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Wide aerial view of a coastline at daybreak.

The category

Aerial virtual tours, explained

An aerial virtual tour is an interactive walkthrough made of 360 panoramas shot by drone and linked together on a map. Visitors look wherever they want, from above, and move from one viewpoint to the next - no app, just a browser.

Browse industriesCreate an accountUpdated August 2026
5 to 10
viewpoints for a convincing first tour
20-60 m
the altitude that gives scale without losing detail
3 lines
of HTML to embed it on your site, cookie-free
1 week
from scouting to publication, weather included

What aerial shows that nothing else does

Two things, and they explain the whole category: volumes and distances.

From thirty metres up, one glance tells you the pool is two minutes from the shaded pitches, that the 7th green backs onto the sea, that the estate’s car park is hidden behind the hedge. That is precisely the information that decides a booking, and it is invisible from the ground and in a brochure.

The other effect is harder to name: a flyover conveys scale. A 400-pitch campsite and a 60-pitch one look alike in photos; from the air, never. For a venue whose size is an argument - or whose intimacy is - this is the format that tells the truth fastest.

A 400-pitch campsite and a 60-pitch one look alike in photos; from the air, never.

Comparison

Aerial, interior, video, satellite

Four ways to show a place, four different jobs. None replaces the others, and saying so honestly is the only way to choose.

  • Our format

    Aerial 360 tour

    What it shows best
    The whole site, its volumes, its distances
    Interactive?
    Yes - visitors choose where to look and where to go
    Embeddable
    Yes, as a lightweight cookie-free iframe
    Freshness
    The date of your flight
    Best use case
    Golf, campsites, estates, marinas, resorts - anywhere that spreads out

  • Other format

    Interior tourMatterport-style

    What it shows best
    Rooms, finishes, dimensions
    Interactive?
    Yes - room-to-room movement
    Embeddable
    Yes, as an iframe
    Freshness
    The date of the capture
    Best use case
    Flats, hotels, showrooms - anywhere partitioned

  • Other format

    Drone video

    What it shows best
    Emotion, movement, a short story
    Interactive?
    No - the edit dictates the path
    Embeddable
    Yes, via a video platform (and its cookies)
    Freshness
    The date of the shoot
    Best use case
    Social media, advertising, home pages

  • Other format

    Satellite map

    What it shows best
    Raw geography, unstaged
    Interactive?
    Partly - 2D pan and zoom
    Embeddable
    Yes, but without your content
    Freshness
    Often 1 to 3 years, out of your control
    Best use case
    Getting your bearings before arriving

Matterport and aerial are not competitors: they cover indoors and outdoors. A hotel with grounds has good reason to have both.

How it is made

How an aerial tour is made

Four steps, only one of which concerns you directly: choosing the viewpoints.

  1. Step 01

    Scouting

    List the viewpoints that tell the story of the place - the entrance, the heart, the areas you sell. Five to ten is enough for a convincing first tour.

  2. Step 02

    The flight

    A professional drone pilot captures a full sphere at each point, usually between 20 and 60 metres. The drone often stitches the sphere itself; if not, stitching happens on the ground.

  3. Step 03

    Processing

    Each panorama is cut into tiles and levels of detail so the tour starts in a second and sharpens afterwards. The platform does this automatically on import.

  4. Step 04

    Publishing

    Place the points on the map, add info cards and booking links, publish. The tour lives on a link, embeds into the site and shares as a QR code.

By trade

Who it is for

The principle is the same everywhere; navigation and info cards change with what the place has to sell.

Further reading

The category's guides

Three ways in: what it costs, how it gets made, and what the market's platforms are worth against a wide site.

Frequently asked questions

What does an aerial virtual tour cost?

The capture itself usually runs from a few hundred to a few thousand euros depending on the size of the site and the number of viewpoints; hosting is a separate monthly subscription. The full breakdown is in our cost guide.

Do we need to buy a drone?

No. Capture is done by a professional drone pilot who owns the equipment, the insurance and the flight permissions. You buy a service, not gear.

Can it be embedded in our existing website?

Yes, with three lines of HTML, on any site including WordPress. The embed is built without cookies or persistent identifiers.

How is this different from Google Earth or Street View?

Freshness (your flight, not a 2023 image), viewpoint (your angles, not a car’s or a satellite’s) and content (your info cards, your booking links, your brand).

You have a place to show, or a drone to make pay

Both roads lead to the same product - but not to the same starting point.

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