Open Knowledge Maps
Free non-profit maps that cluster the top 100 papers on any topic
Overview
Open Knowledge Maps turns a search into an interactive map that groups the 100 most relevant PubMed or BASE results into labelled subtopics. It is free with no account, run by a Vienna non-profit association funded by about 30 member institutions, project grants and 2026 basic funding from the City of Vienna.
Pricing
Pricing shown for reference only. These figures reflect RECATOOLS research as of 12 Oct 2026 and may be out of date or incomplete. This is not financial or purchasing advice — always confirm the current price on the provider’s official website before making any decision.
Use cases
What you can produce with Open Knowledge Maps
- An interactive bubble map of a research field in about 30 seconds
- A choice of PubMed for life sciences or BASE for all disciplines
- Filters for time range, relevance or recency and resource type
- Open-access items highlighted, with full text usually a click away
- Free use with no account
- Maps built from the top 100 results only
- Paid Custom Services that embed maps in institutional catalogues
Open Knowledge Maps turns a query into an interactive map that groups the top 100 PubMed or BASE results into labelled subtopics in about half a minute. It is free, needs no account, and grouping comes from record metadata rather than a generative model, so it invents nothing.
The 100-document ceiling is the real constraint: a map sketches a field rather than surveying it, and its own FAQ warns that important papers can be missed. Good for students, librarians and early scoping; not a substitute for Scopus, Web of Science or a systematic-review workflow.
What we found
Every Open Knowledge Maps map is built from at most 100 documents, and that limit defines the tool. Type a query, choose PubMed for life sciences or BASE for all disciplines, and within about 30 seconds you get an interactive bubble map that groups the top 100 hits into labelled subtopics. The FAQ is candid that important papers can fall outside the cut, and library guides at Hong Kong PolyU and Harvard repeat the warning while recommending the tool as a starting point.
Within that limit it does its job well. There is no account, no paywall and no advertising on the search page. Grouping is driven by the metadata of each record, its titles, abstracts, authors and subject keywords, and natural-language processing rather than a generative model, so nothing is invented: the map can only show what the source database returned, which also means it is only as good as that metadata.
The organisation is unusual for this directory. Open Knowledge Maps is an Austrian registered association based in Vienna, started by Peter Kraker in 2015 and a registered non-profit since 2016. It is funded collectively rather than by investors: about 30 supporting member institutions, including Harvard Library, ETH Library and BOKU University, plus project grants, and in February 2026 the City of Vienna granted it basic funding for the year. Paid Custom Services let libraries and repositories embed maps in their own catalogues, and VisConnect, built with IT:U Austria in 2024 and 2025, applies the same mapping to researcher profiles for research assessment. The visualisation code is MIT-licensed on GitHub.
Treat it as a free first step: quick orientation in an unfamiliar field, a teaching aid or early scoping before a proper search. For systematic reviews or citation analysis you will move on to Scopus, Web of Science or a dedicated review platform, and the tool never claims otherwise.
Compiled by RECATOOLS from public sources: vendor documentation and pricing, code repositories and published reporting.
Notable facts
- Open Knowledge Maps generated over 100,000 research maps in its first 3 years with zero marketing budget — entirely through academic word of mouth.
- The platform was built by a former PhD student who was frustrated by the difficulty of finding entry points into unfamiliar research fields.
- Open Knowledge Maps won the European Commission's Open Science Prize in 2017, validating its mission to make science more accessible.
Frequently asked questions
About this listing
This entry was compiled from publicly available data including Open Knowledge Maps's official website, press releases, documentation, and reputable third-party publications. RECATOOLS is not affiliated with Open Knowledge Maps unless explicitly stated.
Third-party AI tools update their pricing, features, availability, and policies frequently. Information here may be outdated by the time you read this — we make reasonable efforts to keep listings current, but cannot guarantee absolute accuracy.
For the latest details, please refer to Open Knowledge Maps directly →
Spotted something out of date? Suggest an update →
Related reading
Alternatives to Open Knowledge Maps
More in Research & Data
