Not all maps are good in the sense that they may not communicate spatial information to map readers in a functional way. Where functional means, that the readers can understand them, they can easily read them (based on their visual perception, (see Part 1, Section Introduction to visual perception), and they can easily search for content therein as long as they perceive and form groupings of elements of a visual scene (see Part 1, Section Gestalt Theory). This section will assist you in recognizing “good” and “not so good maps”.
Read Chapter 7 Good Map Making Tips of the compilation of lecture notes for the Introduction to GIS and Spatial Analysis course by Manuel Gimond (2024), licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Read the article, Make Maps People Want to Look At – Five primary design principles for cartography, by Aileen Buckley, Esri, to have an idea of the map design principles that lead to a good map result. Finally, the Chapter 2 – Map Elements and Design Principles (by the National Information Security and Geospatial Technologies Consortium (NISGTC), and except where otherwise noted, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License) constitutes an extension to the content on the lesson Which map elements are essential.