Author:
Stewart Berry
29 January 2025
When it comes to transportation and logistics, optimizing your routes is key. Today's route planning tools have truly changed the game, making travel and work operations smoother than ever. Free route planners with unlimited stops are essential for businesses and individuals looking to optimize travel and delivery logistics. This revised list includes all tools from the original list, reassessing their relevance and ranking for 2025 based on verified updates and suitability for multi-stop route planning.
Looking for a top-notch route optimizer? Look no further than Maptitude! Packed with handy features like distance calculators, radius tools, and other analytics, Maptitude is your go-to solution for slashing both time and costs by reducing the number of miles driven and the amount of fuel consumed.
Maptitude is primarily a paid tool, but its 30-day free trial allows users to access its advanced route optimization features, including unlimited stops, multi-depot routing, and traffic considerations. The 2024 updates introduced variable time window handling and Maptitude Online for cloud-based collaboration, reinforcing its position as the best option for businesses.
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“Using Maptitude to work out the closest members of staff to each store we visit has been incredibly helpful in reducing the travel done by our merchandisers, leading to positive environmental and financial results.”
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The Maptitude route planner and route optimizer are tailor-made for balancing routes, whether you're managing one vehicle or a whole fleet. It considers crucial factors like historical traffic, time windows, and vehicle capacity to ensure optimal efficiency. Plus, it goes beyond the basics, offering advanced options that outshine simpler tools like Google Maps. Here's what sets it apart:
Maptitude considers factors like estimated traffic conditions, delivery windows, and vehicle capacities.
Can be run completely offline, ensuring privacy, connectivity, and minimizing ongoing costs.
Can map an impressive 1000 stops per route.
Can plot/geocode unlimited numbers of addresses with no additional fees.
Multiple optimization options: Optimize routes for factors like distance, time, weight, capacity, fuel costs, and vehicle types.
Multivehicle scheduling: Can simultaneously optimize unlimited numbers of routes with no additional fees.
Can simultaneously optimize multiple origins/depots with multiple vehicle fleets.
User-friendly interface: Has an intuitive Wizard-driven interface with step-by-step instructions.
Provides a 1-month free trial period, with live human and USA-based support.
Optimizes routes for the most efficient trip.
Allows for modification of driving speeds by road type.
Allows for control of schedules, breaks, rests, and costs.
Allows you to compare routes with those calculated in other services such as Google Maps, Bing Maps, and HERE.
Provides comprehensive points-of-interest data such as businesses with logos
Uses commercial grade HERE Maps data.
Provides turn-by-turn direction reports.
Allows choice of map background, including aerial and satellite imagery.
The no-code routing tools can be used immediately and provide the full functionality available for optimizing routes, allowing anyone to perform sophisticated route planning quickly and easily.
The SDK allows you to fully customize how routing is performed when you need integration with your own or other software applications.
Additional features: Maptitude includes a range of features beyond routing, including sales territory management, market analysis, and demographics, enhancing overall efficiency and productivity.
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“We have found Maptitude to be a really useful piece of software. It allows us to quickly and easily represent various data geographically, and the ease of functionality and ability to layer data makes it really user friendly. It has, among other things, helped us develop our sector-leading delivery service and understand areas that require focus from our sales teams.”
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Why It's #1: Professional-grade tools, even during the trial period, make it the most versatile on the list
Google Maps offers intuitive route planning with real-time traffic data and multiple route options. While limited to 10 stops per route, its usability and integration with other Google services make it a go-to tool for basic routing. The 2024 updates introduced sustainable routing and immersive views for improved planning.
Here's a breakdown of the pros and cons of using Google Maps as a route planner:
Google Maps is a versatile route planning tool that offers a variety of benefits for travelers and commuters. However, it is important to be aware of the limitations of the tool and to take steps to mitigate the risks, such as using offline maps and being mindful of your data usage.
Why It's #2: Accessible and easy to use, but limited stop counts keep it from the top spot
HERE WeGo is a free and unlimited route planner app that offers turn-by-turn navigation and the ability to download offline maps. Developed by HERE Technologies, it is designed for use on both iOS and Android devices.
HERE WeGo is a popular alternative to Google Maps and Apple Maps, as it competes with them in terms of accuracy, speed, and user experience. According to a Medium article, HERE WeGo has over 100 million downloads and 4.4 stars on the Google Play Store. The app is also available on iOS, Windows, and Amazon devices, as well as on the web. HERE WeGo is especially useful for travelers, as it covers over 200 countries, and supports multiple languages. The app also allows users to book taxis, car rentals, and bike shares directly from the app, making it a convenient travel companion.
Using HERE WeGo as a route planner or optimizer comes with its own set of advantages and disadvantages:
HERE WeGo excels in providing free multi-stop routing and offline navigation, making it ideal for users without consistent internet access. Its 2024 updates improved offline functionality and public transportation data.
Why It's #3: Offline functionality gives it a unique advantage for travelers and small businesses
OpenStreetMap (OSM) is an open-source platform that supports free multi-stop routing through third-party integrations. Its 2024 updates improved map accuracy and added compatibility with routing-focused applications. OpenStreetMap (OSM) stands out as an open-source project that offers a collaborative world map created and maintained by individuals. It's freely available for use under an open license, empowering users with data capable of handling multiple stops.
As an alternative to proprietary map databases, OpenStreetMap is both affordable and flexible, with a permissive licensing model. Being a community-driven project rather than a commercial endeavor, it provides users with freedom in utilizing and storing street data. The OSM community's growth and continuous data updates provide extensive coverage of the road network especially in urban areas.
Here are some considerations to keep in mind when using OpenStreetMap as a route planner or optimizer:
Why It's #4: A flexible tool for developers and tech-savvy users needing custom routing solutions
Circuit is a provider of route optimization software, offering features tailored to meet the needs of businesses for last mile delivery. Here are the pros and cons to using Circuit as a route planner or optimizer:
Why It's #5: Its ease of use and focus on delivery routes make it highly competitive
RouteXL offers free route planning for up to 20 stops, with a focus on optimizing routes to minimize travel time and distance. It remains one of the most accessible tools for small-scale users.
Why It's #6: Ideal for users with moderate routing needs and no budget for premium tools
Bing Maps provides reliable routing and integrates seamlessly with Microsoft tools. Its 2024 updates included improved geospatial data processing and Azure integration, enhancing its appeal for businesses in the Microsoft ecosystem.
Bing Maps offers the flexibility to add up to 25 destinations or stops to your itinerary, allowing you to plan trips by walking, biking, taking public transportation, or driving. Additionally, you can print and save your routes to your computer, and easily share them with others.
As a route planner and navigation program, Bing Maps provides driving directions, real-time traffic updates, and access to aerial and satellite photography. Although it doesn't have dedicated mobile apps for Android (there isn't a dedicated Bing Maps app, but the Bing search app has similar map search and driving directions functions) or iOS, it offers an SDK for developers to create mapping applications.
While Bing Maps lacks features specifically tailored for commercial users, such as inventory tracking or driver GPS tracking, it does offer waypoint optimization via the SDK. This feature allows you to input up to 25 waypoints and optimizes their order to minimize travel time or distance. This can be particularly beneficial for businesses needing to create optimized routes for multiple addresses.
Here are the pros and cons to using Bing Maps as a route planner or optimizer:
Why It's #7: Best for Microsoft users, but its complexity for casual users keeps it mid-ranked
Route4Me’s free version is limited but allows unlimited stops during its trial period. The 2024 updates added real-time re-routing and better bulk address import features, improving its usability for small businesses. Their route optimization software enables you to plan routes with hundreds or thousands of addresses. Route4Me's routing engine (HyperMatrix™) uses open-source OpenStreetMap data, but also leverages Google Maps to improve the OSM data's accuracy and ability to optimize.
While Route4Me offers numerous benefits, it's essential to consider both its advantages and limitations when using it as a route optimizer:
Why It's #8: A great entry-level tool for businesses exploring route optimization
OptimoRoute provides a free trial for its advanced route planning features, including time window optimization and delivery scheduling. Its focus on scalability makes it an excellent choice for growing businesses.
OptimoRoute is a cloud-based route planning and optimization software offering a range of features. It appears that OptimoRoute refers to stops as “Orders” with different maximums per paid plan, currently being: Lite at 700; Pro at 1000; and Custom in the thousands. Some OptimoRoute pros and cons are listed below:
Why It's #9: Flexible and scalable, ideal for businesses needing advanced delivery planning
The Mapbox Directions API supports routing for cars, riding bicycles, and walking. Requested routes can include as many as 25 stops.
The Mapbox Optimization API allows you to include up to 12 locations (waypoints or stops) in a single route calculation. These locations can represent various destinations or points of interest along the route. Both the start and end points count toward this limit, as well as any intermediate waypoints. Therefore, you can select up to 9 additional points beyond the start and end locations. If you need to optimize a route with more than 12 stops, you must request an increase from Mapbox by reaching out to them. Keep in mind that exceeding the free tier might incur additional costs.
Mapbox’s 2024 updates improved its 3D visualization tools and faster map rendering, making it more appealing for developers creating custom routing applications.
Here are the pros and cons to using Mapbox as a route planner or optimizer:
Why It's #10: Best suited for developers, but not as user-friendly for general routing needs
FarEye focuses on delivery management and provides route optimization during its free trial. Its 2024 updates improved analytics and proof-of-delivery tools, making it suitable for larger delivery operations.
Fareye's route planning tools empower businesses to optimize delivery routes for efficiency, offering real-time updates, proof-of-delivery features, and customizable workflows, but may be costlier for high-volume users. Here is an assessment of the strengths and limitations of FarEye as a route planner or optimizer:
Why It's #11: Best for businesses prioritizing delivery analytics and operational insights
Waze is a popular free navigation app with live traffic updates and driver-contributed alerts. While not designed for complex multi-stop routing, its real-time traffic insights make it a valuable tool for personal navigation.
Why It's #12: Great for individual users needing live traffic updates, but limited for business routing
Carto focuses primarily on geospatial analysis and location intelligence, offering tools for visualizing and analyzing spatial data rather than practical multi-stop route optimization. Its features are tailored more for data-driven decision-making rather than logistics or delivery planning, which made it less relevant for this list.
Carto, a cloud-based platform provides routing based on 3rd party data. The Carto API supports routing services via TomTom, Mapbox, and HERE. These provide turn by turn directions and a choice of mode of transport to see differences in routing for pedestrians, cyclists, or vehicles.
The Carto routing module in their Analytics Toolbox for BigQuery can generate routes based on time or distance for one or several origins and destinations and relies on the OpenStreetMap road network that is publicly available through Carto's Data Observatory (for which a subscription is required).
Here are the pros and cons to using CARTO as a route planner:
Maptive offers basic mapping and routing features but lacks advanced capabilities like time window management, real-time re-routing, or delivery-specific tools. Its simplicity and limited feature set make it less competitive compared to more robust free or trial-based tools.
While Upper provides strong route optimization features, such as handling up to 500 stops and proof of delivery, it is restricted to a 7-day free trial. This limited trial duration doesn’t align well with the criteria for a "free route planner" list, where tools need to offer long-term free use or broader trial accessibility.
Upper allows for 250, 500, and 500+ stops at once based on the paid pricing plan you are on. While Upper offers numerous features, it's essential to weigh both its pros and cons when considering it for routing:
As we step into 2025, free route planners with unlimited stops continue to provide essential tools for businesses and individuals seeking to optimize logistics and travel. This year’s advancements emphasize greater accessibility, sustainability, and user-focused features, from the professional-grade capabilities of Maptitude to Circuit’s delivery-specific tools and Google Maps’ real-time navigation. Each platform on this list caters to unique needs, ensuring users can find the right solution—whether for personal use, small businesses, or large-scale delivery operations. With ongoing innovations, these tools make efficient route planning more accessible than ever, empowering users to save time, reduce costs, and improve overall productivity.
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“Maptitude is helping our organization plan our field service territories and control our travel and response time.”
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Maptitude stands out for its balance of user-friendliness, powerful features, and data-driven insights. Whether you're a business development professional seeking informed decisions, a logistics analyst uncovering improved efficiencies, or a salesperson planning the best route to visit clients, Maptitude is your best bet for professional route optimization.
Ready to experience the power of route planning? Dive into Maptitude and discover improved efficiencies with time and cost savings.
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