OSRM vs Photon
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?
OSRM
High-performance routing engine for OpenStreetMap
VS
Photon
Fast, typo-tolerant geocoder built on OpenStreetMap
| Feature | OSRM | Photon |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Maps & GIS | Maps & GIS |
| License | BSD-2-Clause | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | C++ | Java |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 8,192 MB | 4,096 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, bare-metal, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 7,955 | ★ 2,972 |
| First released | 2012 | 2013 |
| Replaces | Google Directions API | Google Geocoding API |
Why pick each one
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++
Choose Photon if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (3k GitHub stars)
- Written in Java
Frequently asked questions
Is OSRM or Photon better?
Neither is universally better. OSRM has the larger community, while Photon is simpler to set up (medium difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are OSRM and Photon free and open-source?
Yes. OSRM is licensed under BSD-2-Clause and Photon under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run OSRM and Photon with Docker?
OSRM: yes. Photon: yes.