Leaving Mapstr?
The Mapstr alternative that brings your places with you.
Pocket Places imports your Mapstr export in about a minute — places, notes and tags, with the tags offered back as lists. No cap on how many places you keep, and nothing saved until you say so. The first 25 places come over free; Plus brings the whole export.
Free to use on iOS and Android · How the import works
- 1,000 places
- in one import, tags and notes included
- No cap
- on the spots you save, on either plan
- Nothing lands
- on your map until you have confirmed it
Import from Mapstr
Your Mapstr places, over in about a minute.
Mapstr can email you everything you saved. Pocket Places reads that file, lands every place exactly where you had it, and turns your tags into the lists they were trying to be.
- 1
Export from Mapstr
In Mapstr, open Profile, then the settings icon. Scroll to Manage your data and tap Export your data. Mapstr emails you a .geojson and a .csv — either works.
- 2
Open the file in Pocket Places
Tap the plus on the home screen, choose Import from Mapstr, and pick the file out of the email. That is the whole of it — no account to connect, nothing to copy across.
- 3
Choose your lists
Your tags come back as lists, split by where their places actually are: "Coffee" holding cafés in twelve countries becomes "Coffee in Lisbon". Untick any you don't want.
- 4
Every place lands where you saved it
Your export knows which place each pin actually was, so a common name cannot come over as a namesake in another city. Your notes come across with them.
A tag is not a list, so we ask
“Coffee” holding thirty-four cafés across twelve countries is a filter nobody opens. The import splits a tag like that by where its places cluster and offers “Coffee in Lisbon” instead; a tag that already names a place, like “Tokyo 2024”, is kept whole. Untick any list and its places still land on your map.
What it costs
The free plan brings over 25 places from an export in all, which is enough to watch the import work on your own data before you decide anything. Bringing a whole Mapstr export across is what Plus is for: up to 1,000 places a month. The spots you save yourself are never capped, on either plan.
Why the search
Why people go looking for a Mapstr alternative.
Usually one of three things, and none of them is the map itself.
The 300-place wall
Mapstr’s free plan stops at 300 saved places — a cap on what you already own, not on what you do each month. The habit that got you there is exactly the one Pocket Places is built for, and it never caps the map.
The alerts and the journal are paid
Being told you are near a saved place, and the record of where you have been, sit on Mapstr’s paid plan. In Pocket Places the nearby alerts and the passport are included.
Posts land unreviewed
Share a Reel into Mapstr and what it finds goes straight onto your map with tags picked for you. Pocket Places shows you every spot first, and the lists it suggests carry an × to say no.
Side by side
Pocket Places vs Mapstr.
Both put your saved places on a map and both read Instagram and TikTok. The differences are in what happens after the save, and in what the free plan lets you keep.
 Pocket Places | Mapstr | |
|---|---|---|
| Saved places on the free plan | No cap | Up to 300 |
| Bringing your places over | A Mapstr export or a Google Takeout export, reviewed before it lands — 25 places free, the whole export on Plus | CSV and KML files |
| What happens to the spots a post names | Shown to you first. You keep or drop each one, and fix a wrong match before it is saved | Added to your map, to tidy up afterwards |
| Alerts when you are near a saved place | Included, within 500 meters, with the app closed | On the paid plan |
| Lists that keep filling | A rule in your own words — "hotels in Rome" — applied to every spot you save from then on, with an × to say no | Tags picked once, when a post is imported |
| Countries and cities you have been to | A passport with a stamp per country, included, filled by hand or by a voice note | A visits journal on the paid plan |
| Offline | Map, lists, passport and search across everything saved | The map |
| Saving spots from social posts | Yes — posts, Reels, TikTok videos and photo posts, YouTube videos and Shorts, profiles and screenshots | Yes |
| Following people and a feed | None, by design. Your map holds the places you wanted to remember | Follow users, influencers, publishers and official maps |
Mapstr details are taken from its public plans and help pages as of September 2026 and may change. Mapstr is a trademark of its owner; Pocket Places is not affiliated with it.
The biggest difference
Nothing lands on your map until you say so.
A post that names five places comes back as five rows. Keep the ones you meant, drop the ones you didn't, and fix a wrong match on the spot. The map only ever holds what you chose to put there.
A list a post fits is offered, not applied
A spot headed for a list is named beside it with an × to say no. The rule is yours, in your words, and it keeps applying to every spot you save later.
Imports get the same review
An export of 200 places arrives as 200 rows, each a keep or a drop. A Mapstr export asks which of your tags are worth a list before it writes one.
Nothing lost
Everything you switched for is still here.
One map, notes on each spot, visited and to-try, nearby alerts and lists you can share. The basics are the basics.
One map
Every spot you save, on one map, grouped by country and city on its own.
Notes and the reason
Your Mapstr notes come across with the import. What a post said about a place is saved with it too.
Visited and to-try
Stamp a spot when you have been. It moves from Wishlist to Visited spots on its own.
Nearby alerts
A notification when you are within 500 meters of a saved spot, even with the app closed.
Shared lists
Send a list to a partner or a friend. They can add their own spots, and everyone sees who added what.
Search across it all
One search over spots, cities, countries and lists — and a second one by meaning, for "somewhere quiet to work".
Included
Where you've been, on the free plan.
A passport with a stamp for every country you've been to and the grey ones waiting beside them. Stamp by hand, hold to stamp a run of them, or record a voice note — “Japan in 2019, then Lisbon and Porto last spring” — and confirm what it heard.
Your map is where you're going. Your passport is where you've been. Neither costs anything.
After the pin
A tag is a word. A rule is a decision.
Tell a list what it's for — hotels in Rome, coffee anywhere, kids' things to do in Japan — and every spot you save from then on is checked against it. The match is shown before the save, with an × on it.
Hotel de Russie
Rome · Hotel
Questions
What people switching from Mapstr ask.
Everything else is in how it works, the full story is on the main page, or ask us.
Can I import my places from Mapstr?
Yes. Ask Mapstr for an export (Profile, settings, Manage your data, Export your data) and it emails you a .geojson and a .csv. Open either in Pocket Places through Import from Mapstr and your places, notes and tags come across — up to 1,000 places in one import, with your tags offered back as lists you can untick.
Does the Mapstr import cost anything?
The free plan brings over 25 places from an export in all, so you can see the import work on your own places before deciding anything. Bringing a whole export across is what Pocket Places Plus is for, at up to 1,000 places a month. The spots you save yourself are never capped on either plan, and everything already on your map stays there whether or not you subscribe.
Is Pocket Places free, and is there a limit on saved places?
Pocket Places is free on iOS and Android, and there is no cap on how many spots you save — that one is never metered. What the free plan does meter is bulk work: 20 shared posts or links a month, 25 places in all brought over from an export, and three lists filling themselves at once. Plus raises all three. Your map syncs between your devices on either plan.
Does Pocket Places save places from Instagram, TikTok and YouTube?
Yes, and YouTube too. Share a post, a Reel, a TikTok video or photo post, a YouTube video or Short, an Instagram profile or a screenshot, and the spots named in it are found and shown to you. Hotels shared from booking sites work too. Nothing lands on your map until you have confirmed it.
What happens to the spots a post names?
They come back as rows you keep or drop, with what the post said about each one kept beside it. A wrong match has a "Not the right spot?" link that takes you to the right one. Only the rows you keep are saved.
Does it work offline?
Yes. Your map, your lists, your passport and the search across everything you have saved all work with no connection. Changes made offline sync when you are back online.
Is Pocket Places a social app?
No. There is no feed and nobody to follow. Sharing is something you do one list at a time, with the people you choose, and they can add their own spots to that list.
Is it "Mapster" or "Mapstr"?
The app is spelled Mapstr, though "Mapster alternative" is a common way to search for the same thing. Either way, this is the page: Pocket Places imports a Mapstr export directly.
Your places were always yours.
Bring them somewhere that treats them that way.
Free to use · iOS and Android · Synced across your devices