I Built a Route Planner With Google's New Free Tool. The Weak Spot Wasn't the Code.
By Steve · updated November 2026
If your day has more than two stops, you know the routine: copy an address out of a message, paste it into Google Maps, add a stop, repeat, then drag them around until the order looks sensible. On November 9, Google made it free to build an app that does that part for you. So I built one, to see what a business owner actually gets. It works. The weak spot showed up somewhere I didn't expect, and I'll get to it once the technical parts are out of the way.
- Google Maps keeps your stops in the order you set. Google's Routes API can order up to 25 of them, and AI Studio now lets anyone build an app on it without a card.
- My test planner read a pasted message, confirmed five stops on Google, ordered them and opened the route in Google Maps.
- It flagged a fixed-time appointment it would miss but didn't plan around it. That takes Google's paid Route Optimization API.
- The free key allows 100 calls a day per Maps service, needs a personal Google account and isn't meant for a live site.
- Every app built on Google's data repeats your Google listing, so fix the listing before you build.
The part Google Maps never did for you
Google Maps is a great navigator and a poor planner. On a computer it takes up to 9 stops, counting the final destination, and you change the order by dragging them. It drives them in the order you set, so the planning is still yours.
Google has had a tool that does the planning for years. Its Routes API returns the best order for up to 25 stops in one request. The catch was getting to it: a developer, a Google Cloud project and a card on file before the first test.
That's the part that changed this week.
What I asked for, and what came back
The tool is Google AI Studio, Google's workshop for building with its Gemini models. Per Google's announcement, Google Maps now works inside it: you describe the app, turn Maps on without a credit card, and a live preview loads with a working map.
I described a planner in one paragraph: paste a message with the day's appointments, written however it arrived, and get back the stops in the best order with a button that opens the route in Google Maps. Gemini built the first version. Getting it right took a few rounds of asking for fixes, all in plain language. The first version turned the greeting and the sign-off into stops.
Then I tested it on a sample day with five stops:
- It read the message. It pulled out the five places and ignored the greeting and the sign-off.
- It checked each place on Google. All five came back with their real addresses.
- It put them in order. 1 hour 22 minutes of driving, with an arrival time at each stop. One tap opened the same order in Google Maps, which estimated 1 hour 20 minutes.
- It caught a late arrival. One stop had a fixed 10:00 appointment. The plan arrived at 10:01, and the app flagged it at the top.
Where it stops being free, and where it stops being smart
That 10:01 matters. The app warned me, but it didn't rebuild the day around the appointment. Ordering stops and respecting appointment times are two different jobs. The second one, with several vehicles, time windows and driver shifts, is Google's Route Optimization API, and it isn't part of the free setup.
The free setup has its own limits, per Google's documentation for Maps in AI Studio:
- 100 calls a day for each Maps service. Every planned day spends a few, so it's plenty for one person testing and nowhere near enough for a page your customers use.
- A personal Google account only. Google says Workspace accounts aren't eligible for the free key, and most businesses log in with Workspace.
- Going live means billing. You link a Google Cloud billing account and the same key keeps working. Paid use still comes with a monthly free allowance: 10,000 calls for the basic tier, 5,000 for Pro and 1,000 for Enterprise. Ordering stops is billed as Pro.
Every stop is only as right as its Google listing
None of that was the weak spot. It sits in the second step of my test, the one that checked each place on Google.
The planner doesn't know where a business is. It asks Google, and Google answers with the business's listing: the address, the pin on the map and, in a store locator, the opening hours. That's the Google Business Profile the owner manages, or forgot to.
So any app built this way repeats the listing exactly as Google has it. If a pin sits at the back of a shopping center, the route ends at the loading dock. If the listing still shows last year's hours, a locator on your own site shows them too, under your logo, to a customer who just decided to drive over.
It works in both directions. Your customers and suppliers can now build these apps as easily as you can, and when your business is one of their stops, their app trusts your listing.
You could feed your app your own list of locations instead. Then you're keeping two copies of the same facts, and they drift apart the first time someone updates one and forgets the other.
Which is why the first step happens outside AI Studio.
The order I'd do it in
If you run a business in your area with several stops a day or more than one location, you can start without a developer, as long as the steps go in this order:
- Fix every listing first. Address, pin, hours, holiday hours and phone, for every location. It pays off on Google Maps whether you build anything or not.
- Pick one job for the app. The day's route for whoever drives to customers, a finder for your locations, or a "how to get here" page. Just one.
- Build it on the free key at ai.studio/build, with your real stops or locations, and test it on a normal day.
- Before customers see it, link billing, lock the key to your own domain and decide where the app lives on your site.
- Check it against your listings every time an address, an hour or a location changes.
Frequently asked questions
Can Google Maps put my stops in the best order by itself?
Not in the app. On a computer you can add up to 9 stops, counting the destination, and reorder them by dragging. Putting them in the best order takes Google's Routes API, which is what an app built in AI Studio can use.
Do I need to know how to code to build one?
Not for a working prototype. You describe it and keep asking for changes in plain language. Putting it on your live site, locking the key and keeping it running is where technical help pays off.
Is it really free?
Building and testing is free on the demo key, with 100 calls a day for each Maps service. A live app needs a Google Cloud billing account, and standard Google Maps Platform pricing applies, with a monthly free allowance for each billable feature.
Will an app like this help me rank on Google Maps?
Not by itself. Where you show up on Google Maps depends on your Google Business Profile. The app helps people who already found you, and it's only as accurate as that profile.
Before you build anything on Google's data, make sure your listing is right
Start with your Exploration and Analysis. Requesting it costs nothing, and I'll tell you what's right for you first.
