Open street map logo

Hola Amigos. This is the story of google map alternative that you might not have heard of. Claps for those who know it.

Open street map, a/c to their website, is a map of the world, created by people like you and me. Plus, free to use under an open license.

OpenStreetMap (OSM) is a collaborative project to create a free editable map of the world.

Here, map data is collected from scratch by volunteers performing systematic ground surveys using tools such as a handheld GPS unit, a notebook, digital camera, or a voice recorder. This map data is made into the “map tiles” and OpenStreetMap will never charge you for the data.

What’s difference between OSM and Google Map?

Map Data: The Major reason is ‘DATA’. Since the map data is updated by us and every update is immediately available to all the consumer of OSM which is quite interesting. Moreover, Consumer of OSM have free access to map data which in fact wasn’t quite possible with Google Map.

Rather than the map itself, the data generated by the project is considered its primary output. ~source: Wikipedia

Pricing: Another choice of using the OSM is to minimize the cost occur from Geocoding api, Direction Api etc.

https://cloud.google.com/maps-platform/pricing/#details

https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geocoding/usage-and-billing

Styling: With other map providers, the map looks how the provider wants it to look. You might be able to do a bit of rudimentary recolouring. But it’s still their style of map, not yours. With OpenStreetMap, you’re in control. Turning the data into tiles can be done any way you like.

However, Google Maps’ design and color scheme is much better looking, you could differentiate various aspects of a map instantly.

Performace: Google Maps does a great job of being incredibly fast (tile loading, mobile performance, etc) and has better coverage in some areas (OSM is better in urban areas), but is definitely less flexible and not open for any off-line purposes.

Updates: Commercial providers only update their data every month, if you’re lucky. New roads and buildings can be missing from their datasets long after they’ve opened. OpenStreetMap data is constantly updated, and you can get those updates every day, every hour or even every minute if you want.

Who use OSM?

Pokemon GO, Github, Evernote, FourSquare and many other however the count is 1% only. So still Google Map is the Supreme Leader no doubt.

However, big companies like evernote and foursquare use third party SDK like MapBox who writes API for these big brand which again has some pricing associated with them. I believe Apple Maps is based on the OSM.

https://blog.openstreetmap.org/2012/10/02/apple-maps/

Try-it-yourself; How to use OSM in your Android Application?

Just implement the latest dependency in your project:

implementation ‘org.osmdroid:osmdroid-android:6.0.1’

2. Add Map View in your layout file.

<org.osmdroid.views.MapView

android:id="@+id/map_view"

android:layout_width="match_parent"

android:layout_height="match_parent" />

3. Now, Initialize your controller.

Screenshots: