Nominatim VS Openstreetmap

Compare Nominatim vs Openstreetmap and see what are their differences.

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Nominatim Openstreetmap
35 741
2,864 2,022
2.1% 1.7%
9.5 9.9
13 days ago 7 days ago
Python Ruby
GNU General Public License v3.0 only GNU General Public License v3.0 only
The number of mentions indicates the total number of mentions that we've tracked plus the number of user suggested alternatives.
Stars - the number of stars that a project has on GitHub. Growth - month over month growth in stars.
Activity is a relative number indicating how actively a project is being developed. Recent commits have higher weight than older ones.
For example, an activity of 9.0 indicates that a project is amongst the top 10% of the most actively developed projects that we are tracking.

Nominatim

Posts with mentions or reviews of Nominatim. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2023-10-05.
  • Answer: How To Get Latitude & Longitude of a Address using python
    2 projects | dev.to | 5 Oct 2023
    You can simply use geopy API to get longitude and latitude from address. geopy includes geocoder classes for the OpenStreetMap Nominatim, Google Geocoding API (V3), and many other geocoding services. The full list is available on the Geocoders doc section. Geocoder classes are located in geopy.geocoders. Here…
  • Nominatim: Open-source geocoding with OpenStreetMap data
    1 project | news.ycombinator.com | 13 Jul 2023
  • Btreefs generates executable code at runtime to unpack btree nodes
    3 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 25 Jun 2023
    I have had a lot of "fun" with this feature in the past. It has earned a permanent place in my setup script:

    ALTER SYSTEM SET jit=off;

    Basically a performance blackhole for more complex queries. Most OSM related projects disable it straight away as it only creates headaches.

    https://github.com/osm-search/Nominatim/pull/2559

  • [Help] searching address
    1 project | /r/OsmAnd | 13 Jun 2023
    Because osm.org and OsmAnd use different search engines. On osm.org it uses the Nominatim geocoder which is good at parsing addresses the way we are used to writing them. It is also running on a server with a lot of storage and memory resources. OsmAnd is built for offline use so it can't use Nominatim and has much more limited computing resources available to it. It is searching through the map files locally on your phone and however they have chosen to implement that search algorithm seems to perform poorly on addresses.
  • Kako riješiti različite verzije istih adresa ulica?
    2 projects | /r/CroIT | 11 Jun 2023
    Ako skupa s adresama imaš i njihove lokacije možeš i koristiti gotov geocoder (e.g. Nominatim je free i koristi OSM podatke, možeš i deployati svoju instancu), pa iz rezultata naći geometrijski najbližu adresu koju imaš.
  • Let's build a Google Maps clone with React, Leaflet, and OneSDK
    13 projects | dev.to | 15 May 2023
    Then implement a use case. We are going to use Geocoding use case with Nominatim provider. But you can, of course, use a different provider. Copy the example code into your server.js file and make a few changes, so we can send the information we will receive from the user:
  • MicroG Qs
    1 project | /r/CalyxOS | 12 May 2023
    There are reasons why this tech was developed: because GPS can take a long time to sync up to the satellites, because GPS often doesn't work indoors, because your phone can keep a local cache of locations, and so you have the ability to find places by name or address (Geocoding) using nominatim ( https://nominatim.org )
  • Digital prepping must haves?
    1 project | /r/preppers | 28 Mar 2023
    and nominatim which does the geocoding/reverse geocoding: https://nominatim.org/
  • Bulk/batch geocoding for cheap?
    1 project | /r/gis | 24 Mar 2023
  • How do I go about with this project idea
    1 project | /r/learnprogramming | 13 Feb 2023
    Then it depends on how the location data is conveyed in the group chat. If it's a text message you need to parse it and possibly use a mapping service to do geocoding. Eg. convert "22 Main Street" or "upper Brooklyn" into GPS coordinates. Besides Google Maps API you can maybe use OpenStreetMaps via Nominatim. If it's something more like "we just passed John's house" then you need to figure out how to write some logic to determine a location from that. Or maybe they just used the WhatsApp location share feature, then you probably don't need mapping at all.

Openstreetmap

Posts with mentions or reviews of Openstreetmap. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2024-04-20.
  • The current state of map design in OpenStreetMap
    12 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 20 Apr 2024
    I wouldn't compare osm-website and osm-carto at all. The commit logs are very different.

    openstreetmap-website: https://github.com/openstreetmap/openstreetmap-website/commi... . Numerous commits most days.

    openstreetmap-carto: https://github.com/gravitystorm/openstreetmap-carto/commits . So far in 2024; one small regression fixed, one niche bit of tagging added to an existing style, some largely pointless code style tidying. That's it.

  • Organizing OpenStreetMap Mapping Parties
    8 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 12 Apr 2024
    Contributing is simple:

    1. When you see a trail or any other feature that doesn't appear on the map, take a picture.

    2. When you get home, visit https://www.openstreetmap.org and start drawing.

    The website has satellite images overlayed wirh map data, so it's easy to see what you are doing.

    You can look at your pictures to remind yourself of what was missing.

    If you have recorded your ride,you can also upload your GPX trace to OpenStreetMap to make it easier to trace features that don't show up clearly on satellite images.

  • The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, Maryland Has Collapsed
    2 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 26 Mar 2024
    What impressed me was that it looks like openstreetmap shows the bridge as down already.

    https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=16/39.2144/-76.5279

  • Open source at Fastly is getting opener
    10 projects | dev.to | 15 Mar 2024
    Through the Fast Forward program, we give free services and support to open source projects and the nonprofits that support them. We support many of the world’s top programming languages (like Python, Rust, Ruby, and the wonderful Scratch), foundational technologies (cURL, the Linux kernel, Kubernetes, OpenStreetMap), and projects that make the internet better and more fun for everyone (Inkscape, Mastodon, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Terms of Service; Didn’t Read).
  • 2024: The year of the OpenStreetMap vector maps
    12 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 11 Feb 2024
    Way overdue. OpenStreetMap's website at openstreetmap.org is its calling card, and for the past few years the default style shown (called Carto) has all but stagnated in development. Accepted features like highway=busway (introduced three years ago) are not rendered there because the maintainers can no longer be bothered, or dislike the tag personally despite broad community backing.

    What worries me for this new effort is that Paul Norman is one of the two remaining Carto sometimes-active maintainers who refuse to merge contributed PRs or even provide alternative minimal support for features like highway=busway, leading to awkward gaps on the baseline map shown on openstreetmap.org.

    I would love to be surprised in a positive way about this new effort, but I'm not holding my hopes up. Thankfully OpenStreetMap can be thoroughly useful in apps like OsmAnd and OrganicMaps, and the tile-based Tracestrack Topo layer on openstreetmap.org is getting quite decent:

    https://www.openstreetmap.org/#layers=P

  • Ask HN: Open-source projects that do something good for the world?
    1 project | news.ycombinator.com | 9 Feb 2024
    https://www.hotosm.org/tools-and-data runs software that's used for example after an earthquake. The tasking manager specifically is a reactjs app plus postgresql with plenty of open issues. HOTOSM has full-time staff, I'm not sure if the developers are full-time, but it's more organized than a volunteer project.

    https://github.com/openstreetmap/openstreetmap-website/ is Ruby on Rails (easy installable with a docker setup). The maintainers have trouble even reviewing incoming PRs so an experienced person who can triage, test, review is currently needed.

    If you're in the US then https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_for_America might be worth having a look at.

    https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/ will soon annouce vetted organizations who do open source. (last year https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/programs/2023/organizati...). Project are paid, the process is long though, all summer. https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/timeline

  • CRT Manufacturing
    1 project | news.ycombinator.com | 24 Jan 2024
    > 9450 S. W. Barns Rd

    Portlandians: Are Barns Rd and Barnes Rd the same thing? Looks like a nice spot if so: https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=18/45.50901/-122.77468

    That building is now a SFX agency: https://hellohinge.com/ (No relation to the dating app)

    Also curious if the TEKsystems employment agency next door took its name from Tektronix.

  • Waterway Map
    4 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 24 Jan 2024
    Yes, https://www.openstreetmap.org has quite inconsistent detail as it relies on people mapping stuff.

    And help is welcome, anyone can join and help with mapping!

  • The Shingle Spit in Whitstable
    1 project | news.ycombinator.com | 4 Jan 2024
    It's shown on OpenStreetMap, but not as a street: https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=16/51.3682/1.0330
  • Quairading shire erects signs telling travellers to ignore Google Maps
    2 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 28 Dec 2023

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Nominatim and Openstreetmap you can also consider the following projects:

photon - an open source geocoder for openstreetmap data

Traccar - Traccar GPS Tracking System

Open Source Routing Machine (OSRM) - Open Source Routing Machine - C++ backend

OsmAnd - OsmAnd

TileServer GL - Vector and raster maps with GL styles. Server side rendering by MapLibre GL Native. Map tile server for MapLibre GL JS, Android, iOS, Leaflet, OpenLayers, GIS via WMTS, etc.

littlenavmap - Little Navmap is a free flight planner, navigation tool, moving map, airport search and airport information system for Flight Simulator X, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, Prepar3D and X-Plane.

OwnTracks Recorder - Store and access data published by OwnTracks apps

OpenTripPlanner - An open source multi-modal trip planner

uMap - uMap lets you create maps with OpenStreetMap layers in a minute and embed them in your site.

μlogger - μlogger • web viewer for tracks uploaded with μlogger mobile client

Graphhopper - Open source routing engine for OpenStreetMap. Use it as Java library or standalone web server.