Export Formats

Shapefile .shp

Shapefiles are a tabular format developed by Esri. They are the most popular file format for GIS data. A shapefile is actually 3-4 individual files, commonly bundled together as a ZIP archive:

  • .shp - shape format; feature geometry
  • .shx - index format; positional index
  • .dbf - attribute format; columnar information
  • .prj - coordinate format; projection information

Choose to export Shapefiles if you need the broadest compatibilty among GIS software.

  • QGIS
  • GRASS GIS
  • ArcMap
  • MapInfo
Limitations
  • Size limit of 2 GB
  • column name length limit of 10 characters

Further Information

Geopackage .gpkg

OGC Geopackages store geospatial data in a single SQLite database. Geopackages are very similar to Spatialite-enabled SQLite databases. They should be usable in most major GIS applications. Geopackages support practically unlimited file sizes and numbers of columns in tables, and have full support for Unicode. They're especially ideal if you need to run SQL queries over the data.

Compatible Software

  • PostgreSQL, SQL databases via GDAL/OGR
  • QGIS
  • Microsoft Access

Further Information

GeoJSON .geojson

GeoJSON is an open standard geospatial data interchange format that represents simple geographic features and their nonspatial attributes. Based on JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), GeoJSON is a format for encoding a variety of geographic data structures. It uses a geographic coordinate reference system, World Geodetic System 1984, and units of decimal degrees.

Compatible Software

  • QGIS
  • ArcGIS
  • Mapbox
  • Leaflet
Limitations
  • Size limit is dependent on the capabilities of the software being used
  • Not suitable for large datasets or complex spatial analyses due to its lack of indexing and projection information.

Further Information

FlatGeobuf .fgb

FlatGeobuf is a binary file format for storing geospatial vector data in a compact and efficient manner. It uses a hierarchical structure to organize features into layers, and stores attribute data in a separate file.

Compatible Software

  • QGIS
  • Mapbox
  • Leaflet
  • PostGIS
Limitations
  • Not all GIS software supports FlatGeobuf natively, which may require additional tools or plugins to use.
  • Lacks support for complex geometry types and some spatial operations.
  • Requires additional processing to work with other non-binary formats, such as CSV or GeoJSON.

Further Information

CSV .csv

CSV is a file format for storing tabular data in plain text format. Each row of data represents a record, and each column represents a field of that record. CSV files are widely used because they are simple and easy to create and manipulate, making them a popular choice for data exchange.

Compatible Software

  • Microsoft Excel
  • OpenOffice Calc
  • Google Sheets
  • R or Python programming languages
Limitations
  • Does not support hierarchical data structures
  • Does not support data typing, meaning that all values are treated as strings
  • Does not include any metadata or schema information

SQL .sql

SQL files are plain text files that contain SQL commands to create, modify or interact with a relational database. They can be used to define database schemas, constraints, and indexes, as well as to insert, update, and query data.

Compatible Software

  • MySQL
  • Oracle Database
  • Microsoft SQL Server
  • PostgreSQL
  • SQLite
Limitations
  • SQL files do not contain data themselves, but rather commands to manipulate data in a database
  • May require additional tools or plugins to visualise or work with data in other software or file formats
  • Performance can be impacted by the complexity and size of the data being queried

Further Information

Garmin .img

A .IMG file contains all information needed to render a map on a Garmin GPS mobile device. A .IMG is a disk image containing several files:

  • .rgn - map elements; polylines, polygons and points
  • .lbl - labels; map elements, city names, localities, etc
  • .tre - map structure information; data tree
  • .net - road network information
  • .nod - routing information
  • .mdr - searchable address table for routing desinations

Compatible Hardware/Software

  • Garmin
  • QLandkarte
  • OSM Composer
  • GroundTruth

Further Information

Google Earth .kml

The KMZ file is a compressed version of a KML file. KML is an XML-based foramt for modeling points, lines, polygons and associated attributes.

Compatible Software

  • Google Earth
  • Google Maps
  • QGIS
  • ArcMap

Further Information

OSM .pbf

OpenStreetMap's canonical data format is an XML document of nodes, ways and relations. The Protocol Buffer Binary Format (PBF) is an optimised representation of OSM XML, which is smaller on disk and faster to read. This format is only compatible with OpenStreetMap specific tools, such as OSM editing software. Each .PBF provided by the export tool should be referentially complete - that is, any node, way or relation referenced by a way or relation will appear in the PBF.

Compatible Software:

  • JOSM
  • Osmosis
  • QGIS
  • ArcMap

Further Information

MBTiles .mbtiles

MBTiles is a file format for storing map tiles in a single file. The Export Tool allows users to create MBTiles containing tiles from OpenStreetMap, which can be used as sources of offline context within applications that support them.

Compatible Software

Further Information

POSM bundle

POSM bundles are intended for bootstrapping Portable OpenStreetMap instances. Bundles are tarballs containing OSM PBFs (with all features in the area of interest) and any other formats that were selected.

Compatible Software