Google Fusion Tables spent eight years as the default answer to 'how do I put this spreadsheet on a map?', and then Google retired it on 3 December 2019. The tutorials outlived the product: university library guides, data-journalism handbooks and forum answers still point at a tool that has been gone for seven years.
We know the refugees are still arriving because we see them: maps landing in our system named 'Fusion. MapScript' and 'layer_Customers', the unmistakable residue of someone rebuilding an old Fusion workflow from its exports. This guide maps each Fusion Tables job to its 2026 equivalent, starting with the one most people actually need: table in, live map out.
- →Google Fusion Tables was retired on 3 December 2019. Its viz URLs died with it, but exported CSVs and the workflows people built on it did not.
- →Seven years on, we still see its ghost weekly: maps arriving named 'Fusion — MapScript' and 'layer_Customers' — people rebuilding old Fusion layers from exports.
- →Every core Fusion job has a modern equivalent: address tables to maps, merged layers, filtered views, embeds and shareable links.
- →The fastest route back: paste your exported CSV into a free geocoder and you have a live, shareable map in about a minute — no API key, no code.
- →For the workflows Fusion never had — live sync from a spreadsheet, custom functions, check-off tracking — Google Sheets plus mapping formulas now does more than Fusion ever did.
What actually died (and what survived)
When Fusion Tables shut down, three things disappeared: the hosted tables, the map visualisations built on them, and the embed URLs scattered across the web, which is why so many old blog posts now show grey boxes. What survived: the CSVs people exported before the deadline, and Google's own takeout archive for those who requested it.
If you still have those exports, you are one paste away from a working map. If you only have the dead embed URL, the underlying data is gone, but the workflow that produced it can be rebuilt in Sheets, usually in less time than Fusion took to configure.
The migration table: every Fusion job, translated
Address table → map: Fusion geocoded a column and dropped pins. Today: paste the same rows into a free bulk geocoder, or in Google Sheets write =GEOCODE(A2) and fill down, coordinates spill live into the sheet, and =INSTAMAP(A2:D50) returns a shareable live map URL.
Merged tables (Fusion's signature feature): two tables joined on a key column. Today: plain VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP in Sheets, which you already know, feeding the same map formulas.
Filtered map views: Fusion let you filter pins by column values. Today: statuses and tabs do this on the live map, and each filtered view keeps its own shareable link.
Embeds: Fusion's iframe embeds are the part that died most publicly. Modern embeds work the same way, one iframe tag, but update themselves when the spreadsheet changes, which Fusion never did without republishing.
Heatmaps and intensity: the one Fusion feature without a one-formula equivalent. For density work, dedicated GIS (QGIS, Kepler.gl) remains the honest answer; for everything else you never needed GIS.
The fastest path: exported CSV to live map in a minute
Take any Fusion export, the classic shape is name, address, a category column, maybe notes, and paste the address column into the free geocoder linked below. You get coordinates for every row, a downloadable enriched CSV, and a live map link you can share or embed immediately. No account, first hundred rows free, no API key configuration, the part of Fusion that was always someone else's problem.
If your table lives in Google Sheets already, skip the tool: =GEOCODE(A2:A500) spills coordinates for the whole column, and the map stays live as the sheet changes, the thing Fusion users always wanted and never got.
What Sheets does now that Fusion never could
Fusion Tables was read-only cartography: data in, picture out. The spreadsheet-native stack that replaced it is bidirectional. Routes: =ROUTE_LINK(A2:A26) turns a column of stops into one Google Maps navigation link (the path form quietly accepts 100 stops, see our research post). Proximity: =CLOSEST_TO(B2, Depots!A:A) answers 'which depot serves this address?' in the cell. Field work: a live map's logbook lets a crew check off visits from their phones, and =LOGBOOK(map_id) pulls the check-off history straight back into the sheet.
None of that existed in Fusion Tables. If you migrated away reluctantly in 2019, the honest news is that the replacement stack is now simply better than the thing you lost.
Map your Salesforce accounts in under 5 minutes — no admin setup.
Paste your exported CSV into the free geocoder: coordinates for every row, a live shareable map, and the enriched file back. First 100 rows free, no login.
Open the free bulk geocoder