Publishing a hosted tiled map service using a tile package

ArcGIS for Desktop allows you to build tiles for a map document and store them in an easily transferrable tile package (.tpk) file. You can share a tile package on ArcGIS Online and choose to publish it as a hosted tiled map service. This workflow allows you to build the tiles using your own computing power, rather than your ArcGIS Online credits.

Follow these steps to publish a hosted tiled map service using a tiled package.

Steps:

1. Open your map in ArcMap and ensure that it's using the WGS 1984 Web Mercator (Auxiliary Sphere) coordinate system.
2. Click Customize > ArcMap Options > Sharing and ensure that Enable ArcGIS Runtime tools is checked.

   This enables the menu option you'll use in the next step.

3. In ArcMap, click File > Share As > Tile Package.
4. Configure all the settings in the substeps below. Other settings are left to your choosing.
   1. In the Tile Package tab, choose Upload package to my ArcGIS Online account.
   2. In the Tile Format tab, choose ArcGIS Online / Bing Maps / Google Maps as the Tiling Scheme.
   3. In the Item Description tab, provide the items marked as required.
   4. In the Sharing tab, make sure that the connection information for your ArcGIS Online account is correct.
5. Click Share.

   You may be prompted to save your map before the tile package can be created.

   It can take a while for a tile package to be generated, especially if you have included large scales.

6. When your tile package has finished generating, log in to your ArcGIS Online organizational account and click My Content.
7. Click your tile package to display its item details page.
8. Click Publish.
9. Type a title and tags and click Publish.

The tiles are unpacked and hosted as a service. You should be able to see the service in the My Content page.

Once you've verified the service is running, you can optionally delete the original tile package so that you don't have to pay credits to store it.

Tip:

To build and share large tile packages, it's recommended that you use the Tile Cache toolset instead of using the above workflow. These tools can take advantage of multiple processing cores. You run the tools in this order:

1. Generate Tile Cache Tiling Scheme to define the tiling grid and image format.
2. Manage Tile Cache to build the tiles.
3. Export Tile Cache to create the tile package.
4. Share Package (in the Package toolset) to upload the tiles onto ArcGIS Online.