Building Footprints Across China from OpenStreetMap

OpenStreetMap exports provide building footprints across China, including every feature tagged as a building. The data includes structures ranging from residential homes to hospitals, schools, and places of worship. The Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) maintains this export, last updated on 2026-05-15.

Use Cases

• Population estimation based on building density and type.
• Damage assessment for disaster response using building location data.
• Urban planning analysis based on the distribution of residential, commercial, and institutional buildings.

Strengths

• Includes all OpenStreetMap features tagged as a building, providing a wide range of structure types.
• Available in multiple geospatial file formats including GEOPACKAGE, SHP, and JSON.
• Data is maintained by the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) and was last updated on 2026-05-15.

Limitations

• Completeness varies by region; urban areas are usually well-mapped, but remote areas may be incomplete.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Cross-checking critical decisions with local field knowledge is recommended.

Provenance

Source

OpenStreetMap

Collection Method

Volunteer-contributed mapping via the OpenStreetMap platform.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-05-15.

Geography

China