5 Ways to Keep Your Mind Maps After Your Subscription Expires

As much as we love mind mapping, we know that there are many reasons you may not want or be able to commit to a paid MindMeister license right now. However, as bona fide mind mapping enthusiasts and all-round good eggs, we do our best to make it as simple as possible to continue mapping even after your subscription expires.

5 Ways to Keep Your Mind Maps After Your Subscription Expires

If you’re reaching the end of your license and you’re not planning on upgrading your account, here are five great ways to keep your mind maps for future reference.

Before We Begin…

While the tips in this article should make the transition from a paid MindMeister account easier, the expiry of your license will obviously lead to some changes in the way you can use the tool in future. These are the main things to bear in mind:

You will still be able to…
  • Store, view and edit up to three maps using your free MindMeister account.
  • Access the Public Maps Universe.
  • Regain access to all your maps if you upgrade back to a paid license in future. 
You will no longer be able to…
  • Create new maps once the three-map limit has been reached.
  • View or edit maps other than the three you have saved.
  • Access advanced mapping features, including attachments, exports and custom themes (full list here).
  • Use features specific to teams, such as team signup pages, team groups and team admin functionality.

Take a look here to find out the full range of features available in each MindMeister package.

1. Share Your Maps

This option is particularly useful for larger groups of MindMeister users who are scaling down their number of paid accounts. If your account will be downgraded but your maps may still be useful to someone with a paid account, simply share the map with them so that they’ll always be able to view and edit it. Make sure to do this before your license expires!

To share your maps, click Share at the bottom of the map screen. This allows you to invite new users to view and/or edit your map, while also adding it to their “My Maps” folder in MindMeister. Sharing is possible via email or link. 

Alternatively, you can make your maps public so that they’re available to MindMeister users all around the world. However, we would strongly recommend against this if your maps contain sensitive or confidential information. Find out more about how to make your maps public from the help center.

Stuck? Read this article from our help center to learn how to share your maps quickly and easily.

2. Save Your Maps to Google Drive 

If you’re working with MindMeister as part of a team and you haven’t already activated the Google Drive integration, now might be a good time to try. With your license expiring, exporting to Drive is the easiest way to keep all your maps in a single collaborative space.

This excellent feature gives you the chance to share access to your maps with your colleagues or classmates. Maps are stored in Google Drive as special .mind files, which can then be opened in MindMeister. 

Remember, you won’t be able to access the Google Drive integration after your account has been downgraded, so plan ahead and move your maps there before it’s too late. You also won’t be able to open links to maps that aren’t included in your Basic plan, so it might be a good idea to export a PDF version of each map to the Drive folder as well.

You can export your mind maps to Google Drive both individually and in bulk (bundled as a ZIP file). Find out how in this help center article.

3. Get the Most out of Your Basic Account

As MindMeister is a freemium service, you’ll still have a MindMeister Basic account to work with after your paid license expires. Although you will only have access to the core features within MindMeister, a Basic account still allows you to access and work actively on three mind maps. 

The maps that are kept available for you after you return to a Basic account are the first three that you made or accessed using MindMeister. Generally speaking, this means that you have to delete or unfollow any other maps you have created or accessed so that the maps you want to keep are the oldest three maps in “My Maps”.

However, you can increase the amount of free maps available by taking part in our Spread the Love referral program. By inviting friends to use MindMeister, you can create and access as many as 13 maps with a Basic account. For paying users, the benefits are even better: find out more about Spread the Love here.

Spread the Love!

And get more out of your Basic Account.

Find out more!

4. Print Your Maps

Especially if you’re a teacher or lecturer, you might want to consider printing out some of your maps to be used by your class as learning aids. Mind mapping for education can bring a huge range of benefits for learners of all ages and abilities. These include: improved information memorization and retention, stronger comprehension of complex issues and better time management for students. 

Not convinced? Read this insightful blog post to learn about the research-backed benefits of mind mapping.

While it isn’t the most high-tech solution, and you might not get the full interactive benefits of your collaborative online mind map, mind maps on paper can still be hugely beneficial to learning.  

Please note that you won’t be able to print or export your mind maps once you have been downgraded to a Basic account, even if you can access them as part of your three free maps. We’d recommend saving each map as a PDF before you send it to the printer. 

5. Map Like a Pro

It’s just a thought… but if you’re a big MindMeister fan, you might want to consider upgrading to one of our paid packages. For as little as $4.99 per month for Personal users ($2.50 for Edu Personal) you’ll be able to keep all the great benefits of MindMeister and carry on working with your maps just like before. There are even better deals for teams, schools and universities: why not talk to our sales team to see what Meister can do for you?

Never Stop Mapping!

Keep all the benefits of MindMeister for an awesome low price.

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