Here’s a summer challenge: Think of a place you’d typically drive to, and map out a bike route to get there instead. You might be surprised—often, places that seem hours away by car are well within your mileage ability once you identify a more direct route. That dreaded slog on the interstate? Now it’s a mini-adventure down gravel roads and trails you never would have stumbled upon otherwise.

But sometimes that idyllic backroad detours into a maze of parking lots or unexpectedly dead-ends in a field. So how do you find the best lower-traffic roads and trails to get where you’re going? We pooled some of our favorite resources for making new bike routes.

Getting Around Town

Google Maps’ Bike Mode

Mapping out a route in Google Maps' bike mode can be useful, but use the tool enough and you’ll probably notice the site’s idea of a good bike route can occasionally be a little… off. That’s because Google’s cycling algorithm seems to value bike lanes, busier streets, and flatter routes over the lower-traffic side streets you might prefer. Just remember to switch to Google Street View if you want a peek at a road’s conditions in advance.



Local Bike Maps

If you live in a bike-friendly area, you might be able to get your hands on local print maps that highlight area trails, bike lanes, and lower-traffic roads. Ask someone at your local bike shop if area bike maps are available. If not, a shop employee might be able to give you good bike directions for where you’re trying to go or point you to other resources

Ride with GPS

The Ride with GPS site and app make route-searching and route-planning easy. You can download and export other users’ routes to your Garmin bike computer (or smartphone!), or create your own routes using the site’s mapping feature. Once you know where you want to go, you can also download and print out PDF cue sheets for your route. Want inspiration to plan a longer bike tour? Check out some of the photos and maps from rides taken by Ride with GPS ambassadors.

Strava and MapMyRide

Just like Ride with GPS, Strava and MapMyRide are great sources of local routes if you search users’ past rides. Although both apps tend to lean toward round-trip rides for fitness and not commuting, you can still incorporate part of a route into your own navigation—especially if you see it on enough local cyclists’ ride maps to confirm it’s a good bike road.

Getting from City to City

Race Routes

In addition to the previous resources, official race routes from local races, rides, and gran fondos can be excellent tools for finding top-shelf routes through an area. Since gran fondos tend to be longer and “play the hits” when it comes to local scenery, tracing these routes is a great way to log some serious mileage on an area’s best roads. Go to a race site and see if you can download the route—or look for past rider files on Strava and Ride with GPS.

Print Maps

Good old-fashioned print maps are oft-forgotten resources when it comes to wayfinding. Try copying relevant pages from a DeLorme Atlas and connecting some of the backroads and quieter state routes. If you have any concerns about road conditions, check out your route ahead of time using Google Maps Street View.

Related: How to Plan the Best Weekend Micro-Adventure

Crossing a State

State Bike Highway Maps

Google your state’s bike highway map, and you should be able to uncover some of the longer routes and rail trails across the state.

Adventure Cycling Association

This nonprofit is your best resource for stringing together long routes—and even coordinating car-free access to these routes by train. While ordering ACA’s print maps is useful for planning a cross-country or cross-state tour (campsites, bike shops, and stores are listed), you’re encouraged to check out the US Bicycle Route System feature on the ACA website for a comprehensive approach to navigating the whole country by bike.

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