County Maps US

Tools Distance, area and drive time

Halfway Between Two Places

The midpoint is computed along the great circle, not on a flat map, then reverse-geocoded so you get a place name you can actually search for.

How to use it

  1. Enter the two places, or use your location for one of them.
  2. Press Find the halfway point. The midpoint, the nearest named place and the distance each side appear, with the point on the map.
  3. Optionally press Also find the driving midpoint to route by road and mark the point half way along the route.

How it works

The straight-line midpoint is the point half way along the great circle between the two coordinates, computed in the browser. It is then reverse-geocoded with Nominatim (OpenStreetMap) at town level to give a name; over open water or wilderness there may be none.

The driving midpoint asks the public Valhalla routing server for a car route, walks along the returned road line until half the route distance is covered, and reverse-geocodes that point. It halves the distance, not the time, and the free routing server can be slow or briefly unavailable.

Questions

Where is the halfway point between two cities?
Type both cities and press the button. The straight-line midpoint is on the map at once; if you are driving, the second button finds the point half way along the road, which is usually a few miles away from the straight-line one.
Why is the midpoint in the middle of nowhere?
Because that is where half the distance lands. The tool names the nearest town or county so you can search for a diner or a rest stop near it, and the driving midpoint is by definition on a road.
Does it work for three or more people?
Not this tool; it takes exactly two places. For a fair meeting point among several people the distance matrix tool shows every pairwise distance so you can pick a city that is short for everyone.

All map tools, free and without an account. Location data is processed in your browser and by the open geocoding services named on the sources page; nothing is stored by this site.