🗺️ OpenStreetMap Business & POI Scraper — Scrape Businesses & Points of Interest, No API Key

Scrape businesses and points of interest from OpenStreetMap using the free Overpass API. This OpenStreetMap scraper extracts business name, full address, phone number, website, email, opening hours, GPS coordinates and category for any city, bounding box or radius in the world. No API key, no Google Maps billing, no proxy and no browser — just clean, structured POI data from the world's most comprehensive open geographic database, ready to export to JSON, CSV or Excel.

✨ What this Actor does / Key features

• 🌍 Global coverage — query businesses and POIs in 190+ countries from the live OpenStreetMap database.
• 📍 Three search modes — by city name, by bounding box (south/west/north/east), or by radius around a point.
• 🏷️ 50+ categories — restaurants, cafes, bars, hotels, pharmacies, hospitals, supermarkets, schools, salons, fuel stations and more.
• 📇 Rich contact data — name, full address, phone, website, email and machine-readable opening hours.
• 🧭 GPS coordinates — latitude/longitude plus OSM element ID, type and direct OSM link for every POI.
• 🏢 Chain & brand info — brand, operator, cuisine, wheelchair access, plus Wikipedia/Wikidata references.
• 🎚️ Quality filters — require a name tag and/or require a street/city address to drop incomplete records.
• ⚡ No browser, no proxy — direct HTTP POST to Overpass with multiple fallback endpoints for reliability.
• 💸 Free data source — a low-cost alternative to the paid Google Maps / Places API.

🔍 Input

Field	Type	Description
searchMode	string	How to define the search area: city, bbox, or radius.
city	string	City to search in. Used only when searchMode = city.
bboxSouth	number	Southern boundary latitude. Used when searchMode = bbox.
bboxWest	number	Western boundary longitude. Used when searchMode = bbox.
bboxNorth	number	Northern boundary latitude. Used when searchMode = bbox.
bboxEast	number	Eastern boundary longitude. Used when searchMode = bbox.
centerLat	number	Center point latitude. Used when searchMode = radius.
centerLng	number	Center point longitude. Used when searchMode = radius.
radiusMeters	integer	Search radius in meters (100–50,000). Used when searchMode = radius.
categories	array	Which types of POIs to search for (e.g., "restaurant", "cafe", "hotel").
requireName	boolean	Only return POIs that have a name tag in OSM.
requireAddress	boolean	Skip POIs that have no street or city address.
maxResults	integer	Maximum number of POIs to return. Set to 0 for unlimited.
queryConcurrency	integer	How many Overpass API batches to run in parallel. Keep low (2–3) to avoid rate limiting.

🚀 Example input

{
  "searchMode": "city",
  "city": "Istanbul",
  "categories": ["restaurant", "cafe", "hotel"],
  "requireName": true,
  "requireAddress": false,
  "maxResults": 500,
  "queryConcurrency": 3
}

📦 Output

Each POI is saved as a structured item in the dataset. Export to JSON, CSV, Excel or XML, or pull via the Apify API.

Field	Description
osmId	OpenStreetMap element ID
osmType	Element type: node, way, or relation
name	Business / POI name
category	Top-level category (e.g., Food & Drink)
subcategory	OSM tag value (e.g., cafe)
amenity	Raw OSM amenity tag
shop	Raw OSM shop tag
tourism	Raw OSM tourism tag
office	Raw OSM office tag
lat	GPS latitude
lng	GPS longitude
street	Street name
houseNumber	House number
city	City
postcode	Postal code
country	Country code
fullAddress	Formatted full address
phone	Phone number
website	Website URL
email	Contact email
openingHours	OSM opening hours string
brand	Brand name for chains
operator	Operator or owner
cuisine	Cuisine type
wheelchair	Wheelchair access (yes / no / limited)
wikipedia	Wikipedia reference
wikidata	Wikidata reference
osmUrl	Link to the OSM element
scrapedAt	Scrape timestamp (ISO 8601)

💡 Use cases

• Lead generation — build targeted business lists (restaurants, hotels, clinics, salons) with phone numbers and websites for sales outreach.
• Google Maps API alternative — get comparable geographic data for free when Maps API costs or quotas become a problem.
• Local directory sites — seed neighbourhood guides and city portals with real addresses, hours and categories.
• GIS & research — download structured POI data for spatial analysis, catchment modelling and urban planning; load directly into QGIS, PostGIS or Python.
• Real estate & site selection — find pharmacies, supermarkets and schools within a radius of a prospective site for amenity scoring.
• Market research — count businesses per neighbourhood, map competitor density and spot underserved areas.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Is it legal to scrape OpenStreetMap data? Yes. OpenStreetMap data is open and released under the Open Database License (ODbL). The Actor uses the public Overpass API. When you publish work using the data, attribution to "© OpenStreetMap contributors" is required.

Do I need an API key or a login? No. There is no API key, no Google Maps billing and no proxy required. You only need an Apify account to run the Actor.

How does this compare to the Google Maps API? The Google Maps / Places API charges per request and enforces quotas. The Overpass API is free with generous rate limits, and OpenStreetMap often has stronger coverage in Europe plus machine-readable opening hours that Google doesn't expose.

How up to date is the data? The Overpass API serves the live OpenStreetMap database, which is updated every few minutes. New businesses added to OSM appear in results almost immediately.

Why are some POIs missing phone numbers or websites? OSM completeness varies — major chains are usually well-tagged, while small independent businesses may have only a name and coordinates. Enable requireAddress to filter out incomplete records.

Can I scrape an entire city or country? Yes. Use city mode for a whole city, or bbox mode with a country's bounding box. Very large queries can time out on the public Overpass API, so the Actor automatically retries on fallback endpoints.

What does the opening hours format mean? OpenStreetMap uses a standardised format like Mo-Fr 09:00-18:00; Sa 10:00-14:00. Libraries such as opening_hours.js can parse it into human-readable schedules or check if a place is open at a given time.

⏰ Scheduling & integration

Schedule this Actor on Apify to keep your POI datasets fresh on any cadence. Export results to JSON, CSV or Excel, sync to Google Sheets, or push to your database, GIS tools and webhooks through the Apify API.