What is Heatmapster?
Heatmapster reads your Strava runs, rides, hikes and other outdoor GPS activities and draws them as one heatmap, sized for a wall. You authorise it with read access, it imports your activities in the background, and you choose which ones make the cut: everything, one season, or a single race. Then you drag, zoom and search the map to frame the crop, pick a theme, decide which caption lines to show, and download a PDF.
The file is 12x18 inches at 300 DPI (3600 by 5400 pixels), portrait or landscape. There is no print shop attached. It is a download, and the site is upfront that it doesn't print or ship anything. It is free, with a cap of three posters per Strava account, and there is no payment step anywhere. The maker is Jakob Hamilton; the terms are governed by Swedish law and the example poster on the homepage is central Stockholm.
Key Features
Every activity, or one
The default is the whole history, filtered by date, distance, type or name. The other mode is a single activity: pick one marathon, ultra or bikepacking day and the route fills the frame instead of a city. For one activity the "number of activities" caption line is dropped, since "1 activity" on a poster of one route says nothing.
Framing you control
You set the crop yourself on an interactive map before generating, and the extent you see in the preview is what gets printed. Five themes: Light, Dark, Black & White, Purple and Magenta.
A caption, if you want one
Name, total distance, activity count, date range or year, and a race name for single-activity posters. Every line is optional and the caption can be turned off.
Print resolution, not a screenshot
300 DPI at 12x18in, or roughly 30 by 45 cm. The PDF downloads on the page as soon as it's ready, so save it then: Strava doesn't share your email address, so there's no download link by email. The file stays stored for 365 days, and the maker will help you get it again in that time if you lose it.
A card for sharing
Once the poster is ready, the app offers a copy of it as an image sized for Instagram, with buttons to share it, save it or copy a link. Once you log in, the app's own text adds a fair warning: a heatmap shows where you usually train, so look at it before you post it.
Who It's For
- People who want a heatmap on the wall without paying poster prices. Cadence Prints and Outdoor Art Print sell the print; this gives you the file and lets you find the printer
- Anyone with one race worth framing, since a single activity gets the same treatment as a whole history
- Runners, cyclists and hikers. The homepage also names walks, skiing, paddling and skating, and the site has pages of its own for a year in review poster and a hiking heatmap
- Anyone giving it as a present, though the poster comes from the athlete's own Strava account, so the site suggests making it together
- German speakers, with the site also in German
Worth Knowing
Three posters per account is a hard cap, and the terms say the button stops working when you reach it. If a poster fails or comes out wrong, the maker will re-render it without counting it against the limit. The preview and the final PDF are drawn by different map engines (OpenFreeMap on screen, Mapbox for the print), so framing, colours and lines match but street detail and label density can differ; the terms call the preview "an accurate representation, not a pixel-exact proof."
There's no GPX upload: everything comes from Strava, so a watch or bike computer has to sync there first, which Garmin, Wahoo, Coros and Apple Watch can do. And this isn't a copy of Strava's own personal heatmap layer; it's drawn from your own routes only, never anyone else's.
Until recently Strava's limit on connected athletes for a new app meant sign-ups could fill up. The maker tells us Strava raised that limit at the end of September 2026 and sign-ups are open.
Is Heatmapster free?
Yes, as of November 2026. The site says it is "currently free," three posters per Strava account, with no payment step and no card details asked for. The terms explain the cap: rendering costs computing time and paid map data, and the limit is what keeps it free.
What do I get, and how big can I print it?
A single PDF, 12x18 inches at 300 DPI, in portrait or landscape. That is 3600 by 5400 pixels, so it prints sharp at full poster size. Nothing physical ships; you take the file to a print shop.
Can I make a poster of one race?
Yes. Select one activity and the route fills the frame at its own scale. You can add the race name as the caption alongside your name, distance and date, or keep only the race name.
Will the printed poster match the preview exactly?
Framing, colours, activity lines and caption position are matched deliberately. The underlying map detail can differ, because the preview and the print come from different map sources and the print is rendered at much higher resolution. The terms say not to generate a poster if that would bother you.
What does it access on Strava?
Read access only: your profile basics and your activities (name, type, distance, time, elevation, start point and route line). It can't post, edit or delete anything. Imported activities are deleted after 90 days if you never make a poster, tokens are stored encrypted, and you can revoke access from Strava's connected-apps settings.
