Quick answer: MindMap AI imports Freeplane .mm files directly, with no conversion step. Open Canvas, go to All Projects, click Import Project, and select the file. Your hierarchy, node text, links, folded branches, and connectors all come across. It takes about ten seconds, it is free, and your original file is untouched.
Freeplane is a serious tool and people who use it tend to have years of maps built up. The reason they start looking around is that everything in a Freeplane map is something they typed. There is no AI that will grow a branch for them, no way to turn a PDF or a recording into a map, and no version of it on their phone.
Freeplane is working on AI, and it is worth knowing where that stands. On a current 1.13.3 build you will find API key fields in preferences and very little pointing you towards an AI panel. Getting it running means a paid account with OpenAI, Gemini, or OpenRouter, a key pasted into settings, and a per-token bill from your provider. Freeplane's own beginners' forum has a user who set up two providers and still could not get an answer to a request as simple as counting the nodes in a map.
MindMap AI has imported .mm files since v2.0.15, released 6 April 2026. Start with one map and see what you get.
What you need
- Your .mm file – this is Freeplane's own save format, so there is nothing to export or convert. Save the map first if it is open with unsaved changes.
- A MindMap AI account – the free plan is enough, imports are unlimited, and they cost no AI credits.
- A file under 20 MB – a large Freeplane map is typically a few hundred kilobytes.
- About ten seconds.
Step 1: Import your .mm file
Sign in at MindMap AI. If you are new, you can sign up with Google, Apple, or email in under a minute.
Open the Canvas page, click All Projects, then click Import Project. Select your .mm file and confirm.
That is the whole process. There is no export step, no converter, and no file preparation, because .mm is Freeplane's native format and we read it directly.
Your original file is not modified. The import creates a new project from a copy, so the .mm on your disk is exactly as it was. That means you can import a map now, look at it, adjust something in Freeplane, and import again as many times as you like.
Step 2: What came across
Open the map and you should recognise it immediately.
| Freeplane element | Comes across | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Root node | Yes | Becomes your root node and the project title |
| Branches and sub-branches | Yes | Full parent and child hierarchy |
| Left and right branch placement | Yes | Side placement around the centre is preserved |
| Node text | Yes | UTF-8 throughout, so accented and non-Latin characters are safe |
| Folded branches | Yes | A folded branch imports folded, with its children hidden |
| Links on nodes | Yes | Both the node's link attribute and inline links, with anchor text kept as the label |
| Connectors between nodes | Yes | Become labelled arrows, including their curve control points |
| Formatted node text | Yes, as plain text | A node holding rich HTML keeps its text and its links. Formatting itself is dropped and the node is never lost |
| LaTeX, formulas, and PlantUML nodes | Text only | The node imports with its text as written; the payload is not evaluated |
| Colours, fonts, icons, and clouds | Replaced | You get a MindMap AI theme, and AI styling changes the whole look from one prompt |
Every node is editable by hand or by AI straight away. Nothing is read-only, and nothing sits behind a paid tier.
We import the map, not the decoration
Your colours, fonts, edge styles, icons, and clouds do not come across, and that is deliberate. Those are Freeplane's presentation layer, built around a Java desktop app, and carrying them over would mean recreating a 2000s look inside a modern canvas.
You get a MindMap AI theme instead, and changing it is a sentence rather than an afternoon. Ask AI styling for a clean dark theme with green accent branches and the whole map changes at once. Priorities, task states, and due dates that you tracked with Freeplane icons become widgets, and anything else you used icons to label becomes a tag.
The thinking is what transfers. The styling is worth redoing, and it takes a prompt.
Step 3: Put the AI to work on it
This is the part that does not exist in Freeplane without a paid API account and a setup project.
- AI copilot – chat your way from an imported map to a finished chart. It works incrementally, so your existing nodes and manual edits are preserved rather than overwritten.
- AI expand – grow any node in one click. Useful on the branches that were placeholders you never returned to, which every long-lived map has.
- AI summaries – condense a long branch to a single line without deleting what sits underneath it.
- AI relationships – have the AI find and link related ideas across branches, on top of the connectors your file already carried.
- AI focus topic – rebuild the chart around one branch when it has outgrown the map.
- AI themes and AI styling – describe the look you want in plain language instead of styling nodes one at a time.
- AI retry prompt – retry any prompt. Retries do not use credits.
Beyond the AI, the same map opens in a browser, on iPhone, on Android, and through the Chrome and Edge extensions, with no Java runtime to maintain. And you can grow a map from a PDF, a spreadsheet, an image, an audio file, or a video rather than only from typing.
You can also switch the same content between a mind map, a logic chart, and an organization chart, or work in outline view.
Step 4: Bringing across the rest
Styling aside, there are a few pieces of content Freeplane stores that we do not import. None of it is lost, because your .mm file is untouched, and each takes a minute to bring over.
Note panels. We do not import notes. If your maps keep their real content there, move that text into child nodes in Freeplane and import again. Once it is in MindMap AI, AI summaries will condense a long child node back to a line.
The details field. A Freeplane node has three text fields: text, details, and note. We use details only when a node has no text of its own, so a node with both keeps its text and leaves the details behind. If you use details as a second line of explanation, merge it into the node text first.
Floating nodes. We import the tree, so a node sitting free on the canvas with no parent does not come across. Give it a parent, even a temporary one.
Node attributes. We do not import Freeplane's key and value pairs, and there is nowhere for them to go today. If you keep structured data there, export it separately from Freeplane.
If you have a large library and some scripting experience, the first three are exactly the kind of pass Freeplane's Groovy scripting handles well, since node.note and node.details are both directly addressable.
One edge case worth knowing: we read the first node under the map, so a file carrying several independent start points brings in the first only. Freeplane maps have a single root, so this will not affect a map you built yourself. Files that started life in Coggle are the usual source.
Importing a whole library
There is no cap. The free plan includes unlimited imports, unlimited projects, and unlimited storage, so a full library costs nothing and consumes no AI credits. Import Project takes one file at a time.
Bring two or three maps across first and work with them before doing the rest. That tells you quickly whether the note and details content in your older maps is worth moving, which for most archives it turns out not to be.
Troubleshooting
- The import failed or the file was rejected. Check the file is .mm and under 20 MB. Freeplane also exports HTML, PDF, PNG, and SVG, and those are flat output rather than editable maps.
- My notes are missing. We do not import note panels. Move the text into child nodes in Freeplane and import again.
- Some nodes lost their second line of text. That was the details field, which we use only when a node has no text of its own. Merge details into the node text and re-import.
- Part of my map is missing. Those were floating nodes not attached to the tree. Attach them in Freeplane and import again.
- The map looks different from how it did in Freeplane. By design. We bring across the map and apply a MindMap AI theme rather than recreating Freeplane's styling. Describe the look you want to AI styling and the whole map changes at once.
- Accented or non-Latin characters look wrong. Both formats are UTF-8, so this should not happen. Send us the file through Help and Support.
Freeplane and MindMap AI, side by side
| Freeplane | MindMap AI | |
|---|---|---|
| AI, in practice | API key fields in preferences, no obvious route in from the app | Open a map and start typing |
| AI setup | Paid account with OpenAI, Gemini, OpenRouter or Ollama, key pasted into settings | Sign in. AI credits included on the free plan |
| AI running cost | Whatever your provider charges per token, billed by them | Included, paid plans from $9.99/month |
| Build a map from a file | Type it yourself | PDFs, documents, spreadsheets, images, audio, video |
| Where you can use it | Java desktop app on one machine | Browser, iPhone, iPad, Android, Chrome and Edge extensions |
| Setup | Install Java, install Freeplane, keep both current | Open a browser |
| Sharing | Send the .mm file | Shared workspaces with live synced updates, public links, iframe embed |
| Chart types | Mind map, concept map, flowchart, outline | Mind map, logic chart, organization chart, outline view |
| Mind map file imports | .mm and several others | 8 formats: XMind, MindManager, Mapify, Coggle, FreeMind, Freeplane, SimpleMind, MindMap AI |
| Cost | Free and open source under the GPL | Free plan with unlimited maps, nodes, and storage |
Freeplane is free, it runs offline, and it has scripting and node attributes that MindMap AI does not. If those are why you use it, keep using it. Nothing here stops you doing both, and your .mm files stay exactly where they are.
What Freeplane will not do is help you think. Every node is one you typed, and the AI it is building is not something you can sit down and use today.
For a fuller breakdown, see our Freeplane vs MindMap AI comparison.
Moving from another tool?
MindMap AI imports eight mind map formats. If Freeplane is not the only tool you are consolidating, we have step-by-step guides for XMind, MindManager, and SimpleMind, plus native support for Coggle, FreeMind, and Mapify files.
FAQ
Yes. MindMap AI has imported Freeplane .mm files since version 2.0.15, released on 6 April 2026. There is no conversion step and no third-party converter, because .mm is Freeplane's own save format: you use Import Project on the Canvas page and select the file. The imported map is a fully editable MindMap AI project rather than a read-only copy. Importing is included on the free plan and consumes no AI credits. Your original .mm file is not modified, so you always have it, and you can import the same map again whenever you want.
Yes. In MindMap AI your root node becomes the root node and the project title, the full branch hierarchy is preserved, left and right placement around the centre is kept, folded branches arrive folded, links on nodes come across with their anchor text, and connectors between nodes become labelled arrows with their curve shape intact. Nodes holding formatted HTML keep their text and links, with only the formatting itself dropped. What we replace is the visual styling, which is the point: you get a modern theme instead of Freeplane's, and AI styling will change the entire look from one sentence.
Three pieces of content, and none are lost because MindMap AI never modifies your .mm file. We do not import note panels, so move that text into child nodes and import again. We use the details field only when a node has no text of its own, so merge details into the node text if you rely on it. And we import the attached tree, so give any floating nodes a parent first. Node attributes are a fourth case with nowhere to go today. Styling is different: colours, fonts, icons, and clouds are deliberately replaced by a MindMap AI theme, which you can change with a single prompt.
Yes, though no hand-built map will reach it. A .mm file must be under 20 MB, and MindMap AI's parser accepts up to 100,000 XML elements and 50 levels of nesting, which works out to roughly 100,000 nodes and around 48 levels deep. Formatted content inside nodes uses the element allowance faster than plain text, which matters more here than for most formats because a Freeplane node can carry rich text in three separate fields. A large Freeplane map is typically a few hundred kilobytes.
Yes. MindMap AI places no limit on imports, and its free plan includes unlimited imports, projects, and storage, so a full library costs nothing and consumes no AI credits. Import Project takes one file per action, so you repeat it per map. Bring two or three across first and work with them before doing the rest, which tells you quickly whether the note and details content in your older maps is worth moving. For most archives it turns out not to be.
It is being built, and it is worth knowing where it stands before you compare it with MindMap AI. On a current 1.13.3 build you will find API key fields in preferences and very little pointing you towards an AI panel. Getting it running means a paid account with OpenAI, Gemini, or OpenRouter, a key pasted into settings, and a per-token bill from your provider. Freeplane's own beginners' forum has a user who configured two providers and still could not get the AI to answer a request as basic as counting the nodes in a map.
Yes, and it is the main reason people import. In MindMap AI, AI expand grows any node into deeper subtopics, which is useful on branches that were placeholders you never returned to. AI summaries condense a long branch into a single line. AI relationships links ideas across branches on top of the connectors your file already carried, and AI styling restyles the whole map from a plain-language prompt. The copilot works incrementally, so it builds around the structure you spent years on rather than regenerating it. Retrying a prompt costs no credits.
Yes. Your .mm files are untouched by the import, so nothing stops you keeping Freeplane for offline work and scripting while using MindMap AI for AI expansion, sharing, and mobile access. Imports are unlimited on the free plan, so you can bring a map across whenever you want to work on it that way. The one thing to remember is that changes made in MindMap AI do not flow back into the .mm file, so decide which side is the source of truth for a given map.
