A sales route planner is judged on the replan, not the plan.

Every figure read on the vendor's own pricing page, help centre or app store listing between 18 and 29 July 2026. Route4Me bills flat per month, not per user; the $199 / $299 / $349 tiers were on the page on 19 July 2026, and by 29 July the same page showed no prices and "CONTACT US" in all three tiers. "Not published" means the vendor states no number, which is not the same as no limit. Verify before you buy.

What is a sales route planner?

The word planner is doing the work. A map shows where your accounts are. A planner decides which of them belong in Tuesday, in what order, and holds that decision together when Tuesday moves. Every tool here does the first job. The second separates the category.

What separates a sales route planner from a general multi-stop route planner is the layer underneath each pin. A delivery stop is an address with a parcel. A sales stop is an account with a history, a value, a cadence and a stage, and the sequence is supposed to respect all four. Map My Customers puts that in its own FAQ: "Frequencies tell Map My Customers how often each account should be visited ... the platform will flag accounts that have fallen behind cadence" (read 29 July 2026). Leadbeam describes its Compass module the same way: "Compass sequences up to 50 stops a day around the things that actually matter - your calendar's fixed meetings, live business hours from Atlas, real-time traffic" (read 29 July 2026). Neither sentence is about distance.

A spreadsheet plus Google Maps gives up at around ten stops and never knew your accounts. Wider category: sales routing software. Map layer: sales mapping software. Dividing the accounts first: sales territory mapping.

The replan test: what reps report when the day changes

A demo shows the first pass. You upload accounts, press Optimize, a tidy line appears. Nobody demos the second pass, and the second pass is most of the job: the eleven o'clock call that adds a stop, the cancellation that removes one, the customer who can only see you after three.

We can put numbers on this because we read one review corpus end to end: 400 of Route4Me's 411 Capterra reviews plus the complete G2 negative tail, between 27 and 29 July 2026. Sorted by theme rather than by star rating, the same handful of failures comes back from independent users across six years.

The two largest themes describe one failure from opposite ends. The route hardens once optimized:

"If you make a mistake, you can't go back after optimizing" ... "You can't delete stops, correct address, program last stop or first stop" ... "It is not possible to edit the route after your started the route or departed" Capterra reviewers, March 2020, November 2020 and December 2022. Read 29 July 2026.

And adding a stop does not rebuild the sequence, it sticks the stop on the end:

"when you add an address in to a route you have already created it does not re optimise" ... "it doesn't change the route it just adds it on" ... "Adding stops during route operations is cumbersome" Capterra reviewers, May 2023 (5 stars), June 2019 and March 2021. Read 29 July 2026.

Two smaller themes are cheap to test and expensive to discover late. Ending the day where you started defeated two reviewers, "difficult to use same start and end point" (March 2019) and "Couldn't figure out how to make starting point also be final destination" (September 2019). Routing to a time window defeated two more, "It's not able to route based on the delivery required time" (December 2019) and "does not optimize that well based on job deadline time" (May 2023).

The same corpus carries the other side, "This cut my routing time in half, literally" (August 2017) and "I can trust the optimized route unlike some of the others!" (February 2018), and Route4Me sells to a different buyer anyway, which we come back to below. The point is not that one vendor is bad. It is that the complaints cluster somewhere the demo never goes, and the cluster is not vendor-specific. Badger Maps carries a review from May 2026 that says it directly, "The routes it makes are pretty much entirely nonsensical and always require editing" (Dalton S., Sales Rep, G2, 28 May 2026), next to "Some features on app are limited compared to the web view" (Hannah C., G2, 27 May 2026). SPOTIO documents the hard version in its help centre: "Territories can only be created on the web app" (read 29 July 2026). Planning is a desk activity in most of these products. Replanning is not.

Four things to do in the trial, in this order

• Optimize a real day, then add a stop. On the phone, not the laptop. Watch whether the order changes or the stop is appended.
• Set an appointment at 3pm and re-run it. A planner that cannot hold a fixed time gets overridden by lunchtime.
• Make the route finish where it started. Two of the eighteen reviewers above got stuck on exactly this.
• Kill the signal and log a visit. Map My Customers publishes an answer, "Everything queues locally and syncs the next time the device gets a signal" (read 29 July 2026). Get the same sentence from whoever you are buying from.

Sales rep route planner: what the vendors' own docs say about optimizing

Feature matrices are useless here: every product in the category ticks the routing box. The documentation is more useful, because it says what each tool needs before it will run.

RepMove documents the mechanism on both surfaces plus one precondition that catches people out: "Once you finished adding your stops click Optimize to create the most efficient route", on mobile "You can tap Optimize, which will reorganize your stops for the most time-effective route", then "The Optimize button will be available only after you add a start and end" (help.repmove.app, read 29 July 2026). Repeat routes are templates: "You can save your route as a Route Template under a unique name so you can easily reuse it in the future."

Map My Customers names the two variables it sorts on: "Map My Customers will sort them into the optimal order by drive time and distance" (FAQ, read 29 July 2026). Badger Maps names the ceiling in the same sentence as the action: "Badger will reorganize the points on your map to create the fastest routes with up to 120 stops" (features page, read 18 July 2026). Leadbeam names the constraints as well as the ceiling: 50 stops a day, sequenced around fixed calendar meetings, live business hours and real-time traffic.

SPOTIO documents routing as native, with the selection tools reps ask for: "SPOTIO's native Routing feature allows you to organize where you need to be in the field", "Use the lasso tool to circle pins and bulk add them to a new or existing route", and "Routes created on the mobile can be run a single time, or given a name and saved as a recurring route" (help centre, read 29 July 2026). One nuance, stated carefully: its routing article describes changing the order as a manual step, "you can edit any specific stops on the route, change the order of stops, set a starting/ending location", and does not describe an automatic pass. An article that omits something is not evidence the product lacks it. It is a question to put to the vendor.

The useful comparison is not who optimizes but what each one insists on first. RepMove wants a start and an end. Leadbeam sequences around the calendar. Map My Customers optimizes on drive time and distance. Badger stops at 120. Four products, one label.

Sales route optimization: minutes or miles?

There is a fork inside the word optimize, and one vendor has stated publicly which side it took. Answering a reviewer who complained about backtracking, Badger Maps wrote:

"our optimized route is the one that takes the least amount of minutes. However, this route doesn't necessarily have to be the one with the least amount of miles." Badger Maps, public vendor reply on G2 to a review of November 2022. Read 18 July 2026.

For most sales teams that is the right choice, because the scarce resource is selling hours, not fuel. It matters because the same vendor also sells the other number, listing "Generate verifiable mileage reports" among its features (read 18 July 2026). If you reimburse mileage, the figure your planner minimises and the figure on the expense claim can move in opposite directions in the same week. Ask which target the tool optimizes for, and whether you can switch it.

Route planner for sales reps: where the tool actually runs

The plan is built at a desk. The replan happens in a car park with one bar of signal, which makes the phone app not a companion but the half that carries the harder job. That is measurable: every vendor here is rated separately by buyers on G2 and by users on Google Play, and the two numbers disagree in one direction.

None of that means an app is broken. Store ratings are self-selected and tilt towards people with a problem, while G2 and Capterra reviews are often collected by vendors from customers they pick. Neither is a verdict. What matters for a trial is that the gap runs one way for all four vendors, and the low side is the population replanning in the car. The Android reports are specific rather than vague: on Badger's Play listing, "Absolutely terrible to use. Developers rarely/never update with requested QoL fixes" (May 2026) and "constantly receiving error messages... tired of wasting portions of my day uninstalling" (July 2025), both read 18 July 2026. So run the trial on the phones and the network your reps actually have, and give the Android half of the team a vote.

Sales route planning software: what it costs in 2026

The seat prices are in the table at the top of this page. What a table cannot show is the shape of the bill, and that is where the surprises live.

Add-ons on top of the seat. SalesRabbit prices four capabilities separately from the plan: "DataGrid AI $19 / $31", "Mover Leads $13 / $20", "Digital Contracts $13 / $20" and "Weather $19 / $31", each "/ user / month" for annual and monthly billing, on top of Team at $59 monthly or Pro at $75 monthly and $49 annual (read 29 July 2026). The advertised $49 assumes the annual commitment.

Two statements on one page. Badger Maps publishes "Straightforward pricing with no hidden fees" and "No setup fees. No integration fees." on the same pricing page that sells four territory products separately, from "$12 /mo Per user" to "$50 /mo Per user", each with a five-unit minimum (read 29 July 2026; the four products are broken out on our sales territory mapping page). The Business tier also carries a record ceiling, "Up to 2,000 records/accounts per license", with the qualifier that belongs with it, "(unlimited records for CRM integrated users)".

A price that depends on where you look. Map My Customers states in its FAQ that "Pricing is custom because field teams vary so much", while its pricing page lists $99, $139 and $199 per user per month with three, ten and thirty-five seat minimums and "Plans are based on a 12-month commitment" (both read July 2026). Two answers from one vendor, and which you get depends on the page you land on.

No price at all. SPOTIO's pricing page says "Pricing is user-based. View add-ons below for additional benefits" and shows none, alongside "Minimum team size: 5+ field sales professionals" (read 19 July 2026). Its billing documentation says what you are signing: "User Commitment - how many licenses have you committed to keeping 'active' on the account at each billing date. This is the MINIMUM number of licenses you will be charged for at each billing date", with "You are automatically billed for new licenses at time of invite" (read 29 July 2026). Route4Me went the same way inside ten days in July 2026, from three published flat tiers to "CONTACT US" in all three.

Full sourced breakdowns per vendor: Badger Maps pricing, SPOTIO pricing, SalesRabbit pricing, Route4Me pricing.

Is there a free sales route planner?

Mostly no, and the exceptions are narrower than the search results suggest: one documented free tier across eight vendors, a handful of trials on different terms, and three products whose only entrance is a call.

The one free tier. SalesRabbit publishes "SalesRabbit Lite - Free version available with limited functionality" for individual users, and where the limit sits was settled in public. A reviewer wrote in May 2025, "You cannot export your data without paying them money And they are not upfront about that", and SalesRabbit replied in June 2025, "SalesRabbit Lite is the free version of our platform. While it doesn't include features like data export, it still offers strong value at zero cost." Both read 29 July 2026. A usable free planner, as long as your data never needs to leave.

The trials. Badger Maps advertises "We offer a 14-day free trial for individual users" and, on the same page, "Start Your Free Trial No Credit Card Required For 7 Days". Its own knowledge base article answers differently: "The free trial is around 4 to 14 days. You have 4 days of free trial upon signing up, and you can extend it to 3 more days after completing your profile. You can also get another 7 days once you subscribe to any of our plans." All three read 29 July 2026, all three from Badger, printed together because that is the only fair way to print them. Route4Me published "7 Day Unlimited Trial" and "No Credit Card" on 19 July 2026; ten days later the page carried no trial wording at all.

The closed doors. SPOTIO: "We don't offer a free trial, but we provide comprehensive demos." Map My Customers: "Most teams start with a guided demo and pilot rather than a self-serve free trial." Leadbeam publishes prices but no self-serve entry, every call to action reading Book a demo or Talk to sales (all read 29 July 2026). A sales model, not a fault, and it decides whether a two-rep team evaluates the product this week or next quarter.

A sales route planner and a delivery route planner are not the same tool

Search results for route planning mix two categories that share an algorithm and nothing else. The clearest statement of the difference comes from the delivery side, in Route4Me's own Google Play listing:

"This app is for professional drivers & couriers... not recreational roadtrippers." ... "already being used by many UPS, FedEx, and professional delivery drivers" Route4Me, Google Play store listing, store category "Maps & Navigation". Read 29 July 2026.

The commercial structure follows the sentence. On Route4Me's pricing page the row "ERP and CRM Platforms" carries "Contact Us" in all three tiers, next to "Order Label Scanning" and "Load and Unload Orders" (read 29 July 2026). That also explains where the replan complaints cluster. A delivery manifest is fixed at dispatch, so a route that hardens after optimization is a reasonable design; a sales day is not fixed at dispatch, which is why the same design fails in the field. If your team runs stock as well as calls, see food and beverage distribution.

FAQ

What is the best sales route planner?

It depends on the motion. For a field team working named accounts, Lead Mapper at $27 per user per month and Badger Maps at $58 billed annually are the direct comparison. For solo reps, RepMove Flex is the cheapest published seat at $16.67 annually. For door-to-door, SPOTIO and SalesRabbit are built for the knock. For deliveries, Route4Me says its app is for professional drivers and couriers.

Can I add a stop after the route is optimized?

Test it, do not assume it. In the Route4Me corpus, four independent reviewers between 2019 and 2023 report that an added stop is appended rather than resequenced, and four more report that a route cannot be corrected once optimized or once the driver has departed. It is a ten-second test and the most useful one in a trial.

How many stops should a sales route planner handle?

More than a day, because the constraint that bites is the week, not the Tuesday. Published figures: Leadbeam up to 50 stops a day, Badger Maps up to 120, Lead Mapper up to 6,000. Most vendors publish no number. Full comparison in the sales routing software guide.

Is there a free sales route planner for sales reps?

One: SalesRabbit Lite, free for individual users, without data export by the vendor's own June 2025 statement. Everything else is a trial or a demo, and three of the eight vendors publish no self-serve entry at all.

Does a sales route planner replace my CRM?

No. Leadbeam's FAQ answers it directly: "Are you a CRM replacement? - No, Leadbeam is a CRM companion. We integrate seamlessly into your existing CRM" (read 29 July 2026). The planner decides where the day goes and returns what happened. See our CRM integrations for how that sync works on our side.

Can I just use Google Maps?

For a handful of stops, yes. Google Maps gives up at around ten and knows nothing about your accounts: no visit history, no cadence, no territories, no CRM. Most tools here, including ours, plan the day and hand individual legs to Google Maps, Waze or Apple Maps for the driving.