Key:addr:*

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Public-images-osm logo.svg Prefix addr:*
Housenumber-karlsruhe-de.png
Description
A prefix for several addr:* keys to describe addresses. Show/edit corresponding data item.
Group: addresses
Used on these elements
may be used on nodesmay be used on waysmay be used on areas (and multipolygon relations)should not be used on relations (except multipolygon relations)
See also
Status: de factoPage for proposal
taginfo: addr:*

information sign

This page describes a key prefix rather than a simple key.

The various addr:*=* keys are used to provide address information for buildings and facilities. See Addresses for more details on usage.

How to map

Where to add the address

The address tagging should be added to

  • the object nodewayarearelation of a point of interest;
  • the polygon representing an area area (building or campus/site outline) if the address is valid for the whole object (e.g. a detached house, an individual terraced house, a school campus);
  • to a particular node node sitting on the site outline or building outline (e.g. entrance, gate) or contained within the object if the address applies to this point, in particular when an object has multiple addresses such as an apartment building with several entrances;
  • to a node node if you are unsure about the extent of the address.

For objects which do not have an official address, such as a lamppost or public artwork, a nearby address can be specified with object:*=* instead.

What to add

As a minimum, please add

If you know them and if they exist, please add:

  • addr:city=* (adding to single elements might depend on local mapping practices)
  • addr:postcode=* (adding to single elements might depend on local mapping practices)
  • addr:country=* (depending on the mapping practices in your country)

If they are part of the postal address, please add:

Example addresses rendered on map in OSM Carto style:


Higher-level tags such as addr:city=* and addr:postcode=* are often redundant, since they could be calculated from the respective boundary relations they are contained in (if present and valid).

The focus on the usage of addr:country=* differs across national communities, some consider it as necessary part of tagging (Germany), some as unwanted tag (Poland).

Collection methods

Commonly used subkeys

Key Value Element Comment Rendering Photo

Tags for individual houses

addr:housenumber user defined node area The house number (may contain letters, dashes or other characters).
Addresses describes ways to tag a single building with multiple addresses.
Please do not only tag addr:housenumber=*, but also add at least addr:street=* or addr:place=* for places without streets (or map the belonging to a street with a relation using associatedStreet relation or street relation.)
Addr-housenumber rendering.png
Ferry Street, Portaferry (09), October 2009.JPG
addr:housename user defined node area The name of a house.
This is sometimes used in some countries like England, Spain, Portugal, Latvia instead of (or in addition to) a house number.
House-name sign, Main Street Aberlady. - geograph.org.uk - 1753443.jpg
addr:flats user defined node The unit numbers (a range or a list) of the flats or apartments located behind a single entrance door. Rendering of addr flats 2.png Flat numbers on an entrance.png
addr:conscriptionnumber user defined node area This special kind of housenumber relates to a settlement instead of a street. Conscription numbers were introduced in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and are still in use in some parts of Europe, sometimes together with street-related housenumbers which are also called orientation numbers.
Konskriptionsnummer.jpg
addr:street user defined node area The name of the respective street. If the street name is very long or nonexistent, the ref of the respective street.
A way with highway=* or a square with place=square and the corresponding name should be found nearby. The belonging to a street can alternatively be represented by a associatedStreet relation or street relation. The keys addr:housenumber=* and addr:street=* in principle are the only necessary ones if there are valid border polygons. If you are not sure if it is so, just add addr:city=*, addr:postcode=* and addr:country=*.
UK - London (30474933636).jpg
addr:place user defined node area This is part of an address which refers to the name of some territorial zone (usually a place=* like island, square or very small village) instead of a street (highway=*). Should not be used together with addr:street=*.
addr:postcode user defined node area The postal code of the building/area. Some mappers prefer to rely on boundary=postal_code
addr:city user defined node area The name of the city as given in postal addresses of the building/area. (In some places the city in the address corresponds to the post office that serves the area rather than the actual city, if any, in which the building is located.) Some mappers assume it can be derived from a boundary=administrative relation.
Lillerod.jpg
addr:country user defined node area The ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 two letter country code in upper case.
Example: "DE" for Germany, "CH" for Switzerland, "AT" for Austria, "FR" for France, "IT" for Italy.
Caveat: The ISO 3166-1 code for Great Britain is "GB" and not "UK". More or less favoured in different national communities.
addr:postbox user defined node area Use this for addressing postal service Post Office Box (PO Box, BP - Boîte Postale, CP - Case Postale, Поштански преградак, Поштански фах, Поштански претинац) as alternative to addressing using street names. Example: "PO Box 34"
addr:full user defined node area Use this for a full-text, often multi-line, address if you find the structured address fields unsuitable for denoting the address of this particular location. Examples: "Fifth house on the left after the village oak, Smalltown, Smallcountry", or addresses using special delivery names or codes (possibly via an unrelated city name and post code), or PO Boxes.
Beware that these strings can hardly be parsed by software: "1200 West Sunset Boulevard Suite 110A" is still better represented as addr:housenumber=1200 + addr:street=West Sunset Boulevard + addr:unit=110A.

For countries using hamlet, subdistrict, district, province, state, county

addr:hamlet user defined node area The hamlet of the object. In France, some addresses use hamlets instead of street names, use the generic addr:place instead.
Grosvenor Place 2 2008 06 19.jpg
addr:suburb user defined node area If an address exists several times in a city. You have to add the name of the settlement. See Australian definition of suburb.
addr:subdistrict user defined node area The subdistrict of the object.
addr:district user defined node area The district of the object.
addr:province user defined node area The province of the object. For Canada, uppercase two-letter postal abbreviations (BC, AB, ON, QC, etc.) are used. In Russia a synonym {{{key:addr:region}}} is widely used
addr:state user defined node area The state of the object. For the US, uppercase two-letter postal abbreviations (AK, CA, HI, NY, TX, WY, etc.) are used.
addr:county user defined node area The county of the object.

Tags for interpolation ways

addr:interpolation all/even/odd/ alphabetic way How to interpolate the house numbers belonging to the way along the respective street.
See detailed description.
Spořilov, Púchovská, označení domu.jpg
addr:interpolation Number n way Every nth house between the end nodes is represented by the interpolation way.
addr:inclusion actual/estimate/potential way Optional tag to indicate the accuracy level of survey used to create the address interpolation way.
See detailed description.
This section is a wiki template with a default description in English. Editable here.

Detailed subkeys

More detailed information as approved here: Proposed features/addr keys (2011-04)

Key Value Element Comment Photo Taginfo
Tags for parts of a building
addr:door user defined node area The door number (or name) of an apartment/flat/office/room. Could also be called differently in some countries (In Austria for example it is sometimes referred to as "Top"). If a room has more than one door, you can tag them separately.

See also: room=*

addr:unit user defined node area The number, letter, or name of a single unit or flat that exists within a larger complex. While a big building could have only one entrance, sometimes the way inside divides into different units or staircases, where certain apartments/flats/offices can only be reached through a specific unit. Useful for apartment, suite, or office numbers. Information necessary for postmen, for example.

In the United States, there is no consensus on how to represent secondary unit designators, however according to taginfo it is far more popular to omit the designator and only include the identifier: there are only a few thousand "Apartment/Unit/Suite A" entries versus 46,000 "A" entries as of 2021. This practice only allows data consumers to format the unit as "#A", which the USPS says will result in rejected mail in some cases. [1] Consider using addr:full=* to disambiguate.

addr:flats user defined node area A list of flat numbers accessible in a building or behind a door.
addr:floor Number node area The floor number that is part of the address of an apartment/flat/office. Also add level=*, which is applicable regardless of whether the floor number is part of the address.
addr:block user defined node area The city block, if part of the address. Note that this tag is most often used in places where blocks can have names and not just numbers, and in many cases is specified in addition to a street name. This tag is common in a variety of countries, including India, Egypt, and Kuwait. addr:block_number=* on the other hand is common in Japan, where blocks are typically numbered and often are specified instead of a street name.
addr:block_number user defined node area The city block, if part of the address. This version of the tag is used in Japan, where it is common for house numbers to be associated with blocks where a street does not have a name. These blocks are typically numbered, hence the name. See JA:住所 § 街区 Block number address systemについて. addr:block=* is semantically different in that it may describe blocks that have names rather than numbers, and is not as commonly used in Japan.
addr:plot user defined node area Undocumented tag to specify the plot number in an address which includes one.
This section is a wiki template with a default description in English. Editable here.

Multilingual addresses

In areas with two or more official languages, addresses can be localized by adding a language code after the usual address keys like:

How language codes are selected is described in multilingual names.

Addresses without house numbers

  • If there wasn’t a house number assigned to the address, you can use nohousenumber=yes

Old (former) house numbers and street names

Sometimes house numbers or street names change. In this event, it may still be useful to keep track of the former address (e.g. because it is still visible, because it makes house numbers unambiguous with respect to the old/new question, etc.). The common tag for these is old_addr:housenumber=* and old_addr:street=*. Similarly, for areas with house numbers referring to a place rather than a street, old_addr:place=* is used.

Possible tagging mistakes

If you know places with this tag, verify if it could be tagged with another tag.
Automated edits are strongly discouraged unless you really know what you are doing!

See also