The service, first developed by two public agencies (the IGN and the BRGM), was officially inaugurated on 23 June 2006 by president Jacques Chirac.

All maps and aerial photographs at Geoportail may be combined and viewed in transparent layers controlled by the user.

Place names are identified and searchable for smallest villages and physical locations, beyond what is found on similar sites.

On 6 January 2006, in Metz, the former President of the French Republic, Jacques Chirac, expressed the wish to open the Géoportail during the year.

In this first release, users could browse in 2D over: After the site was first launched, connection requests were 5 times greater than expected by the project team, which led to a crash of the servers.