Run it on their servers for free or on your own with no quotas. openrouteservice is an open source routing service from HeiGIT with a hosted API. Its plans page lists a Standard plan at 0 euros for everyone, a Collaborative plan at 0 euros with higher quotas for humanitarian, academic, governmental and non-profit projects, and an On-Premise option for running the software on your own servers. Standard quotas are daily and per minute: 2,000 and 40 for Directions, 500 and 20 for Isochrones, 500 and 40 for Matrix, 3,000 and 100 for Geocoding. No paid hosted tier appears on the page. The routing engine is a Java project on GitHub, built on a forked version of GraphHopper.
Free tier quotas
Standard plan
0 euros, free to use for everyone
Directions
2,000 per day, 40 per minute
Isochrones
500 per day, 20 per minute
Matrix
500 per day, 40 per minute
Geocoding
3,000 per day, 100 per minute
Elevation and Snap
2,000 per day each, 40 and 100 per minute
Optimization and POIs
500 per day each, 40 and 60 per minute
Export
100 per day, 5 per minute
Collaborative plan
0 euros for humanitarian, academic, governmental or non-profit use, for example Directions 10,000 per day
On-Premise
Run it on your own infrastructure with no API quotas
Credit card
Not required
Last sniffed Oct 19, 2026. Always confirm on the official pricing page.
👍 Good boy
+The Standard plan is free for everyone with no card, and the quotas are published endpoint by endpoint.
+It is open source. The On-Premise option lets you install the services on your own infrastructure and configure the backend limits yourself.
+The Collaborative plan raises quotas for eligible projects, for example Directions from 2,000 to 10,000 per day and Geocoding from 3,000 to 15,000.
+The endpoint list is broad: Directions, Isochrones, Matrix, Snap, Elevation, Geocoding, Optimization, POIs and Export.
+Client libraries exist for Python and R on GitHub, and the project documents its API with Swagger specifications.
+The code is a Java routing service on GitHub that uses a forked and edited version of GraphHopper, so you can read how routes are built.
+The same HeiGIT account page also lists plans for the ohsome API family, which helps if you work with OpenStreetMap analytics.
👎 Watch out
−Daily quotas are small for production: 500 per day for Isochrones, Matrix and Optimization, and 100 for Export.
−Per-minute caps bite in scripts. An issue in the openrouteservice R package notes that subsequent queries can exhaust the 40 requests per minute rate limit.
−The plans page lists no paid hosted tier, so scaling beyond Standard means qualifying for Collaborative or running the service yourself.
−The Collaborative plan is for humanitarian, academic, governmental or non-profit organisations, so a commercial startup cannot count on it.
−On-Premise means you operate the routing service, its data and its updates yourself, with no hosted support described on the plans page.
−I found no G2 or Capterra reviews for this product. Reddit mentions are sparse, so the quota table is the main evidence.
The catch
The plans page, served from account.heigit.org, lists a Standard plan at 0 euros, a Collaborative plan at 0 euros and an On-Premise option, with no paid hosted tier. Each endpoint shows two numbers in parentheses. I read them as requests per day and requests per minute, which matches the 40 per minute rate limit mentioned in a GitHub issue for Directions and the project README saying the key is free up to a request limit per day. Confirm on the live page before sizing a project.
Standard plan quotas: Directions 2,000 and 40, Export 100 and 5, Isochrones 500 and 20, Matrix 500 and 40, Snap 2,000 and 100, Elevation 2,000 and 40, Geocoding 3,000 and 100, Optimization 500 and 40, POIs 500 and 60. Collaborative raises them, for example Directions 10,000 and 60, Isochrones 2,500 and 40, Matrix 2,500 and 60, Geocoding 15,000 and 150. The page says the Collaborative plan is for humanitarian, academic, governmental or not-for-profit organisations.
The page says the Standard plan is free to use for everyone unless under specific collaborative conditions. It does not mention commercial use directly, so that is marked unknown. Card requirement is marked not required because the plans are 0 euros and the page asks for no payment details.
The On-Premise plan is a local installation on your own infrastructure with no API restrictions. The GitHub project describes openrouteservice as a highly customizable, performant routing service written in Java using a forked and edited version of GraphHopper 4.0.
I found no G2 or Capterra reviews for it, so the pros and cons rest on the plans page, GitHub and Reddit.
What’s included
✓Directions API
✓Isochrones
✓Matrix API
✓Snap to road
✓Elevation
✓Geocoding
✓Route optimization
✓POI search
✓Export
✓On-premise installation
✓Python and R clients
Free tier value
Generosity
B
Estimated value
Free hosted routing API with daily quotas, or self-host with no quotas
Feature parity
Standard, Collaborative and On-Premise differ in quotas only.
Screenshots
HomepagePlans page
Paid plans
No paid hosted plan listed
The plans page shows Standard, Collaborative and On-Premise, each at 0 euros. If you need more than the Standard quotas and do not qualify for Collaborative, the page points to running the software yourself.
Collaborative
0 euros with higher quotas for humanitarian, academic, governmental or non-profit organisations. Directions 10,000 per day, Geocoding 15,000, Matrix 2,500, Isochrones 2,500.
On-Premise
Self-host the services. The page says backend restrictions do not apply and can be configured to your needs, and infrastructure costs are yours.
Common questions
Is openrouteservice free?
Yes. The Standard plan is 0 euros for everyone with published daily and per-minute quotas.
Can I use it for a commercial app?
The plans page says Standard is free to use for everyone, but it does not spell out commercial terms. Read the terms of use or self-host.
What do the numbers like 2000 / 40 mean?
I read them as requests per day and per minute. A GitHub issue on the R package mentions a rate limit of 40 requests per minute for Directions.
Can I run it myself?
Yes. The On-Premise plan is a local installation, and the code is open source on GitHub.
Who gets the Collaborative plan?
Humanitarian, academic, governmental or not-for-profit organisations may be eligible.
Change history
Checked October 22, 2026
Plans page shows Standard, Collaborative and On-Premise at 0 euros, with per-endpoint daily and per-minute quotas. No paid hosted tier is listed.
