How to 3D print a map of your city

Step-by-step: from map to printed model

The workflow is four steps. Most people go from a place name to a sliced, ready-to-print file in under ten minutes.

1. 1. Select an area on the map

   Open the editor and search for your city, address or landmark, or simply pan and zoom the map until your area is centered. Then draw a selection — a rectangle, circle or polygon — over exactly the region you want to turn into a 3D printable map.

   A tight selection around a downtown core gives you dense buildings and recognizable streets; a wider selection captures rivers, parks and the surrounding terrain. Keep the footprint close to your printer's bed size so you don't have to scale the model down so far that small details disappear.

2. 2. Generate the 3D model

   Hit Generate. Map2Model pulls building footprints and heights from OpenStreetMap and drapes real elevation data over the area, then assembles a watertight 3D model of the buildings, roads, water, greenery and terrain — all in your browser. Within a few seconds you get a live 3D preview you can orbit and inspect.

   This is where a city model and a terrain model are really the same job: select a mountain valley instead of a downtown and the same Generate step produces a 3D printable terrain model, a topographic relief you can print exactly like a cityscape.

3. 3. Export a 3MF or STL

   When you like the preview, export the file. You have two options:

   • Multicolor 3MF — terrain, buildings, water, roads, greenery and the frame are each stored as a separate part with its own color. This is the best choice if you want a color print.
   • Merged STL — one solid body, ideal when you just want a single-color print or need a universally compatible file.

   Both come out oriented for the bed and watertight, so there is no mesh repair step before slicing.

4. 4. Slice in your slicer and print

   Open the exported file in your slicer. The 3MF carries its per-part colors with it, so:

   • Bambu Studio and OrcaSlicer map each part to an AMS slot — assign a filament to terrain, another to buildings, and so on.
   • PrusaSlicer treats the parts as separate objects you can paint or assign to extruders on an MMU.
   • Cura slices the merged STL cleanly for any single-extruder printer.

   Slice, send it to the printer, and you have a physical 3D printed map of your city.

Tips for a great print

Scale to your bed

Pick a map area that roughly matches your build plate so you keep detail. If you scale a large city down too far, narrow streets and small buildings can fall below your nozzle's line width and vanish. For a 256 mm bed, a few square kilometers of city is a good starting point.

Give it a solid base

A base thickness of around 2–4 mm keeps the model rigid, gives you a clean bottom layer, and provides a surface for an engraved label if you add one. Thicker bases help large flat terrain models stay warp-free.

Plan your colors (AMS / MMU)

Because the multicolor 3MF separates buildings, water, greenery, roads and terrain, a multi-material printer can render each in its own filament. A classic palette is white or cream buildings, blue water, green parks and a neutral terrain — but it's entirely up to you. No AMS? Print in a single color, or pause-and-swap filament by layer height for a two-tone effect.

City vs. terrain

City selections shine with buildings and street grids; terrain selections shine with elevation. For dramatic mountains, exaggerate the vertical scale slightly so the relief reads clearly at print size. For flat cities, the buildings themselves carry the height, so you can keep terrain subtle.

Common questions