OpenStreetMap Scraper — Business & POI Data, No API Key

An OpenStreetMap scraper that extracts local business and points-of-interest (POI) data by category from the live OpenStreetMap database via the free Overpass API. Get business name, full address, phone, website, email, opening hours and GPS coordinates for any city, bounding box or radius in the world.

This OSM business scraper is a low-cost alternative to the Google Maps / Places API — no API key, no Maps billing, no proxy and no browser. It returns clean, structured POI data ready to export to CSV, JSON or Excel, making it ideal for local-business lead generation, GIS research and directory building.

What you get

Each POI is one structured dataset item. Fields:

• Identity — osmId, osmType (node/way/relation), name, category, subcategory
• Raw OSM tags — amenity, shop, tourism, office
• Location — lat, lng, street, houseNumber, city, postcode, country, fullAddress
• Contact — phone, website, email, openingHours (machine-readable OSM format)
• Business detail — brand, operator, cuisine, wheelchair
• References — wikipedia, wikidata, osmUrl, scrapedAt

Quality filters let you require a name tag and/or a street/city address to drop incomplete records. Export to CSV, JSON, Excel (XLSX) or XML, or pull via the Apify API.

Coverage

• Global — query 190+ countries from the live OSM database (updated every few minutes).
• 50+ categories — restaurants, cafes, bars, hotels, pharmacies, hospitals, supermarkets, schools, salons, fuel stations and more.
• Three search modes — by city name, by bounding box (south/west/north/east), or by radius around a point.

Use cases

• Local-business lead generation — build targeted 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 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.

How to use

1. Choose a Search Mode: city (auto-resolves a bounding box), bbox, or radius.
2. Provide the area — a city name, the four bbox coordinates, or a center point plus radiusMeters.
3. Set Categories (e.g. restaurant, cafe, hotel) and optional filters (requireName, requireAddress).
4. Set maxResults (0 = unlimited) and run. Export results as CSV, JSON or Excel, or pull via the Apify API.

Example input:

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

Schedule the actor to keep POI datasets fresh, and sync results to Google Sheets, a database, GIS tools or webhooks via the Apify API.

FAQ

Do I need an API key or login?

No. There is no API key, no Google Maps billing and no proxy required — the actor uses the public Overpass API. You only need an Apify account to run it.

Is it legal to scrape OpenStreetMap data?

Yes. OpenStreetMap data is open under the Open Database License (ODbL). When you publish work using the data, attribution to "© OpenStreetMap contributors" is required.

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 limits, and OSM often has strong coverage in Europe plus machine-readable opening hours that Google doesn't expose.

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.

Is this an Overpass API alternative?

Yes. It wraps the free Overpass API so you can scrape OpenStreetMap without writing Overpass QL — pick a city, bbox or radius plus categories and get clean POI records back.

How do I export OpenStreetMap data to CSV or JSON?

Run the actor and download the dataset as CSV, JSON, Excel (XLSX) or XML from the run, or pull it via the Apify API. Each POI becomes one structured row.

Can I scrape OpenStreetMap business data without an API key?

Yes. There is no API key, no Google Maps billing and no proxy — the public Overpass API powers an OSM business directory dataset for any area worldwide.

Changelog

2026-06-07

• Docs: added coverage for Overpass API alternative usage, exporting OpenStreetMap data to CSV/JSON, and scraping OSM business data without an API key.

2026-06-05

• Reliability fix: results are no longer dropped by strict output validation — runs complete cleanly at high volume.
• Stability & performance hardening; fresh rebuild.

2026-06-01

• Maintenance & reliability pass: rebuilt the actor on the current base image; build verified.

2026-06-04

• Verified live & refreshed build — reliability/maintenance pass.