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- Special Interest
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- ActivitiesHobby
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- United States
- Date change rule:
- Every April 5
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- 🗺️
Read a Road Map Day calls on adventurers every April 5 to ditch the GPS and embrace the tactile joy of paper navigation. Unfold a physical map, trace a route with your finger, and plan an exciting journey. Challenge yourself to navigate a new area, explore local landmarks, or simply appreciate the intricate details of cartography.
Want to sponsor Read a Road Map Day? Learn how
Expected Read a Road Map Day Deals
While specific 2027 promotions are still on the horizon, history suggests a surge in deals for travel enthusiasts. Look for discounts from retailers like REI and Cabela’s on physical maps, atlases, and outdoor gear. Online map stores such as Omnimap and National Geographic Maps may offer special bundles. Travel agencies like AAA Travel often promote road trip packages, and book retailers like Barnes & Noble could feature travel guides. Even gas stations like Shell or ExxonMobil might run loyalty promotions for long-distance drivers. We will update this page with confirmed live deals as April 5 approaches.
Platform Guide for Read a Road Map Day
Tag @nationaltoday_ and use #ReadARoadMapDay. Share photos of your favorite vintage maps, road trip adventures, or unique map collections.
TikTok
Tag @www.nationaltoday.com and use #ReadARoadMapDay. Film a quick tutorial on how to read a compass or demonstrate an old-school map folding technique.
X/Twitter
Mention @NatlToday and use #ReadARoadMapDay. Ask followers to share their most memorable road trip stories or tips for navigating without GPS.
Read a Road Map Day Hero
Gerardus Mercator
History of Read a Road Map Day
Paper road maps have become somewhat obsolete in today’s day and age, but this is exactly why Read a Road Map Day aims to raise awareness. There’s much history attached to road maps, from the times of Ancient Egypt to modern Europe.
The history of road maps starts in 1160 B.C. in Egypt. The earliest recorded instance of the road map showcased dry river beds in a mining region of Thebes. Years down the line, in 350 A.D., the Roman road network called Tabula Peutingeriana was created. It showed roads and trails running from North Africa and Europe to West Asia. The highly detailed road map also depicted the Mediterranean Sea and the Italian Peninsula. In more modern times, Rand McNally’s “New Automobile Road Map of New York City & Vicinity” was published in 1904. As the name suggests, it outlines New York City’s road structure and such.
At its basic, a road map includes travel routes and links that lead and connect to all major and minor points of a place. These types of maps also showcase political boundaries and any restrictions. Apart from these, road maps also aid in finding the nearest pit stops, gas stations, and other transport options. Famous landmarks, tourist sites, hotels, inns, etc. are also included. The types of content you’ll find on a road map depend on the type of road map you have on hand. For example, single-page and smaller road maps will outline all the major and minor routes. On the other hand, larger and foldable maps display more details.
Today, paper road maps may have become a thing of the past, but they still offer much-needed guidance, especially when technological devices are of no use, either due to network issues or battery problems. Paper road maps also allow us to peek into yesteryear’s experiences, allowing us to indulge in nostalgia. While it is unclear who created Read a Road Map Day and/or when it was first celebrated, the day creates awareness about human beings’ amazing feats and advancements.
Read a Road Map Day timeline
Ancient Egypt’s Turin Papyrus Map is the first-recorded road map in the history of humankind.
A Roman soldier draws a road map of Europe that displays towns on the northern side of the Black Sea.
Erhard Etzlaub makes the first Roman road map to help religious pilgrims reach Rome to celebrate the Holy Year 1500.
The American Automobile Association manufactures its first road map, which shows roads on Staten Island.
How Businesses Can Celebrate Read a Road Map Day
Local businesses can celebrate Read a Road Map Day by encouraging patrons to explore their area. Bookstores could host a ‘Map Your Local Adventure’ event with local history maps. Outdoor gear shops could offer discounts on physical maps, compasses, or guidebooks. Even coffee shops could create a ‘Road Trip Fuel’ special, providing free local maps with purchases and encouraging customers to discover nearby attractions.
Read a Road Map Day FAQs
When is Read a Road Map Day?
Read a Road Map Day 2027 is observed on Monday, April 5, encouraging a mindful start to the work week by planning new routes or revisiting classic cartography. Consider it a prompt to embrace a different kind of journey.
How many people still use paper maps?
Despite the prevalence of GPS, the appeal of paper maps persists, with a significant segment of the population, particularly outdoor enthusiasts and those seeking digital detox, continuing to rely on them. Their use often spikes during road trips and wilderness adventures.
What are the benefits of reading a road map?
Beyond simple navigation, engaging with a physical road map offers cognitive benefits, improving memory and planning skills. It fosters a deeper connection to the landscape and encourages a more deliberate, less distracted approach to travel and exploration.
What is the difference between a road map and a topographic map?
While both are types of maps, a road map is designed for drivers to get from one place to another, highlighting transportation networks. A topographic map provides a three-dimensional representation of the earth’s surface, indicating hills, valleys, and water bodies, which is crucial for activities like mountaineering or land management.
How To Celebrate/Observe Read a Road Map Day
Get a road map for your trip
We always use a GPS to get around. After all, it’s easier to look up a direct route with all your customized preferences and with a GPS voice guiding your steering wheel. But dive into nostalgia by getting to your destination using only a paper road map with your friends. It will be a lot of fun, and you’ll come to appreciate today’s technologies even more.
Plan a long road trip
You may have your everyday routes imprinted into your brain so getting a road map for these may not be necessary. Plan a road trip with your friends or loved ones to another city or another country. Get paper road maps of the place to discover the wonder that a road map is!
Learn about the history of road maps
There are several different types of road maps out there, some very specific ones and others more general in their content. However, each still holds important parts of history and purpose. Learn and research about the road map’s past. You will not only be increasing your knowledge, but you will also come to admire the hard work and dedication of cartographers.
5 Facts About GPS That Will Blow Your Mind
GPS used to be called Navstar
The first satellite launched for the GPS tracking system was called Navstar, which also happens to be the name that GPS was initially referred to.
GPS’ introduction after tragedy
The Soviet Union introduced free GPS services to its public after it accidentally shot down a Korean Airlines plane when it entered the country’s airspace.
People use phone GPS more
Even if their cars already have GPS installed into them, the majority of people will use the GPS installed in their phones.
GPS for helping Alzheimer’s patients
The benefits of GPS have become so popular that now it is also being installed into shoes made for patients with Alzheimer’s disease in order to track them if they wander off.
GPS for time location
GPS not only helps with planning routes and such, but it also helps in predicting the exact time, more or less, of when a destination will be reached.
Why We Love Read a Road Map Day
It’s a celebration of advanced technologies
Today, our devices, despite being extremely compact, hold so many essential things. Starting from alarm clocks to cameras to calculators to calendars and, now, to detailed GPS maps of almost every place in the world. Previously, paper road maps could offer only so much no matter how detailed they would be. But now no place on Earth is too unfamiliar, thanks to GPS.
It’s a celebration of old craftsmanship
To even fathom remembering all important details about a place and jotting them down is an extremely difficult task. Cartographers did all this and much more without the help of any kind of machinery or technology to help them in their tasks. Not to mention all the dangers (in terms of food/water scarcity, climates, unknown people, etc.) they would have faced months on end as they charted a place.
It’s a celebration of joyous trips
We have come to appreciate and crave the wondrous feeling of being able to go on trips. Paper road maps, with all their squiggly and straight lines, instill a sense of wanderlust into the onlooker’s mind by inviting them on adventures.
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