Mailing lists

The mailing lists are the traditional communication channel of the OpenStreetMap project, and nowadays coexist with other platforms such as the forums. An attempt to collect the information about local communication channels is done at the osm-community-index (browse as a website).

The canonical list of mailing lists available is at lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo.

Please note that even if the lists are moderated, you have to become a member of the mailing list to send an email to that list!

Lists provided by OSMF or a local chapter

The OpenStreetMap mailing lists by OSMF live on lists.openstreetmap.org/. The French and the German local chapters provide lists at lists.openstreetmap.fr and lists.openstreetmap.de. The following list excludes unused lists.

Topic lists in English

Info	Description	Admins	Moderators	Archive
accessibility	For discussion about accessibility: OSM for disabled users and mappers (Blind, wheelchair, deaf etc.).	Lulu-Ann	Bahnpirat	archive
announce	A moderated announcement list. OSMers should subscribe to this list for all the important announcements (low traffic)	Mike Collinson Jonathan Bennett		archive
dev	For developer discussion.	Mikel Maron Mike Collinson Andy Robinson		archive Nabble
diversity-talk	For discussion of diversity initiatives in OpenStreetMap			archive
geocoding	For discussion of geocoding.	Tom Hughes		archive
historic	Historic mapping (time dimension)	Mikel Maron		archive
HOT	For Humanitarian OSM Team discussion and response.	Mikel Maron		archive Nabble
HOT-announce	Important HOT announcements and updates only. Very low volume.			archive
imports	For discussion of data imports.	Ian Dees		archive
imports-us	For discussion of data imports impacting the United States.			archive
josm-dev	For JOSM developer discussion.	Frederik Ramm		archive Nabble
learnosm-coord	Coordination group for LearnOSM.org			archive
legal-general	General discussions about alternative OSM licensing scenarios.	Mike Collinson Frederik Ramm		archive
legal-talk	For discussion of specific legal issues relating to the current and proposed license including use of OSM data and compatibility of other data sources.	Richard Fairhurst		archive Nabble
local-chapters	General discusion of topics relevant for (local) chapters of the OSM Foundation	Simon Poole		archive
lorodux-dev	LoroDux developers	Lulu-Ann Daniel Haenssgen		archive
mapcss	For MapCSS implementers and stylesheet authors.	Richard Fairhurst		archive
maproulette	MapRoulette general discussion and development			archive
merkaartor	For Merkaartor OpenStreetMap editor for Unix/Windows/Mac discussion.	Christian Browet		archive Nabble
openhiking	Mailing list to discuss tagging and rendering hiking trails using the OpenStreetMap Database			archive
osm-professional	OSM Professional. A general discussion forum for professional (commercial, government, non-profit , NGO, ...) users of OpenStreetMap geodata.	Kate Chapman		archive
osm2world	Discussion about OSM2World, the 3D renderer	Tobias Knerr		archive
osm4j	Discussion about osm4j, a lightweight Java programming framework for working with OSM data			archive
osmcha-dev	Discussion of OSMCha development and APIs (higher level talks, announcements of downtime and releases, etc)			archive
osmf-announce	OpenStreetMap Foundation member announcements (low volume), Foundation members only.	Mike Collinson		archive
osmf-talk	Talk about the OpenStreetMap Foundation, closed list for Foundation members.	Mike Collinson Frederik Ramm Simone Cortesi		archive
osmosis-dev	For Osmosis developer discussion.	Brett Henderson		archive Nabble
osrm-talk	Mailing list to discuss Project OSRM			archive
outdoor-natural	Outdoor sports, wilderness and natural features mapping. Everything from scuba diving to paragliding, from undersea volcanoes to Mount Everest, related software and talk. All languages welcome.	User:RicoZ		archive
Overpass dev	Overpass API development / system administration list	User:Sletuffe		archive
party	For discussion and organisation of mapping parties.	Richard Fairhurst		archive
photon	Photon Geocoder			archive
photos	For discussion and organisation of the use of photos in mapping.	John McKerrell		archive
potlatch-dev	For Potlatch developer discussion.	Richard Fairhurst		archive Nabble
rails-dev	Discussion of rails port (web site) development	Tom Hughes		archive
routing	For discussion about routing with vector data.	Jörg Ostertag		archive Nabble
science	Discuss anything science related in the OpenStreetMap ecosystem	Joost Schouppe		archive
sotm-asia	Planning for SotM Asia			archive
strategic	Fundraising, planning and strategy for OSMF	Mikel Maron	Richard Weait	archive
tagging	For tag discussion, strategy and related tools. - High traffic!	Richard Fairhurst		archive Nabble
taginfo-dev	For developers of Taginfo, users of the Taginfo API and people running their own Taginfo instance.	Jochen Topf		archive
talk	For general OpenStreetMap user discussion.	Mikel Maron Mike Collinson Andy Robinson		archive Nabble
talk-transit	For discussion about public transport.	Peter Miller Frankie Roberto Stefan Bethke		archive
teachOSM	teachOSM project discussion			archive
tile-serving	For discussion about OSM tile serving infrastructure.			archive
umap	Discussions about uMap project			archive

Topic lists in a local language

Info	Description	Admins	Moderators	Archive
dev-fr	Technical topics in French			archive
dev-italia	Developer discussion in Italian			archive
HOT-francophone	For Humanitarian OSM Team discussion and response (discussion in French).	sev_osm FofB	augustind	archive
tagging-fr	For tag discussion, strategy and related tools (discussion in French).	sev_osm		archive
transport	French public transport discussion			archive

Country-specific lists

Info	Description	Admins	Moderators	Archive
talk-af	Afghanistan specific topics and discussion	Kate Chapman		archive
talk-africa	African topics	Mikel Maron		archive
talk-al	OpenStreetMap mailing list of the Albanian speaking community			archive
talk-alps	European Alps specific topics and discussion. Discussion in Italian, French, German, Slovenian, Romanche and English welcome.	Simone Cortesi		archive
talk-ar	Argentina specific topics and discussion	Guillermo Sansovic		archive
talk-asia	OpenStreetMap across Asia			archive
talk-at	Austria specific topics and discussion	Norbert Wenzel Andreas Labres Nabble Account: Markus Mayr		archive Nabble
talk-au	Australia specific topics and discussion	Richard Weait		archive Nabble
talk-ba	Bosnia and Herzegovina specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-baltics	Discussion on topics for three small baltic states - Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania			archive
talk-bd	Bangladesh specific topics and discussion	Larry O'Neill Syed Ishtiaque Ahmed		archive
talk-be	Belgium specific topics and discussion. English used as compromise between French and Dutch. But everyone can use their own language, especially for regional topics.	Johan Huysmans Mark Van den Borre		archive
talk-bf	Burkina Faso specific topics and discussion	Helge Fahrnberger		archive
talk-bi	Burundi specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-bj	Benin specific topics and discussion	Benedikt saliousoft		archive
talk-blr	Belarus specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-bo	Bolivia specific topics and discussion	Alex Infantes Marco Antonio Frias		archive
talk-br	Brazil specific topics and discussion (Brazilian Portuguese)	Vitor George		archive
talk-ca	Canada specific topics and discussion	Richard Weait		archive
talk-carib	Caribbean-related content			archive
talk-cat	Catalan mailing list			archive
talk-cd	Democratic Republic of the Congo, mostly in French - Discussions sur OSM en RDC			archive
talk-cf	Liste de discussion sur OpenStreetMap en République Centrafricaine			archive
talk-ci	Côte d'Ivoire specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-cl	Chile specific topics and discussion	Julio Costa		archive
talk-cm	Cameroon specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-cn	China specific topics and discussion	Sun Ning		archive
talk-co	Colombia specific topics and discussion	Fredy Rivera		archive Nabble
talk-cr	Costa Rica-specific topics and discussion	Ben Konrath Jorge R		archive
talk-cu	Cuba specific topics and discussion	Elpbatista Mike Collinson		archive
talk-cz	Czech discussion	Dan Barta Tom.k		archive
talk-de	German discussion	Frederik Ramm		archive Nabble
Germany Regional lists	Due to the high traffic on talk-de, separate lists for regions in Germany are available on lists.openstreetmap.de. Infos on requesting regional lists: Deutsche Mailinglisten
talk-dk	Danish discussion			archive
talk-do	Dominica specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ee	Estonia-specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-es	Spain discussion	Francisco Santos Iván Sánchez Ortega		archive Nabble
talk-et	Ethiopia-specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-fi	Finland-specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-fr	French speaking discussion			archive Nabble
openstreetmap.fr lists	Mailing lists hosted by openstreetmap.fr: association, conseil-administration, contact, ga (Groupe d'Accompagnement), opentraffic, pro-fr, roborthos (aerial imagery), tech, transport, many local-* lists, others
talk-fr-bzh	Mapping, mapping parties and localisation in the Bretagne / Breizh / Brittany region of France.			archive
talk-gb	UK-specific topics, such as UK mapping parties and meetups	Matthew Newton		archive Nabble
talk-gb-london	Mapping in the UK London area	Mike Collinson		archive
talk-gb-midanglia	Mapping in the UK area loosely based around Cambridge	David Earl		archive
talk-gb-oxoncotswolds	Mapping and development in the UK area of ["Oxfordshire"], the Cotswolds and nearby.	Richard Fairhurst		archive
talk-gb-thenorth	Mapping in the North of England, UK	Simon Ward Tim Waters		archive
talk-gb-westmidlands	Mapping in the UK West Midlands (Birmingham) area	Andy Robinson		archive
talk-ge	Georgia, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-gh	Ghana specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-gr	Greece specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-hn	Honduras specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-hr	Croatia-specific topics, discussion			archive
talk-ht	Haiti-specific topics, in English and French	Jaakko Helleranta		archive
talk-id	Indonesia-specific topics, in Bahasa Indonesian			archive
talk-ie	Ireland-specific topics, such as Irish mapping parties and meetups	Gareth Eason		archive
talk-il	Israel discussion - preferred language: Hebrew. This is being phased out in favour of Israel-Forum			archive
talk-in	India-specific topics, such as Indian mapping parties and meetups			archive
talk-iq	Iraq specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ir	Iran-specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-is	Iceland-specific topics, such as the OSM data in Iceland and Icelandic mapping parties. Discussions in Icelandic or English			archive
talk-it	Italian discussion - but english is welcome	Simone Cortesi		archive Nabble
talk-it-appulo-lucana	Italian regional talk list for Basilicata and Puglia - Lista regionale della Basilicata e della Puglia			archive
talk-it-cai	Italian Alpine Club - Discussioni riguardanti la convenzione con il CAI			archive
talk-it-bici	Italian bicycle discussion - but english is welcome	Luca Delucchi		archive
talk-it-fvg	Italian region Friuli Venezia Giulia discussion - but english is welcome			archive
talk-it-lazio	Italian region Lazio discussion - but english is welcome	Martin Koppenhöfer		archive
talk-it-liguria	Italian region Liguria discussion - but english is welcome	Luca Delucchi		archive
talk-it-marche	Italian region Marche discussion - but english is welcome	Lorenzo Mastrogiacomi		archive
talk-it-piemonte	Italian region Piemonte discussion - but english is welcome			archive
talk-it-sardinia	Italian region Sardegna discussion - but english is welcome			archive
talk-it-sicilia	Italian region Sicilia discussion - but english is welcome			archive
talk-it-southtyrol	Italian regional South Tyrol discussion - Lista regionale dell' Alto Adige - Regionale Mailingliste für Südtirol - (Italian, German and English welcome)	Martin Raifer		archive
talk-it-trentino	Italian region Trentino discussion - but english is welcome	Luca Delucchi		archive
talk-it-veneto	Italian region Veneto discussion - but english is welcome			archive
talk-ja	Japanese discussion.			archive
talk-ke	Kenya specific topics and discussion.	Daniel Westergren Mikel Maron		archive
talk-kg	Kyrgyzstan discussion.			archive
talk-ko	Korean discussion. Korean and English language.			archive
talk-kosovo	Kosovo specific topics and discussion. Discussion in English and Albanian.			archive
talk-latam	Latin America - Postings in Spanish, Portuguese and Englisch are welcome.			archive
talk-lb	Lebanon specific topics and discussion. Discussion in Arabic, English, French.			archive
talk-lk	SriLanka specific topics and discussions.	Vivien Deparday		archive
talk-lt	Lithuania specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-lu	Luxembourg specific topics and discussion. Discussion usually in English, but French, German or Luxembourgish are ok too.			archive
talk-lv	Latvia specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ly	Libya specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ma	Morocco specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-mg	Madagascar specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-ml	Mali specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-mm	Myanmar specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-mn	Mongolia specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-mw	Malawi specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-mx	Mexico specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-my	Malaysia specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-nc	New Caledonia specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ne	Niger specific topics and discussion. Discussion usually in French, but English is welcome.	Orsolya Jenei		archive
talk-ng	Nigeria specific topics and discussion	Rafael Ávila Coya		archive
talk-ni	Nicaragua specific topics and discussion	Felix Delattre		archive
talk-nl	Dutch discussion	Henk Hoff Martijn van Exel		archive Nabble
talk-np	Nepal specific topics and discussion	PrabhasP		archive
talk-nz	New Zealand specific topics and discussion (openstreetmap.org host email list. Jan 2018 - )	Eliot Blennerhassett		archive
talk-pe	Peru specific topics and discussion	Omar Vega		archive
talk-ph	Philippines specific topics and discussion,			archive
talk-pl	Poland specific topics and discussion,	Zbigniew Czernik		archive
talk-pr	Puerto Rico specific topics and discussion.	Víctor Ramírez Agustín Graterole		archive
talk-ps	Palestine specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-pt	Portuguese specific topics and discussion.	ViriatoLusitano		archive
talk-py	Paraguay specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ro	Romania specific topics and discussion.			archive Nabble
talk-rs	Serbia specific topics and discussion.			archive
talk-ru	Russia specific topics and discussion. Inactive from March 2015. See other contact channels.			archive
talk-sc	Seychelles specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-scotland	Scotland specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-se	Swedish discussion (Feel free to discuss Swedish issues in English though). Sweden			archive
talk-si	Slovenian discussion			archive
talk-sn	Senegal specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-sy	Syria specific topics and discussion. Discussion in Arabic, English and French	Crataegus		archive
talk-td	Chad specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-tg	Togo specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-tn	Tunisia specific topics and discussion	Chedli Ghedira		archive
talk-tr	Turkish discussion			archive
talk-tw	Taiwan specific topics and discussion in Chinese.			archive
talk-tz	Tanzania specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-ug	Uganda sample topics and discussion.	Douglas Ssebaggala		archive
talk-us	USA-specific topics, such as US mapping parties and meetups; see also imports-us in Topic Lists table	Dave Hansen		archive Nabble
talk-us-massachusetts	Topics specific to Massachusetts			archive
talk-us-newyork	New York-specific topics	Richard Welty		archive
talk-us-nps	USA national parks related content			archive
talk-us-pugetsound	Topics specific to the Puget Sound region, Washington State			archive
talk-us-sfbay	USA local list for the San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California in general			archive
talk-uy	Uruguay specific topics and discussion in Spanish			archive
talk-ve	Venezuela specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-vi	Vietnam specific topics and discussion			archive
talk-za	South Africa specific topics and discussion	Grant Slater		archive Nabble
talk-zm	Zambia specific topics and discussion			archive

Archived mailing lists

Mailing lists that were removed but archives continue to be available.

Info	Description	Admins	Moderators	Archive
design	This was a place to discuss design related issue in OpenStreetMap. The topics include things such as user interface, user experience and general aesthetics.	Kate Chapman		archive
moderation	The Moderation mailing list was used to discuss how to respond to Vandalism and mistakes.			archive
newbies	This list was intended for questions by new users. This role has been taken over by help.openstreetmap.org [1] and the forum [2].	Richard Fairhurst		archive Nabble
OSMF-membership	OSMF membership services working group
rebuild	Temporary forum for technical discussion of process, tools and functionality for rebuilding the OSM database ready for ODbL change-over	Mike Collinson		archive
voting	This list was originally used for electronic voting for board members. It has now been superseded by other methods and will probably be deleted.
welcomewg	Working group discussions: Why do we have such a hard time retaining mappers after they sign up, and do something about it.			archive

Lists provided by external services

Info	Description	Admins	Moderators	Archive
abul	French speaking discussion around Bordeaux and Aquitaine.			archive
kart	Norwegian discussion. Norway			archive
openstreetmap-hr	Croatian discussion			archive
openstreetmap-hungary	Hungarian discussion (Google group)	asdmin	City-Busz, BáthoryPéter BKristof grin	archive
maps-l	Discussion and development coordinating the integration of OpenStreetMap and other free map sources into Wikimedia projects.			archive
mkgmap-dev	General development list for mkgmap.			archive
nantes	French speaking discussion around Nantes.			archive
nzopengis	New Zealand specific topics and discussion (Google group)			nzopengis archive
openrailwaymap	Discussions of users and developers of OpenRailwayMap, but also other railway-related stuff.			archive
openseamap-develop	OpenSeaMap developer discusssion.			archive
openseamap-maps	Everything about using and creating maps for OpenSeaMap.			archive
talk-ch	Switzerland specific topics and discussion	Jiuka		archive
talk-md	Moldova specific topics and discussion. This is a Google group.
talk-sk	Slovak discussion (google group)			archive

Requests for new lists

If you want a new list for your country or language, send an email to Michael Collinson, michael at osmfoundation dot org.

Non-ASCII language digest support

OSM lists operate using Mailman. Some lists that use non-ASCII character sets may not display digests correctly. If you are the list administrator a suggested solution is to login to the admin panel, go to "Digest options" and change the digest format to MIME. You may also need to un-set the 'Plain' setting for existing users in the membership list.

Reading mailing lists via newsgroup interface

You can read and participate in the mailing list using a NNTP-compatible newsgroup client. The advantage is that the software shows discussion in a thread-like view. This simplifies following multiple discussions in high volume mailing lists.

Thunderbird has built-in newsgroup-support. To add Gmane.org, a newsgroup server which is syndicating the OSM mailing lists, you need to do the following:

1. Select Tools -> Accounts...
2. Press the 'Add account'-button
3. For the account type select Newsgroup-account
4. Enter the name that should appear when sending mails to the list in the name field and your email adress in the second one.
5. The nntp server address is news.gmane.org
6. Enter a descriptive account name for Thunderbird and hit 'Finish'
7. Now right-click on the new branch in your Thunderbird folder overview and select 'Subscribe...'
8. Enter openstreetmap in the filter field and subscribe to the (regional) osm mailing list(s) of your liking.

Search the mailing lists

As long as the list archive doesn't have its own search you can use Google search or The Mail Archive.

Download the archives

You can download the archive of a mailing list in Mbox format (compatible with Thunderbird) after registering to it by using the following link and replacing the parameters: https://lists.openstreetmap.org/mailman/private/LISTNAME.mbox/LISTNAME.mbox
For the Tagging list, for example, replace each LISTNAME by "tagging" (without quotes).
You will then be presented with a form asking your email address and password (the password you chose or that was sent to you when registering to that list).
Optionally, you can set these by adding ?username=YOUREMAILADRESS&password=YOURPASSWORD at the end of the url (replace YOUREMAILADRESS by your email address and YOURPASSWORD by your password).