# Map Men
**Map Men** is a British educational comedy YouTube series presented by Jay Foreman and Mark Cooper-Jones, in which each episode uses humor, sketches, and songs to explain a map, a border, or a piece of geography. The first episode, "Bir Tawil - The Land That Nobody Wants," was published on May 4, 2016, and the series has continued with new seasons since.[1](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men/allseasons/official) The pair describe the show as halfway between an educational series about maps and geography and a silly sketch show in which they put on costumes and act out stories.[2](https://rosetta.to/u/talksatgoogle/jay-foreman-mark-cooper-jones-map-men-this-way-up-talks-at-google?t=1041)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Presenters | Jay Foreman and Mark Cooper-Jones, comedians and writers[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) |
| First episode | May 4, 2016, on YouTube[1](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men/allseasons/official) |
| Format | Comedy documentary shorts, average runtime about 9 minutes[4](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men) |
| Catchphrase | "We're the men and here's the map"[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) |
| Channel size | About 1.8 million subscribers and roughly 280 million total views[5](https://vidiq.com/youtube-stats/channel/UCbbQalJ4OaC0oQ0AqRaOJ9g/) |
| Book | *This Way Up: When Maps Go Wrong (And Why It Matters)*[6](https://brilliantmaps.com/map-men-playlist/) |
| Production time | The fastest episode took about six weeks; some took more than a year[7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/) |
## Spoilers
### Episodes and reach
TheTVDB lists five numbered seasons plus specials: season 1 in 2016 (6 episodes), season 2 in 2019 (5), season 3 from November 2020 to September 2021 (11), season 4 from July 2023 to August 2024 (7), and season 5 from September 2025 onward (7), along with specials including two *Map Men vs. Geoguessr* contests and two behind-the-scenes visits to [Ordnance Survey](https://www.edgepedia.org/ordnance-survey), the maker of Britain's national maps.[4](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men) • [1](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men/allseasons/official)
Popular episodes include "Why every world map is wrong" (about 4.6 million views), "The mystery of the squarest country" (about 4.8 million), and "The world's oldest border?" (about 4.5 million), which explains that the England–Scotland border follows rock formations created when the ancient continents Avalonia and [Laurentia](https://www.edgepedia.org/laurentia) collided about 400 million years ago.[6](https://brilliantmaps.com/map-men-playlist/) The channel's most-viewed videos overall include Foreman's non-Map Men videos such as "Why are there no bridges in East London?" at 8.58 million views.[5](https://vidiq.com/youtube-stats/channel/UCbbQalJ4OaC0oQ0AqRaOJ9g/)
## Origins
Jay Foreman and Mark Cooper-Jones met on the London comedy circuit and at the [Edinburgh Festival Fringe](https://www.edgepedia.org/edinburgh-festival-fringe), where Foreman performed musical comedy and Cooper-Jones did stand-up about being a geography teacher. Realizing they shared interests in comedy and geography, they began collaborating, and the Map Men series launched in 2016.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) In their own account, Cooper-Jones proposed the series to Foreman, who already had a YouTube channel with about 10,000 subscribers; the two hoped an experimental series might lead to television work. Instead, Map Men grew into its own thing, and only after more than ten years did Cooper-Jones quit his day job to work on it full time.[7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/)
The two bring complementary backgrounds. Cooper-Jones moved from geography teacher to stand-up comic and later worked as a documentary producer, and he does most of the episode research.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) Foreman, the main comedic influence behind the channel, had already found success with *Unfinished London*, a series about the city's unbuilt roads, railways, and transport projects.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography)
## Format and style
Each episode opens with the two hosts behind their desk, singing the theme that ends "Map Men, Map Map Map Men Men," and then examines a single cartographic question. Episodes answer questions such as where England's north–south divide lies, who owns the [South China Sea](https://www.edgepedia.org/south-china-sea), why every world map is wrong, and why mapmakers deliberately publish mistakes on purpose.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) • [1](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men/allseasons/official) The stated influences are [Monty Python](https://www.edgepedia.org/monty-python) and the strange educational videos the pair remembered from childhood, and the videos mix desk segments with live-action sketches, graphics, props, and sound effects.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography)
**Accuracy matters to the format.** Foreman has said the pair aim to combine true facts and true geography, using humor to make the facts more memorable rather than to distract from them. Because episodes typically receive more than a million views, errors are quickly corrected by viewers in the comments, which he describes as an effective form of research.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) The topics range from dinner-party questions such as what makes a city a city to niche phenomena, and the pair have said a map can serve as a window onto politics, history, or human behavior, letting them smuggle education into comedy.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography) • [7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/)
## Production
Episodes take far longer to make than their few minutes suggest. The shortest production the pair report is about six weeks for one episode, covering research, writing, filming, and editing; most are made in batches of three to five. During lockdown they produced an entire season of eleven episodes back to back, filming all the desk segments in a single very long day, so that editing the final episode finished about a year and a half after filming began.[7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/) The pair put heavy effort into small details; Foreman once hired, disassembled, reassembled, and learned to play a drum kit for a single second of footage topping off one intentionally bad pun.[3](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography)
## The book and other projects
In 2025 the pair published *This Way Up: When Maps Go Wrong (And Why It Matters)*, a book about maps that fail, from intentional errors such as Soviet map distortions and copyright trap streets to overambitious maps and modern problems with sat-navs, GPS, and [Google Maps](https://www.edgepedia.org/google-maps).[6](https://brilliantmaps.com/map-men-playlist/) • [7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/) They deliberately excluded stories already covered on the channel, with the exception of paper towns and trap streets, fake map details added for copyright purposes, which they had previously discussed only in vague terms.[7](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/) The book became a bestseller, and the pair have promoted it through appearances including a Talks at Google event.[8](https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/the-book-about-maps-that-became-a-best-seller/) • [2](https://rosetta.to/u/talksatgoogle/jay-foreman-mark-cooper-jones-map-men-this-way-up-talks-at-google?t=1041)
Beyond the series, the pair fund their work through Patreon, where they describe doing the research, writing, filming, editing, graphics, and administration largely themselves, and list ambitions including a live show tour, a podcast, and more books.[9](https://www.patreon.com/mapmen/about) Educators have adopted the series as a classroom resource for teaching geography through humor, and commentators note its appeal to family audiences, with a high density of jokes, a silly tone, and videos of roughly ten minutes or less.[10](https://www.geographyrealm.com/sunday-maptinee-teaching-geography-humor/) • [11](https://ask.metafilter.com/388092/What-on-YouTube-is-like-Map-Men)
## References
1. [Map Men – Aired Order – All Seasons, TheTVDB.com](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men/allseasons/official)
2. [Jay Foreman & Mark Cooper-Jones | Map Men: This Way Up | Talks at Google, Rosetta](https://rosetta.to/u/talksatgoogle/jay-foreman-mark-cooper-jones-map-men-this-way-up-talks-at-google?t=1041)
3. [Map Men: where comedy meets geography, Geographical (22 November 2023)](https://geographical.co.uk/news/map-men-where-comedy-meets-geography)
4. [Map Men, TheTVDB.com](https://thetvdb.com/series/map-men)
5. [Map Men YouTube Stats, vidIQ](https://vidiq.com/youtube-stats/channel/UCbbQalJ4OaC0oQ0AqRaOJ9g/)
6. [Map Men Complete Video Playlist Sorted From Least To Most Popular, Brilliant Maps](https://brilliantmaps.com/map-men-playlist/)
7. [An Interview with the Map Men, F(r)iction](https://frictionlit.org/an-interview-with-the-map-men/)
8. [The book about maps that became a best seller, Jewish News](https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/the-book-about-maps-that-became-a-best-seller/)
9. [Map Men – About, Patreon](https://www.patreon.com/mapmen/about)
10. [Sunday Maptinee: Teaching Geography Through Humor, Geography Realm](https://www.geographyrealm.com/sunday-maptinee-teaching-geography-humor/)
11. [What on YouTube is like "Map Men"?, Ask MetaFilter](https://ask.metafilter.com/388092/What-on-YouTube-is-like-Map-Men)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Unscripted, reality, and web-native series › Web-native and streaming-original series › Comedy, drama, and general-genre web series › Premiered 1999 to 2016*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license