How to get FREE maps for your Garmin GPS

Commercial maps are expensive and can get out of date real fast. And who wants to spring for a whole country map if they're just going on holiday for a week? This Instructable shows how to get pre-compiled FREE maps from OpenStreetMap onto your Garmin GPS.

OpenStreetMap is a global wiki map (think "Wikipedia for maps"). The wiki nerds have produced Garmin-compatible extracts that are available for free. Here's how to enjoy fresh free wiki maps on your GPS.

You will need:

• An expandable Garmin GPS (one with 'x' in its name or a fancy-pants new model like the ForeRunners or Colorado).
• A micro-SD memory card.
• Either a USB connector and Garmin driver software, or a card reader.

Step 1 Get Maps!

There are lots of places where you can download free, regularly-updated Garmin maps made from OpenStreetMap data. Here are three:

Map company Cloudmade do the whole world. Go to http://downloads.cloudmade.com/ and browse for the region you're interested in. Let's say we're flying to Barbados on holiday: http://downloads.cloudmade.com/north_america/barbados - download the IMG file and unzip it.

The OpenStreetMap project has their own download page here: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM_Map_On_Garmin. There are lots to choose from including different regions, levels of detail, and styling. Fill your boots, it's all free.

My own Garmin map, which is a routable UK & Eire with extra contour lines (thanks NASA!) updated weekly, is here: http://ravenfamily.org/andyg/maps.

When you've downloaded your map, you should have one file with a .IMG extension.

Comments

[The Insomniac]

 Awesome! I use a Garmin 60csx all the time, but I hate the price Garmin charges for map. But.....
How do you load more than one map at a time? Do I merge the foiles or something? I want to put New Mexico and Colorado topo maps on my GPS. Thanks in advance!

[andygates]

If you install the maps in Mapsource on your computer, you can send over the bits you want.  Or you could just use two cards, but that's a fuss. 

[The Insomniac]

 Finally got them all on my GPS, but I have to say I never figured out how to properly do it with the Cloudmade ones. For some reason, the files I downloaded from Cloudmade weren't showing up on mapsource.
I ended up using the site www.gpsfiledepot.com
They have very detailed maps that have their own executables also. I used BaseCamp to put them over.

[ItsTheHobbs]

Awesome! I think mine should be compatible. Those maps are expensive! Like, $70 is what I saw.

[andygates]

Yup, heinous and often out of date.  Have fun :)

[wbaumgardner]

Do you happen to know if there are similar web sites where topo maps can be downloaded for use on an eTrex???
Thanx in advance....

[andygates]

The topo data is available (yay NASA! - it's Shuttle mission stuff) and can be built into maps.  I've done that for my UK & Ireland one. 

Get hold of the Groundtruth app from the Openstreetmap community to build your own: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/GroundTruth