Swiss Populated Places and Residential Areas from OpenStreetMap

OpenStreetMap exports for Switzerland include named cities, towns, villages, suburbs, and residential land areas. The Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) compiled this data, last updated on 2026-05-14. Completeness varies by region, with urban areas typically well-mapped and remote areas potentially incomplete.

Use Cases

• Demographic context mapping based on named settlements and residential land use.
• Settlement-level targeting for humanitarian or commercial projects based on populated place locations.
• Population distribution analysis based on the density and classification of residential areas.

Strengths

• Data is derived from OpenStreetMap, a free, collaborative world map built by volunteers.
• Covers multiple settlement types including cities, towns, villages, suburbs, and residential land.
• Available in multiple geospatial formats including GEOPACKAGE, KML, SHP, and GEOJSON.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Completeness varies by region; urban areas are usually well-mapped, remote areas may be incomplete.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

OpenStreetMap

Collection Method

Volunteer-contributed mapping and export by the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT).

Freshness

Last updated 2026-05-14 01:52:39.939252; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Switzerland