openrouteservice

openrouteservice

This connector uses openrouteservice by HeiGIT (Heidelberg Institute for Geoinformation Technology), the routing and geocoding service built on OpenStreetMap, at its current address https://api.heigit.org: geocoding and reverse geocoding, routes with turn-by-turn directions for car, truck, bicycle, foot and wheelchair, travel-time matrices, reachability areas (isochrones), route optimisation for several vehicles, and points of interest.

Setup (about 2 minutes)

1. Sign up for free at https://account.heigit.org and create an API key (the free plan covers testing and small production use).
2. Paste the key into OPENROUTESERVICE_API_KEY. It is sent as is in the Authorization header (no Bearer). Keys made for the old api.openrouteservice.org work here too; that old address is being shut down in November 2026.
3. Install and run openrouteservice_geocode to check the key.

Coordinates are [longitude, latitude], longitude first, in every routing tool (e.g. [7.8421, 47.9990] for Freiburg). Geocoding results also return coordinates as [longitude, latitude]. Swapping them is the usual cause of "point not found" (error 2010) or of a route in the ocean.

Workflow

• Addresses to points: openrouteservice_geocode (country narrows, e.g. DE), openrouteservice_autocomplete, openrouteservice_reverse_geocode.
• Routes: openrouteservice_directions returns distance, duration and steps; set profile (driving-car, driving-hgv for trucks, cycling-regular, foot-walking, wheelchair...), language for the instructions and options.avoid_features to avoid highways, tolls or ferries.
• Many-to-many: openrouteservice_matrix (durations in seconds, distances in the chosen unit).
• Catchment areas: openrouteservice_isochrones with range in seconds (or metres with range_type distance).
• Tours for a fleet: openrouteservice_optimize_routes with jobs and vehicles (VROOM format; times in seconds since midnight or Unix time).
• Places around: openrouteservice_find_pois with a point and a buffer in metres.

Units: durations are seconds; distances follow units (km by default here). Convert seconds to hours and minutes before quoting.

Limits and errors: the free plan allows about 2,000 directions and 40 per minute, with smaller daily quotas for matrix, isochrones, optimisation and POIs; answers carry x-ratelimit-remaining. 403 means the daily quota is used up (or a wrong key), 429 the per-minute limit, 401 a missing key. Error 2004 means the request exceeds a limit (too many points or too long a route), 2010 a point not near a road.