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MapQuest

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MapQuest
Screenshot
Screenshot of MapQuest in use
Website type
Web mapping
Available inMultilingual
ParentAOL (2000–2015)
Verizon Media (2016–2019)
System1 (2019–present)
Websitemapquest.com
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedFebruary 6, 1996; 30 years ago (1996-02-06)
Current statusActive

MapQuest (formerly stylized as mapquest) is an American free online web mapping service. It was launched in 1996 as the first commercial web mapping service.[1] MapQuest's competitors include Apple Maps, Google Maps and Here.[2][3]

History

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Former logo, phased out as part of website redesign on July 14, 2010
Logo used in 2017

Founding (1967)

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MapQuest's origins date to 1967 with the founding of Cartographic Services, a division of R.R. Donnelley & Sons in Chicago, which moved to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in 1969. In the mid-1980s, Donnelley & Sons began generating maps and routes for customers with the help of Barry Glick at University at Buffalo, who had a PhD degree in geography.[4] In 1994, it was spun off as GeoSystems Global Corporation. Much of the code was adapted for use on the internet to create the MapQuest web service in 1996. MapQuest's original services were mapping (referred to as "Interactive Atlas") and driving directions (called "TripQuest").[5]

The initial Denver team consisted of Evans, Simon Greenman, Chris Fanjoy, and Harry Grout. To make MapQuest a serious contender in the online spatial application market, a robust set of geographical tools was developed under Greenman's direction. Grout, who had spent time at Rand McNally; Etak, a now defunct mapping company; and Navigation Technologies Corporation (Navteq) building digital map data, was tasked with acquiring data and licensing arrangements. The initial team experienced rapid growth in the Denver office, and in a short time MapQuest became a well-known brand.

IPO (1999)

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On February 25, 1999, MapQuest went public, trading on Nasdaq.[6] In December 1999, America Online (AOL) announced that it would acquire MapQuest for $1.1 billion. The deal closed in 2000.[1] COO / CFO Jim Thomas managed the transactions.[7] For a time (until 2004),[8] MapQuest included satellite images through a licensing deal with GlobeXplorer, but later removed them because of the unorthodox business mechanics[clarification needed] of the arrangement brokered by AOL. In September 2006, the website again began serving satellite imagery in a new beta program.

New product features (2004–2008)

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In 2004, MapQuest, uLocate, Research in Motion, and Nextel launched MapQuest Find Me, a buddy-finder service which worked on GPS-enabled mobile phones. MapQuest Find Me let users automatically find their location, access maps and directions and locate nearby points of interest, including airports, hotels, restaurants, banks and ATMs. Users also had the ability to set up alerts to be notified when network members arrive at or depart from a designated area. In 2005, the service became available on Sprint (as a result of their merger with Nextel), and on Boost Mobile in 2006.

In July 2006, MapQuest created a beta version of a new feature with which users could build customized routes by adding additional stops, reordering stops along the way and avoiding any undesired turns or roads. Users could also write out the starting address.[9] In October 2006, MapQuest sold its publishing division to concentrate on its online and mobile services.[10] In April 2007, MapQuest announced a partnership with General Motors' OnStar to allow OnStar subscribers to plan their driving routes on MapQuest.com and send their destination to OnStar's turn-by-turn navigation service. The OnStar Web Destination Entry pilot program began in the summer of 2007 with a select group of OnStar subscribers.[11]

Around 2008, the general public made a significant shift away from MapQuest to the much younger Google Maps service.[12][13] In July 2010, MapQuest announced[14][15] plans to become the first major mapping site to embrace open-source mapping data, launching a new site[16] separate from its main site, entirely using data from the OpenStreetMap project.[17] On July 14, 2010, MapQuest launched a simplified user interface and made the site more compact. MapQuest also introduced "My Maps" personalization, which enables the user to personalize the interface.

Headquarters relocation and President Trump (2012–present)

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In 2012, the executive team of Glick and Perry Evans celebrated MapQuest's 15th anniversary and moved MapQuest to the LoDo area of Denver to centralize their engineering and product teams. IA Interior Architects was asked to oversee the relocation and design of the new 17,000 sq ft office.[18][19]

In July 2012, Brian McMahon became the CEO and GM of MapQuest. In May 2015, with the purchase of AOL by Verizon Communications, MapQuest came under the ownership of Verizon.[20] On July 11, 2016, MapQuest discontinued its open tile API,[21][22] and users such as GNOME Maps were switched to a temporarily free tier of the Mapbox tileserver,[23] while considering alternatives.[24] In 2019, Verizon Media sold Mapquest to System1.[25][26]

In early 2025, after an executive order by President Donald Trump renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America", MapQuest gained attention for its satirical response. Through its official Bluesky account, MapQuest announced that they would not change the name of the gulf on their map. They later announced "Name Your Own Gulf", a website allowing someone to generate an image of a map saying "Gulf of" something, which received attention on social media and was featured on several news outlets.[27]

Similarly, on August 27, 2026, after an analogous executive order by president Trump renaming Lake Ontario to "Lake America", MapQuest responded that it would not change the name of the lake on their map, and allowed users to generate a map with a custom name for the lake, with the "Lake" prefix.[28] Due to Google Maps and Apple Maps switching their maps to use the name "Lake of America" for users geographically located within the United States of America, MapQuest's announcement subsequently resulted in the app becoming the most downloaded on the iPhone App Store in the United States on the morning of September 1 and second-most downloaded app overall in Canada on the night of August 30.[29][30][31]

Services and programs

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From 2014, MapQuest uses some of TomTom's services for its mapping system.[32] MapQuest provides some extent of street-level detail or driving directions for a variety of countries. Users can check if their country is available using a dropdown menu on the MapQuest home page.

The company offers a free mobile app for Android and iOS that features POI search, voice-guided navigation, real-time traffic and other features. MapQuest also offers a mobile-friendly website. MapQuest has several travel products and also includes a feature to let users compare nearby gas prices, similar to the service offered by GasBuddy. However, this feature is only available in the United States. MapQuest's POI data helps the service differentiate itself from other wayfinding software by guiding users directly to the entrances of businesses and destinations, rather than to general street addresses.

See also

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References

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  1. 1 2 Boulton, Jim (June 28, 2016). "Plotting the past". Digital Archaeology. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  2. ↑ Harlan, Chico (May 5, 2015). "'Does MapQuest still exist?' Yes, it does, and it's a profitable business". The Washington Post. Retrieved April 19, 2016.
  3. ↑ "Top 12 Digital Map Companies in the World". IMARC. June 7, 2024.
  4. ↑ "Alumni Around the World". University at Buffalo. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  5. ↑ "Welcome To MapQuest!". December 11, 1997. Archived from the original on December 11, 1997. Retrieved May 18, 2012.
  6. ↑ "MapQuest.com Starts IPO Journey". InternetNews. February 25, 1999.
  7. ↑ Howard, Mark R. (October 31, 2011), "Economic Engine?" Archived December 5, 2022, at the Wayback Machine. Florida Trend. Retrieved May 22, 2022.
  8. ↑ Schutzberg, Adena (April 10, 2005). "Google Integrates Keyhole into Google Maps". Directions mag. Retrieved April 29, 2024.
  9. ↑ Kissiah, Michael (June 8, 2022). "Maps and Geography Research Tools". eInvestigator. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  10. ↑ Vuong, Andy (September 19, 2006). "MapQuest selling publishing arm". The Denver Post. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  11. ↑ Thomas, David (April 26, 2007). "GM's OnStar Joins MapQuest for Desktop Route Planning". Cars.com. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  12. ↑ McKinley, John (February 15, 2009). "MapQuest: A Symbol Of Everything That's Gone Wrong". Business Insider. Retrieved August 16, 2016.
  13. ↑ Sterling, Greg (January 10, 2008). "Google Maps Gaining On Market Leader Mapquest". Search Engine Land. Retrieved April 29, 2024.
  14. ↑ Tankersley, Deb (9 July 2010). "MapQuest Opens Up (MapQuest Blog)". MapQuest Blog. Archived from the original on 12 July 2010. Retrieved 20 December 2011.
  15. ↑ Ant (July 9, 2010). "MapQuest Opens Up – in the UK (MapQuest DevBlog)". MapQuest Devblog. Archived from the original on January 3, 2012. Retrieved December 20, 2011.
  16. ↑ "MapQuest Open – Beta". Open MapQuest.co.uk. Retrieved December 20, 2011.
  17. ↑ "MapQuest – OpenStreetMap Wiki".
  18. ↑ Searer, Stephen (December 11, 2013). "Inside Mapquest's Denver Headquarters". Office Snapshots. Retrieved September 9, 2026.
  19. ↑ Mekeel, Tim (September 19, 2014). "MapQuest to close city office in first quarter of 2015". LancasterOnline. Retrieved September 9, 2026.
  20. ↑ Chuang, Tamara (October 19, 2015). "MapQuest gets a new look after Verizon takes over". The Denver Post.
  21. ↑ Willis, Nathan (27 July 2016). "GNOME Maps and the tile problem". LWN.net. Retrieved 15 February 2023.
  22. ↑ "Modernization of MapQuest results in changes to direct tile access". 15 June 2016. Archived from the original on 19 August 2016. Retrieved 30 July 2016.
  23. ↑ Bengtsson, Mattias (July 20, 2016). "Tiles and Mapbox". GNOME Project.
  24. ↑ "Bug 764841 – Stop Using MapQuest Tile Server". GNOME Project. April 10, 2016.
  25. ↑ Doctrow, Cory (October 10, 2019). "Verizon dumps another Oath property for peanuts: RIP, Mapquest". Boing Boing. Retrieved February 15, 2023.
  26. ↑ Sterling, Greg (October 4, 2019). "A eulogy for Mapquest". Search Engine Land. Retrieved April 29, 2024.
  27. ↑ "MapQuest Trolls Trump's Gulf Renaming Effort". Comic Sands. February 2025.
  28. ↑ Syme, Pete (August 28, 2026). "The 'OG' online map platform, MapQuest, says it won't change the name of Lake Ontario". Business Insider. Retrieved August 31, 2026.
  29. ↑ Maruf, Ramishah (September 1, 2026). "MapQuest is No. 1 on the App Store after refusing to change Lake Ontario's name". CNN Business.
  30. ↑ Combs, Cody. "Apple and Google Lake Ontario backlash grows as MapQuest tops downloads". The National. Retrieved September 2, 2026.
  31. ↑ Luscombe, Richard (September 1, 2026). "MapQuest app reaches No 1 on US Apple list after defying Trump's Lake Ontario order". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved September 2, 2026.
  32. ↑ TomTom Corporate (June 19, 2014). "TomTom Powers MapQuest's Core Map Data with New Partnership" (pdf). Retrieved April 29, 2024.
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