Export and Share a Relationship Map

In one line: how to get a relationship map out of Slima — PNG, SVG and the .map source file — and exactly what a reader sees when you put one on a share link.

What problem it solves

Once a relationship map is drawn, it sits inside your book. But almost every occasion for using it is outside Slima: a query letter wants a cast diagram, a pitch deck wants one page on the three factions, a co-writer wants to check the worldbuilding, you want it printed and pinned to a wall.

There are two ways out, and which one you want depends on whether the other person needs to move it:

Two routes

They need a picture Export PNG / SVG Drop it in a doc, deck or letter

They need to pan and zoom Add it to a share link They open it in a browser

A picture is a snapshot. A link follows every edit you make later.

Three exports

The download icon in the canvas's top-right corner opens a menu:

Option	What you get	When to use it
Export PNG	A raster image at double resolution	Slides, Word, query letters, social
Export SVG (vector)	Vector art, sharp at any size, editable in a drawing app	Print, or when you need to change the type or colours
Export .map source	The map itself	Backups, handing it to another Slima user

All three hand the file to your browser to save. Every filename starts with relationship-map-, then the map's own name, then the date: relationship-map-Relationship_Map-2026-09-09.png. Anything that isn't a Latin letter, a digit, a hyphen or an underscore becomes an underscore, so a map named in Chinese, Korean or Arabic comes out as a row of underscores. If you want to tell them apart in your downloads folder, name the map in Latin letters.

It exports the whole map, not the part you're looking at

However far you've zoomed out or wherever you've dragged to, the export always frames all of the content, with a margin around it. Nodes sitting outside the window are drawn too; nothing gets cropped.

In dark mode the export is still on white

Exports are fixed to a white background with light-theme colours. If dark mode's white text came through as-is, the whole thing would vanish the moment you pasted it into a white document — so this one deliberately doesn't match your screen.

The source export is the .map file itself

Export .map source saves a file with a .map extension. Drag it back into Slima and it's a complete relationship map again, no conversion needed: positions, colours, groups, edges and relationship labels all intact.

What a reader sees on a share link

A .map can go into a public share link — just tick it at the file-picking step. What the other person gets isn't a flat picture, it's a read-only relationship map:

• The whole map on first sight, scaled and centred, not landing on some corner of it.
• They can pan and zoom (25% to 200%), with the current level shown in the corner.
• On a computer the scroll wheel scrolls the page. To zoom, they hold Ctrl/⌘ and scroll. That's so the map can't swallow the page they're trying to read.
• On a phone, one finger pans and two fingers zoom.
• Once they've dragged it off-centre or zoomed in too far, a Zoom to fit button appears in the corner — there's a way back.

What a reader doesn't get matters just as much:

• No editing, and no toolbar.
• None of the comments you left on nodes, edges or groups.
• The character files behind the nodes aren't published with the map and can't be opened from it — unless you add those files to the same share link yourself.
• The light/dark theme on the reader page is theirs, not yours.

If the file's contents can't be read, the share page says Could not read this relationship map rather than showing an empty frame.

Putting it in a document or a pitch

A few real routes:

• One diagram page in a query letter or pitch deck: export PNG and paste it. The names are baked into the picture, so settle them first — renaming one character later means exporting again.
• Anything going to print: use SVG. It stays sharp at A3, and you can still adjust colours and type in a drawing app.
• Back into your own draft in Slima: export PNG, then insert the image from the editor. That way the picture gets backed up with the book.
• A collaborator who'll keep coming back to it: use a share link, not a PNG. When you change the map, the link changes with it. A PNG doesn't.
• Handing the map to another Slima user: the .map source.
• When you want feedback: a share link can take comments. Note that comments anchor to the page, so the notes you left on nodes in the editor don't show up on their side.

Notes

• An export is a snapshot of that moment. Edit the map afterwards and the file you already exported doesn't change with it.
• One book can hold many .map files. Rather than cramming every faction into one and exporting an unreadable picture, draw one per thread and export one per thread.
• The .map source contains internal ids meant for Slima to read. Don't hand-edit it in a text editor — make changes in the relationship map editor instead.

Related

• Docs: Relationship Map: Draw Your Characters' Connections — how nodes, edges and groups are built.
• Docs: The Relationship Map Is Also a Whiteboard — selection, alignment, undo, phones.
• Docs: Public share links, The reader view recipients get.
• Docs: Exporting your book — the whole-book export formats.