Topographic map guide

How to Prepare a Topographic Map for Outdoor Use

A useful outdoor map should show more than a destination. It should give enough surrounding terrain, route alternatives and coordinate references to help you understand where you are and how the landscape fits together.

1. Include the surrounding area

Do not place your destination at the edge of the sheet. Leave room for nearby ridges, valleys, roads, settlements and alternative routes. For long routes, several overlapping sheets can preserve detail better than one very small-scale map.

2. Choose scale for the task

Larger-scale maps show a smaller area with more room for detail. Smaller-scale maps cover more ground on the same sheet. For close route work, 1:10,000 or 1:25,000 may be useful; for wider context, 1:50,000 may provide better coverage.

See How to Choose a Map Scale for a fuller comparison.

3. Choose A4 or A3

At the same scale, A3 shows more ground than A4. A4 is more portable and easier to print on common home or office printers.

4. Match orientation to the route

A long east–west route often fits landscape better, while a north–south route may make better use of portrait orientation. Choose the orientation that gives the route useful surrounding context.

5. Add the coordinate grid you need

TopograpMaps can show a UTM grid, a latitude–longitude graticule, both together or no grid. UTM is convenient for metre-based grid work; latitude–longitude is useful for geographic coordinates.

See Latitude–Longitude vs UTM Grid for the differences.

6. Add terrain details when useful

The Terrain details option can display mapped springs, drinking-water points, shelters, settlements, caves, bridges and similar OpenStreetMap features. These records are not a complete field inventory. A feature missing from the map does not prove it is absent on the ground.

7. Name and number your sheets

If you prepare several outputs, use clear names such as “Snowdonia – Sheet 01” and “Snowdonia – Sheet 02”. This makes printed maps and saved PDFs easier to organise.

8. Read true north separately from the grid

The red arrow on TopograpMaps output shows True north. UTM lines belong to a projected grid. True north and grid north do not have to point in exactly the same direction.

9. Preserve print scale

Use the site's Print / Save PDF button, match paper size and orientation, and print at 100% or Actual size. Avoid fit-to-page scaling.

10. Verify the 100 mm calibration line

Measure the printed calibration line with a ruler. If it is not 100 mm, the print has been rescaled and ruler-based map distances are no longer reliable.

11. Protect the paper in the field

Paper can be damaged by water, repeated folding and abrasion. A transparent weather-resistant map case or other suitable protection can help keep the map readable while still allowing compass work on a flat surface.