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Google Maps alternatives?

Do any of you have experience building products with maps? Google maps is of course the most well-known way to build custom maps, but it is a lot more expensive than it used to be. I'm looking for to compare alternatives with pricing and pros and cons. If I can find a good single resource with some comparisons, maybe I'll put one together myself. In that case it would still be good to hear what experiences you guys have had with Google Maps, Mapbox, OSM, and any others you may have tried.

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    I toyed around with Mapbox for a bit. It's as easy (or as complicated) to use as Google Maps. If I recall, the free tier was generous enough.

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      2nd mapbox. Easy to use and nice free tier.

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    Bing Maps
    MapQuest
    Waze
    Here WeGo
    Rand McNally
    Maps.me

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    For a client I looked some time ago into Open Street Maps. Which looks like a nice and free alternative compared to Google Maps.

    However take a close look to their ODbL (Open Database License). I am not a lawyer so I can't give legal advice on the license. But the share-a-like clause might be interpreted that you have to publish your data under ODbL if you merge Open Street Maps Data with yours.

    Depending on your use-case you might want to get this analyzed by a legal team before jumping to OSM.

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      From my experience most of the licensing is about not abusing their hosting. It's totally free to use (with attribution) their data if you run your own tile service to generate the tile images required for viewing the maps. There are also plenty of services around that help you with this for a small fee.

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        This might be totally true. But I don't have the legal knowledge to be sure about it 😆

        I found the article that made me rethink on OSM some years ago:
        https://geohipster.com/2015/04/27/gary-gale-dear-osm-its-time-to-get-your-finger-out/

        Of course if you just show a map then you are save. But as soon as you want to start a Saas that is transfering the data into something new (or adding to it?). Then you might get into the share-a-like issue.

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    OpenLayers is my goto - it's free and easy to use (with lots of tutorials and use cases). I use Openlayers + OSM.

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    There's a lot of tools around Open Street Map, it's pretty customizable so IMO it's the best alternative to Google Maps

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    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

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