EU sovereignMaps & NavigationHeadquarters: DE

Geofabrik: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Geofabrik is a German company in Karlsruhe that processes freely licensed geodata from OpenStreetMap and makes it available as downloadable extracts, map tiles and web mapping services. Customers use the data and services for mapping applications and spatial analysis. The company also offers consulting, training and server services. The map data is published under the open ODbL licence, while the company's own services are offered as a service.

Geofabrik GmbH is based in Karlsruhe, Germany, and registered at the Mannheim register court. The website does not name shareholders. The company states that all servers it operates are located with major hosting providers in the European Union and are accessible only to authorised staff. Because the source data is open, an organisation can also self-host comparable extracts, which reduces dependence on any single provider.

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Sovereignty score

71 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign

Jurisdiction SOV-2100
Headquartered in the EU: European law applies
Data residency SOV-3100
EU-only hosting
Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-360
Key management with a European vendor
Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
Closed source: switching requires data migration
Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-655
Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 11, 2026

Headquarters	DE (EU)Verified by hand
Sovereignty model	Vendor-hosted (EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting	EUVerified by hand
Open-source	NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant	NoVendor-stated
Category	Maps & Navigation
Type	Product
Website	geofabrik.de ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Geofabrik

The European alternatives to Geofabrik come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

37 European Maps & Navigation vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Geofabrik

Geofabrik is headquartered in DE and therefore falls under European law: the GDPR, NIS2 and the Data Act. No foreign legislation can compel access to your data.

Data is hosted exclusively in the EU, so Geofabrik scores best on data residency.

Geofabrik is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Geofabrik together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Geofabrik?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Geofabrik include BRouter, calimoto and cartes.gouv.fr. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Geofabrik?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Geofabrik include BRouter and GraphHopper. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Geofabrik GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Geofabrik is headquartered in DE (EU) and hosts data in EU. That makes Geofabrik an EU-sovereign choice in its own right; the EU alternatives on this page are comparable European tools.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 11, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Maps & Navigation

Maps & Navigation: Maps, route planning and navigation services. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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