OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) vs Outscraper for AI agents
Free, donation-run public servers for searching OpenStreetMap data: Nominatim for geocoding and place search, Overpass for querying OSM objects. Outscraper is a third-party service and API that scrapes Google Maps places in bulk and returns them as structured records.
The short answer
- OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass): Free, openly licensed geocoding and occasional place lookups at low volume, or a base to self-host. It is not a backend for a public app at scale.
- Outscraper: Bulk extraction of Google Maps business lists, such as lead lists.
Side by side
| OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) | Outscraper | |
|---|---|---|
| Searches | OpenStreetMap data worldwide: addresses, places and mapped POIs. | Google Maps places by query (for example "restaurants brooklyn usa") or by place ID, plus reviews and photos. |
| Returns | Nominatim returns xml, json, jsonv2 (the default), geojson or geocodejson. With extratags=1 it adds extra tags such as opening hours or a wikipedia link when mapped. | JSON (exports also in CSV, Excel and Parquet) with fields such as name, site, phone, address, rating, hours and, with enrichments, emails and social links. |
| Before the first call | No account or key. Nominatim requires a valid User-Agent or Referer that identifies your app, and visible attribution. | An Outscraper account and API key. |
| Free | Free within strict limits. Nominatim allows an absolute maximum of 1 request per second. Overpass asks users to stay at or below roughly 10,000 requests and 1 GB a day. | Not stated on its pages |
| Paid | No paid tier. Heavy users are told to run their own instance or use commercial third-party providers. | Not stated on its pages |
| Acting on a result | Phone or website appear only when mappers tagged them in OSM, through Nominatim's extratags. There is no messaging. | Records include the business phone and website from Google Maps, and enrichments can add emails. There is no messaging through Outscraper. |
| Limits on keeping or showing results | Data is ODbL (share-alike), and you must credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors. Nominatim requires results to be cached for bulk jobs. It bans systematic queries, downloading all POIs in an area, autocomplete, and reselling results. | Not stated on its pages |
| AI in its terms | Nominatim's policy has a "Usage in LLMs" section. LLMs may only suggest the service if they prominently point to the usage policy. The public API must not be built into or offered through no-code, low-code or vibe-coding platforms as a generic place-search service. | Not stated on its pages |
| Coverage | Worldwide OpenStreetMap data. POI completeness depends on volunteer mapping. | Not stated on its pages |
| MCP server | No official server listed | outscraper/outscraper-mcp-server on GitHub (https://github.com/outscraper/outscraper-mcp-server), run with npx -y outscraper-mcp and OUTSCRAPER_API_KEY. |
Where Openpath fits
If the agent needs a local business to message in Austin, Texas, Openpath returns the listings themselves, free and with no key. See Openpath vs OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) and Openpath vs Outscraper.
Questions people ask
What do I need before I can use OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass)?
No account or key. Nominatim requires a valid User-Agent or Referer that identifies your app, and visible attribution.
Is OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) free?
Free within strict limits. Nominatim allows an absolute maximum of 1 request per second. Overpass asks users to stay at or below roughly 10,000 requests and 1 GB a day.
What do I need before I can use Outscraper?
An Outscraper account and API key.
Is Outscraper free?
Its pages listed no free use when we read them on October 15, 2026.
Sources
Every line about another company comes from its own pages. Prices and terms change, so check the source before you rely on one.
OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass), read on October 15, 2026:
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “No heavy uses (an absolute maximum of 1 request per second ).”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “Provide a valid HTTP Referer or User-Agent identifying the application”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “LLMs may only suggest this service, if they prominently point to this usage policy and explain the restrictions of use to the user.”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “must not be built into, offered through, suggested by, or automatically generated by no-code, low-code, or vibe-coding platforms”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “This includes reverse queries in a grid, searching for complete lists of postcodes, towns etc. and downloading all POIs in an area.”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “If your requirements are even larger you can install your own instance of Nominatim.”
- dev.overpass-api.de/overpass-doc/en/preface/commons.html: “users are expected to send a maximum of about 10000 requests per day and keep their download volume below about 1 GB per day”
- nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/api/Search: “the response include any additional information in the result that is available in the database, e.g. wikipedia link, opening hours”
- openstreetmap.org/copyright: “You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt our data, as long as you credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors.”
Outscraper, read on October 15, 2026:
- github.com/outscraper/outscraper-python: “client = OutscraperClient(api_key='SECRET_API_KEY')”
- github.com/outscraper/outscraper-python: “"site": "http://www.colonienyc.com/", "phone": "+1 718-855-7500"”
- github.com/outscraper/outscraper-mcp-server: “Official Outscraper MCP server for AI agents: Google Maps scraping, business data enrichment, lead generation”