Platform
2025 Year in Review
As 2025 comes to a close, I wanted to make a post reflecting on the year we've had building The Guinness Map.
We've really ramped up this year, especially since the summer. We started to see increased numbers month over month, which is great since we do virtually zero paid marketing. Posting on Reddit and Instagram are our main avenues for marketing, though we view these more as a way to communicate and interact with current or possible users.
Some notable milestones this year include: a website UI refresh early on in the year, our Guinness-branded merch giveaway, moving to a new analytics platform in June (which gave us virtually unlimited insights into how our website and apps were being used), launching our iOS and Android apps in November/December, and adding social features like following users or locations and location check-ins.
A big shoutout to these people for helping grow The Guinness Map this year:
Sam Buddery (Product and Partnerships)
Shane Pepper (UI Design)
Shane Gavin (Graphic Design)
Calla Carlin (Social Media & Content)
Here's a deeper look at some of our statistics from 2025 — I am breaking this down by data, web, mobile, and overall platform statistics:
Data
- New Users Registered: 1,097 ~3.0 users per day average
- Reviews Added: 1,966 ~5.4 reviews per day average
- Locations Added: 2,515 ~6.9 locations per day average
- Photos of Pints Uploaded: 2,088 ~5.7 photos per day average
2024 Summary (May–Dec) with % Increase vs 2025
Comparing these numbers to the data from 2024, you can see massive growth:
- New Users Registered: 118 ~830% increase in 2025
- Reviews Added: 379 ~419% increase in 2025
- Locations Added: 400 ~529% increase in 2025
- Photos of Pints Uploaded: 302 ~591% increase in 2025
Busiest Days
- Most Users: 94 on August 7th, 2025
- Most Reviews: 56 on November 12th, 2025
- Most Locations: 38 on December 4th, 2025
Web
Website
- Total Unique Users: 38,300
- Page Views: 103,900
- Average Session Duration: 1 min 08s
Google Search
These statistics show how The Guinness Map website performed in Google Search this year. A little known fact is that the website has over 12,000 indexed pages on Google, and as a result we get the majority of our traffic via Google.
An impression is counted each time a user sees a link to our website in Google Search results and a click is counted each time a user clicks on one of those links.
- Total Impressions: 543,000
- Total Clicks: 16,900
- Average CTR: 3.1%
- Average Position: 15
- Top 10 Queries for Search Appearance:
- guinness map
- guinness guru map
- best guinness in melbourne
- the black map guinness
- guiness map
- the guinness map
- guinness rating app
- black map guinness
- guinness maps
- guinness finder
Mobile
iOS App (since November)
- Sessions: 23,977
- Downloads: 783
Android App (since November)
- Total Sessions: 7,123
- Downloads: 127
All Platforms
Top Views by City (since June)
- New York (7,732)
- London (4,618)
- Dublin (3,089)
- Melbourne (1,599)
- Newark (1,236)
- Mount Kisco (1,033)
- Manchester (977)
- Brooklyn (943)
- Chicago (828)
- Ashburn (744)
Top Views by Country (since June)
- United States (29,237)
- United Kingdom (15,787)
- Ireland (3,720)
- Australia (2,723)
- The Netherlands (1,276)
- France (1,256)
- Canada (1,092)
- Sweden (1,055)
- Singapore (665)
- Germany (628)
Top Views by Location (since June)
These are the most popular locations viewed on the map.
- O'Donoghue's Bar - Dublin, Ireland
- The Long Hall Pub & Grocery - New York, USA
- Swift Hibernian Lounge - New York, USA
- Bowe's Lounge Bar - Dublin, Ireland
- The Brazen Head - Dublin, Ireland
- Mulligan's - Dublin, Ireland
- Confession Box - Dublin, Ireland
- The Irish Times - Los Angeles, USA
- Tom Kennedy's Bar - Dublin, Ireland
- International Bar - New York, USA
It's been an incredible year of growth and learning. We're grateful to every user and reviewer who has helped shape The Guinness Map into what it is today. So many of the features we implemented this year were requested by our users.
Looking Ahead to 2026
The Platform
Apart from bug fixes and UI tweaks, the website and apps will stay largely the same. We feel we're in a good spot now and technically aren't in need of new features for at least the first half of the year. Unless of course one of our users recommends something — we are always open to hearing your ideas!
Platform Costs
As of right now, the entire platform costs roughly $50-$100 a month to run. I am happy to pay this as a slightly expensive "hobby" but as we grow, it will only become more expensive. Beginning to offset some of these costs would be great.
If you would like to contribute you can donate via the following link: https://www.theguinnessmap.com/support
So, 2026 is going to be a year where we focus on trying to make a little money so we can start offsetting costs as we continue to grow.
We plan to do this by:
Business Tools & Partnerships
For our business users (people who own/run the locations on the map) we will start offering the following:
- Our Free business analytics tools for pubs and bar locations on the map.
- We now offer owners the ability to see stats about their location views, respond to reviews, and upload further info about their location including price, description, website URL, and location image.
- Our Paid partnership program with pubs and bars that exist on The Guinness Map.
- This will give owners the option to promote their location in their city or area, appear at the top of search results, have a unique map marker, etc.
- These paid partnerships also include insights into paid placement performance, including views and clicks.
- They will be able to promote anything — from event space, to trivia nights, to happy hour deals. Even their Guinness if they like :)
Our aim is to the Yelp of Guinness.
Merch
We plan to release some merch in 2026! Included in this launch will be:
- Tees
- Sweatshirts
- Hoodies
- Hats
- Beer Mats/Coasters
- Stickers
Our designer Shane is putting together some new signature Pintman characters which will feature on this merch. These new graphics will continue our Guinness safari theme with our Pintman mascot hunting for creamy pints. We're really excited about it and plan to launch within the first few months of the new year.
We've said this a bunch, but we never plan to show shitty ads or charge users for access to the site, so implementing these things will help us keep us motivated and keep the platform going!
Thank You!
As a final note, I just want to thank all of our users, whether you left a review or just used our platform to find a creamy pint in your area. Seeing The Guinness Map used over the past nearly two years (our bday is in April) has been truly amazing. I started this project because a) nothing existed when I went looking, and b) I wanted to challenge myself as a developer. I never expected it to grow into what it is today. So thank you for a wonderful 2025 and cheers to an even better 2026. Sláinte!
Thank you! Go raibh maith agaibh!
Darren