point, line, area, rectangle, circle or route, the pointer over the map is now a crosshair, so you can see exactly where it will go. Adding text shows a text cursor.
Clickable things look clickable
Buttons, menus, toggles and your profile picture now show a pointer when you hover them, across the site and the editor. On the map, the pointer shows over features you can click: in the editor, ones you can select, and on published maps, ones that open a card or panel. Dragging a feature in the editor shows the move cursor.
Hello, World!
The squidmaps private beta starts today. Thanks for being one of the first to try it! Draw, import and style your data, then publish your map at its own link. New to squidmaps? Start with Get started.
Updates will show up here as new features land and bugs get fixed.