Tileserver Mapnik vs OSRM
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted maps & gis options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Tileserver Mapnik
Render and serve raster map tiles from a database
VS
OSRM
High-performance routing engine for OpenStreetMap
| Feature | Tileserver Mapnik | OSRM |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Maps & GIS | Maps & GIS |
| License | MIT | BSD-2-Clause |
| Language | C++ | C++ |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 2,048 MB | 8,192 MB |
| Deployment | docker, source | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 318 | ★ 7,955 |
| First released | 2008 | 2012 |
| Replaces | Mapbox Tiles, Google Maps tiles | Google Directions API |
Why pick each one
Choose Tileserver Mapnik if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in C++
Choose OSRM if…
- Released under the BSD-2-Clause license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 8k GitHub stars
- Written in C++
Frequently asked questions
Is Tileserver Mapnik or OSRM better?
Neither is universally better. OSRM has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Tileserver Mapnik and OSRM free and open-source?
Yes. Tileserver Mapnik is licensed under MIT and OSRM under BSD-2-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Tileserver Mapnik and OSRM with Docker?
Tileserver Mapnik: yes. OSRM: yes.