This article covers Best 3 Tour Builder Websites To Create Story Map Online. You can use Story Maps to share your tour experience with others. A story map has World’s map where you can highlight the locations you have visited. You can upload photos and videos of these places on your story map, and can also write down your experience of those places.
These 3 tour builder websites have some common as well as some unique features from one another. Google Tour Builder and ArcGIS Story Map Tour let you build your story map on Google Maps whereas KnightLab Story Map uses a plain white-colored map overlay. Each of these represents your story map in unique style.
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Best 3 Tour Builder Websites To Create Story Map Tour Online:
Google Tour Builder
Google’s Tour Builder is a Story Map tour builder tool just like a story map. Initially, this tool was designed for veterans, so that they can record all the places where they served the military. In this way, they can build a legacy and share their stories and memories with family, friends, and with the whole world. Later, Tour Builder was made available to the public. Now, anyone can make beautiful story map using this tool.
To make story map using Google Tour Builder, go to the Tour Builder website, and select Create A Tour. Next screen will ask you to enter a name for the tour along with your name. Tour Builder will open after that. A screenshot of Tool Builder interface is attached below.
Google Tour Builder has three sections:
Location Panel: All the locations you add to your tour will be listed in this panel.
Map View: To show your locations on the map.
Info: Here, you can add your experience in the place you visited along with photos, videos, and the time you spent there.
To add a location, click the Add Location button in the Location Panel. You can choose a location either by entering the address or by dropping placemark on the map. Then, you can name the place, add your photos, videos, and time you spent there. You can write an introduction for your story map tour in the Introduction column. You have a 25 photos/videos limit per location, which is enough. Similarly, you can add as many locations as you want in your tour.
Other Features:
- You can use custom icons for each location by pasting a URL to that icon source online.
- Support for KML files. You can import a tour from a KML/KMZ file.
- You can show/hide the borders, labels, and roads on the map.
- It has two modes for connecting you locations; Story, and Hub. In Story mode, locations will be connected in sequential order. In Hub mode, the first location entry will serve as a hub and all the other locations will be connected to that hub separately.
- After building your tour, you can share it online or download it as KML or CSV file.
Build your own story map here.
KnightLab Story Map
KnightLab Story Map is an online tour builder designed by KnightLab community. The user interface is very similar to Google Tour Builder. You have a panel that lists all the locations you add to your story map. The information area is in the bottom half, below the map. 
To add a location click on the + icon present in the Location Panel and search that location. After selecting the location, you can name it and type your experience. Pictures of that location can be upload directly. You can add URL to your media, which supports both pictures and videos. You also have options to add caption and credit to the media. The caption field has support for HTML tags. And, you can also upload custom location icons if you don’t like the stock icons.
By clicking on the Preview button at the top, you can see the preview of your story map anytime.
Other Features:
- Option to change the background color of the text information (location names and experience text) on the story map.
- You can set a custom default size for all of your photos.
- You can add Call To Action button to your story map.
Give it a shot here.
ArcGIS Story Map Tour
ArcGIS is a mapping and analytic platform that provides contextual tools for mapping and spatial reasoning. Story Map tour is one of those contextual tools offered by ArcGIS. You can build gorgeous story map using this tool and it’s free to use.
In the beginning, you can select whether you want to upload your media or its already online. If your photos/videos are already present on Flickr, YouTube or Picasa, you can import those here. It also has an option for upload media (only supports photos) which requires ArcGIS online subscription.
After that, you can name your tour and write a description at the top left corner. The interface is divided into two main parts; one for map and other for media. Here, you will find three buttons at the bottom area
Add: To add location, media links, and descriptions.
Organize: Organize the sequence of the locations.
Import: Import media from other online platforms.
Other Features:
- You can import tour data from a CSV file.
- Multiple layouts for story map.
- Additional appearance tweaks (Color, Map, Zoom level, etc.)
There is no option to download your story. But, you can make your story public on ArcGIS website and share a link to that on your social media.
Check it out here.
Closing Words
All of these tour builder websites are good for creating a story map tour. Each of these has some of their own unique features. Give them all a try, check their features, and share your experience with us.
