FAQ
Designing your map
Do I need an account?
No. Open the editor, make your poster, and add it to your cart. Nothing is required of you before you have something you like.
Can I save a design and come back to it?
Yes. Press Save in the editor and your design is kept in that browser, with a small preview, so you can reopen it later. Saved designs stay on the device you made them on — if you want a design for good, add it to your cart.
Can I put more than one design in the same order?
Yes. Save each one, then tick the ones you want and add them to your cart together.
Which places can I use?
Anywhere in the world. Any city, town, village, street or stretch of coast that exists on the map — and you can move and zoom the map by hand until it frames exactly what you mean.
Or a whole country, state, province or island, with the country map poster: choose it by name and it is drawn as its own silhouette, with its borders, rivers, roads and towns.
Or the whole world, or a single continent, with the world map poster. And a star map is not a place at all but a moment: the night sky over any place you choose, on any date from 1900 to 2050.
What does a star map show?
The sky as it stood over the place you choose, at the date and time you choose: the stars you could see with the naked eye, the constellations and the Milky Way, down to the horizon. It is calculated from a star catalog, not photographed. The moon and the planets are not drawn.
Can I change the text?
All three lines are yours: the title, the line beneath it and the small line under that. Write a date, a name, a message — anything you like, in any language.
Will the printed poster look like what I see on screen?
Yes. The file we print from is drawn by the same code that draws your preview, at 300 dpi rather than screen resolution. What you framed on screen is what is printed.
Ordering and delivery
Where do you ship?
Printed posters — paper, framed and canvas — are made and shipped within the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, from whichever of our labs is closest to you.
Everywhere else, the same design is available as a print-ready digital file you can print locally.
How long does it take?
Everything is made to order. Printing takes a few business days, and shipping depends on where you are — the times for each country are on our Shipping policy page.
When do I get my digital file?
Within 24 hours. Each file is prepared individually from your design rather than pulled off a shelf, which is why it is not instant. It arrives as a link by email, and the link also sits on your order page if you lose the email.
Do I need an account to download my file?
No. The link works on its own, from any device, for 90 days.
Do your prices include VAT?
In the European Union and the United Kingdom, the price you see is the final price: it already includes any VAT that applies in your country. It follows the address you give at checkout, so if you are sending to another country, the checkout shows that country’s price before you pay.
Do you offer discounts?
Two, all year round and for everyone: 15% off when you order three or more maps — any mix of maps, sizes and finishes, including a Set of 3 — and 25% off three or more maps from Black Friday to Cyber Monday. Both are taken off automatically in your cart, so there is no code to look for. One offer applies per order: if more than one could, you get the larger.
Will I pay customs or import charges?
Almost certainly not, and here is why.
Your order is printed in your own country wherever we can — in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada or Australia — so most posters never cross a border at all. A few of the less common sizes are made in our London studio and shipped from there. In Australia, nothing is charged on packages under A$1,000, which is well above anything we sell. And in more than eight years of sending prints to Canada and Australia, we can recall one package ever being held.
We still have to say the formal thing, because it is not ours to promise: any duty or import charge that does arise is the customer’s to pay, and it is set by your own country, not by us. If anything unexpected happens, write to us — we would rather hear about it than have you deal with it alone.
Changes and returns
Can I cancel or change my order?
Printed orders can be canceled within one hour of ordering — after that they are already in production. Digital files cannot be canceled once purchased, because the file is made immediately.
Can I return a poster?
Every poster is made to your design and to your order, so it cannot be resold and we cannot accept returns for a change of mind. This is the customer’s own exception under UK and EU consumer law for personalized goods.
If something arrives damaged, or the print does not match the design you ordered, tell us and we will replace it. The full terms are on our Refund policy page.
My file will not open, or it looks wrong.
Contact us within 7 days and we will send a corrected one.
The maps themselves
Where does the map data come from?
OpenStreetMap — the map the world builds together. The geography is the work of thousands of people who mapped their own streets; the styling is ours.
On the country and world posters, the borders, coastlines and place names come from Natural Earth, geoBoundaries and GeoNames, alongside OpenStreetMap.
On the star maps, the stars come from the Yale Bright Star Catalogue, the constellation figures from the IAU and Sky & Telescope by way of d3-celestial, and the Milky Way is derived from a panorama by ESO/S. Brunier.
A street is missing, or something is in the wrong place.
That will be the underlying data rather than the drawing. Anyone can correct OpenStreetMap, and the correction reaches us when we next update our maps. Write to us and we will tell you what we see.
Can I use my poster commercially?
The posters and files are for personal use. The map data is © OpenStreetMap contributors under the Open Database License, and every source is credited under the map in the editor.
Still stuck?
Contact us and a person will answer.