The types of maps based on the scale are as follows:
(i) Large scale maps show small areas in greater detail because they are drawn on a relatively large scale.
(ii) Cadastral maps are village and town maps which show individual fields and house sites.
(iii) Topographical maps show smaller areas in much greater detail. These maps are prepared by Survey of India. These are also large scale maps which show both natural features like hills and valleys as well as man-made features like buildings, road and canals. 
(iv) Small scale maps show large areas like continent or countries. These maps are drawn on 1 cm = 1000 kms. These are called small-scale maps.
(v) Wall maps are small-scale maps showing large areas. They are useful for students in classrooms and offices. Small scale maps cover a larger area and depict it with limited information.
(vi) Atlas is a collection of maps in a book. Atlas maps are small-scale maps covering large areas like continents and countries. Only prominent relief features, main roads, railways and important towns are shown in Atlas maps. The study of geographic characteristics of a large area is possible at the time with the help of an atlas.

Based on functions maps are classified as follows.
(i) Physical maps show natural features such as relief, geology, soils, drainage, elements weather, and vegetation.
(ii) Relief Maps show general topography like mountains valleys, plains, plateaus and rivers.
(iii) Geological Maps are drawn to show geological structures, rocks and minerals. 
(iv) Climatic Maps show the distribution of temperature, rainfall, clouds, relative humidity, direction and velocity of winds and other elements of weather.
(v) Soil Maps which are drawn to show the distribution of different types of soil and their properties.
(vi) Cultural Maps which shows the man-made features are called cultural maps.
(vii) Political Maps show the administrative divisions of a country, state or district. These maps facilitate the administration in planning and management of the concerned administrative units.
(viii) Population Maps show the distribution, density and growth of population, occupation structure and literacy.
(ix) Economic Maps depict the production and distribution of different types of crops and minerals, location of industries, trade routes and flow of commodities.
(x) Transportation Maps show roads, railway lines and the location of railway station, airports and seaports, etc.,
(xi) Thematic maps are all such maps that represent the distribution of a particular feature or theme and its spatial variation.
(xii) Google maps is a web-based service that provides detailed information about geographical regions and sites around the world.

Maps are a graphical representation of the world or a section of the world. As a representation of the world, maps are compressed versions of the real world meaning that a large piece of land is recreated onto a smaller piece of paper or digital file. The relationship between the real world size of a geographic feature and its representative feature on a map is known as scale. There are three main ways that scale is indicated on a map: graphic (or bar), Verbal and representative fraction (RF).

Elements of maps:
(i) Maps provide us with a lot of information and one must know how to read and interpret them.
(ii) Every map is provided with certain features that act as an aid to study the information presented in it.
(iii) The basic essential elements of a map are title, direction, scale and legend (or) key of symbol.
Title:
Every map has a title that describes the information given in the map. For example, a map with the title India Rivers shows rivers of India.
Direction:
(i) In general maps are drawn with north orientation. It helps us to find other directions on the map like East, West and South. In addition to the North notation, latitudes and longitudes are depicted in the margins.
(ii) The North is notified by letter 'N' with an arrow mark.

Scale:
(i) The scale of a map is the ratio between the distance on the map between two points and actual distance between the two places on the ground.
(ii) The scales can be represented as 1 cm = 10 km.
(iii) It means lcm on the map is equal to 10 km on the ground. It helps to find the distance on the map between two points.

Legend:
(i) A legend or key of a map explains the symbols that are used on it to represent various physical and cultural features.
(ii) The common signs and symbols are internationally accepted and used in maps are called conventional signs and symbols.
(iii) Every map has a legend or a key which explains the different colours and symbols used in it. On a map it is difficult to show the real shapes such as settlements, bridges, post offices, railway lines and forests because there is not enough space to actually draw them.
(iv) They are depicted by using certain colours, symbols or letters.