View the grid (LatLon or UTM) and read grid coordinates

A grid draws coordinate lines over your map so you can read a location at a glance. Scribble Maps has two general-purpose grids:

LatLon Grid draws lines of latitude and longitude (WGS84).
UTM draws Universal Transverse Mercator easting and northing lines in metres.

Both grids adjust as you zoom, so there are always a few labelled lines on screen.

Turn on a grid

1) At the bottom-left corner of the map footer, click the gear icon to open Settings.

2) Under Map Settings, open the Grid list.

3) Choose LatLon Grid or UTM. Choose None to hide the grid.

The grid is saved with your map, so people who open the map see the same grid.

To change the color of the grid lines, use Line color under the Grid list. Default color brings back the grid's own colors.

Labels sit at the edges of the map. Longitude labels (for example 74.02°W) run along the top and bottom. Latitude labels (for example 40.72°N) run along the left and right sides.
Darker lines are labelled. Lighter lines divide the space between them so you can estimate a position between two labels.
The spacing changes as you zoom. Zoomed out, lines can be 10° or 20° apart. Zoomed in on a street, they can be 0.001° apart.
The Equator, the Prime Meridian and the 180° line are drawn a little heavier. The grid continues across the 180° line without a break.

The LatLon grid follows your coordinate display setting:

With the default display, labels use decimal degrees, such as 40.75°N.
If you set the coordinate display to DMS, labels use degrees, minutes and seconds, such as 40°45'N or 40°42'30"N, and the lines fall on whole minutes and seconds.

Blue lines are UTM zone boundaries. The tag at the middle of the left side of each zone, such as UTM 18T, gives the zone number and latitude band.
Labels at the edges give metres. Eastings (for example 583000mE) run along the top and bottom. Northings (for example 4507000mN) run along the left and right sides.
Line spacing changes as you zoom, from 100 km down to 10 m, with lighter lines in between the labelled ones.
Zoomed far out, only the zone boundaries and zone tags are shown, because the metre grid is too dense to read.
Special zones are included: the wider 32V zone off Norway and the X-band zones around Svalbard.
UTM covers latitudes from 80°S to 84°N. Polar areas have no UTM grid.

With the coordinate display left on its default setting, the coordinate readout at the bottom of the map matches your grid:

For other reference systems, see the articles on the MGRS grid, the USNG grid and the British National Grid (BNG).

Last updated October 16, 2026