GDAL — GDAL documentation

GDAL — GDAL documentation
GDAL documentation
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GDAL
GDAL is a translator library for raster and vector geospatial data formats that is released under an MIT style Open Source
License
by the
Open Source Geospatial Foundation
. As a library, it presents a single raster abstract data model and single vector abstract data model to the calling application for all supported formats. It also comes with a variety of useful command line utilities for data translation and processing. The
NEWS
page describes the March 2026 GDAL/OGR 3.12.3 release.
This documentation is also available as a
PDF
or a
ZIP of individual HTML pages
for offline browsing.
See
Software using GDAL
You may quote GDAL in publications by using the following Digital Object Identifier:
Source Code
Binaries
Containers
Documentation
Programs
"gdal" application
"Traditional" applications
Raster drivers
AAIGrid -- Arc/Info ASCII Grid
ACE2 -- ACE2
ADRG -- ADRG/ARC Digitized Raster Graphics (.gen/.thf)
AIG -- Arc/Info Binary Grid
AIRSAR -- AIRSAR Polarimetric Format
AVIF -- AV1 Image File Format
BAG -- Bathymetry Attributed Grid
BASISU -- Basis Universal
BMP -- Microsoft Windows Device Independent Bitmap
BSB -- Maptech/NOAA BSB Nautical Chart Format
BT -- VTP .bt Binary Terrain Format
BYN - Natural Resources Canada's Geoid file format (.byn)
CAD -- AutoCAD DWG raster layer
CALS -- CALS Type 1
CEOS -- CEOS Image
COASP -- DRDC COASP SAR Processor Raster
COG -- Cloud Optimized GeoTIFF generator
COSAR -- TerraSAR-X Complex SAR Data Product
CPG -- Convair PolGASP data
CTG -- USGS LULC Composite Theme Grid
DAAS (Airbus DS Intelligence Data As A Service driver)
DDS -- DirectDraw Surface
DERIVED -- Derived subdatasets driver
DIMAP -- Spot DIMAP
DOQ1 -- First Generation USGS DOQ
DOQ2 -- New Labelled USGS DOQ
DTED -- Military Elevation Data
ECRGTOC -- ECRG Table Of Contents (TOC.xml)
ECW -- Enhanced Compressed Wavelets (.ecw)
EEDAI - Google Earth Engine Data API Image
EHdr -- ESRI .hdr Labelled
EIR -- Erdas Imagine Raw
ENVI -- ENVI .hdr Labelled Raster
ESAT -- Envisat Image Product
ESRIC -- Esri Compact Cache
ERS -- ERMapper .ERS
EXR -- Extended Dynamic Range Image File Format
FAST -- EOSAT FAST Format
FITS -- Flexible Image Transport System
GenBin -- Generic Binary (.hdr labelled)
Oracle Spatial GeoRaster
GFF -- Sandia National Laboratories GSAT File Format
GIF -- Graphics Interchange Format
GPKG -- GeoPackage raster
GRASS Raster Format
GRASSASCIIGrid -- GRASS ASCII Grid
GRIB -- WMO General Regularly-distributed Information in Binary form
GS7BG -- Golden Software Surfer 7 Binary Grid File Format
GSAG -- Golden Software ASCII Grid File Format
GSBG -- Golden Software Binary Grid File Format
GSC -- GSC Geogrid
GDALG: GDAL Streamed Algorithm
GTA - Generic Tagged Arrays
GTI -- GDAL Raster Tile Index
GTiff -- GeoTIFF File Format
GXF -- Grid eXchange File
HDF4 -- Hierarchical Data Format Release 4 (HDF4)
HDF5 -- Hierarchical Data Format Release 5 (HDF5)
HEIF / HEIC -- ISO/IEC 23008-12 High Efficiency Image File Format
HF2 -- HF2/HFZ heightfield raster
HFA -- Erdas Imagine .img
RST -- Idrisi Raster Format
ILWIS -- Raster Map
IRIS -- Vaisala's weather radar software format
ISCE -- ISCE
ISG -- International Service for the Geoid
ISIS2 -- USGS Astrogeology ISIS Cube (Version 2)
ISIS3 -- USGS Astrogeology ISIS Cube (Version 3)
JDEM -- Japanese DEM (.mem)
JP2ECW -- ERDAS JPEG2000 (.jp2)
JP2KAK -- JPEG 2000 (based on Kakadu SDK)
JP2MrSID -- JPEG2000 via MrSID SDK
JP2OpenJPEG -- JPEG2000 driver based on OpenJPEG library
JPEG -- JPEG JFIF File Format
JPEGXL -- JPEG-XL File Format
JPIPKAK - JPIP Streaming
KEA
KMLSuperoverlay -- KMLSuperoverlay
KRO -- KOLOR Raw format
KTX2
LAN -- Erdas 7.x .LAN and .GIS
L1B -- NOAA Polar Orbiter Level 1b Data Set (AVHRR)
LCP -- FARSITE v.4 LCP Format
Leveller -- Daylon Leveller Heightfield
LIBERTIFF -- GeoTIFF File Format
LOSLAS -- NADCON .los/.las Datum Grid Shift
MAP -- OziExplorer .MAP
MRF -- Meta Raster Format
MBTiles
MEM -- In Memory datasets
MFF -- Vexcel MFF Raster
MFF2 -- Vexcel MFF2 Image
MiraMon Raster
MrSID -- Multi-resolution Seamless Image Database
MSG -- Meteosat Second Generation
MSGN -- Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) Native Archive Format (.nat)
NDF -- NLAPS Data Format
NetCDF: Network Common Data Form
NGSGEOID - NOAA NGS Geoid Height Grids
NGW -- NextGIS Web
NITF -- National Imagery Transmission Format
NOAA_B -- NOAA GEOCON/NADCON5 .b format
NSIDCbin -- National Snow and Ice Data Centre Sea Ice Concentrations
NTv2 -- NTv2 Datum Grid Shift
NWT_GRD/NWT_GRC -- Northwood/Vertical Mapper File Format
OGCAPI -- OGC API Tiles / Maps / Coverage
ESRI File Geodatabase raster (OpenFileGDB)
JAXA PALSAR Processed Products
PAux -- PCI .aux Labelled Raw Format
PCIDSK -- PCI Geomatics Database File
PCRaster -- PCRaster raster file format
PDF -- Geospatial PDF
PDS -- Planetary Data System v3
PDS4 -- NASA Planetary Data System (Version 4)
PLMosaic (Planet Labs Mosaics API)
PNG -- Portable Network Graphics
PNM -- Netpbm (.pgm, .ppm)
PostGISRaster -- PostGIS Raster driver
PHOTOMOD Raster File
RasterLite2 - Rasters in SQLite DB
RCM -- RADARSAT Constellation Mission Product
RIK -- Swedish Grid Maps
RMF -- Raster Matrix Format
ROI_PAC -- ROI_PAC
RPFTOC -- Raster Product Format/RPF (a.toc)
RRASTER -- R Raster
RS2 -- RadarSat 2 XML Product
S102 -- S-102 Bathymetric Surface Product
S104 -- S-104 Water Level Information for Surface Navigation Product
S111 -- S-111 Surface Currents Product
SAFE -- Sentinel-1 SAFE XML Product
SAR_CEOS -- CEOS SAR Image
SAGA -- SAGA GIS Binary Grid File Format
SENTINEL2 -- Sentinel-2 Products
SIGDEM -- Scaled Integer Gridded DEM
SNAP_TIFF -- Sentinel Application Processing GeoTIFF
SNODAS -- Snow Data Assimilation System
SRP -- Standard Product Format (ASRP/USRP) (.gen)
SRTMHGT -- SRTM HGT Format
STACIT - Spatio-Temporal Asset Catalog Items
STACTA - Spatio-Temporal Asset Catalog Tiled Assets
Terragen -- Terragen™ Terrain File
TGA -- TARGA Image File Format
TIL -- EarthWatch/DigitalGlobe .TIL
TileDB - TileDB raster
TSX -- TerraSAR-X Product
USGSDEM -- USGS ASCII DEM (and CDED)
VICAR -- VICAR
VRT -- GDAL Virtual Format
WCS -- OGC Web Coverage Service
WEBP - WEBP
WMS -- Web Map Services
WMTS -- OGC Web Map Tile Service
XYZ -- ASCII Gridded XYZ
Zarr
ZMap -- ZMap Plus Grid
Vector drivers
ADBC -- Arrow Database Connectivity
ADBC BigQuery -- Google BigQuery through Arrow Database Connectivity
Artificial intelligence powered vector driver
AmigoCloud
(Geo)Arrow IPC File Format / Stream
Arc/Info Binary Coverage
Arc/Info E00 (ASCII) Coverage
CAD -- AutoCAD DWG
Carto
Comma Separated Value (.csv)
CSW - OGC CSW (Catalog Service for the Web)
Microstation DGN
Microstation DGN v8
AutoCAD DWG
AutoCAD DXF
Google Earth Engine Data API
EDIGEO
Elasticsearch: Geographically Encoded Objects for Elasticsearch
ESRIJSON / FeatureService driver
ESRI File Geodatabase (FileGDB)
FlatGeobuf
GDALG: GDAL Streamed Algorithm
GeoJSON
GeoJSONSeq: sequence of GeoJSON features
GeoRSS : Geographically Encoded Objects for RSS feeds
GML - Geography Markup Language
GMLAS - Geography Markup Language (GML) driven by application schemas
GMT ASCII Vectors (.gmt)
GPKG -- GeoPackage vector
GPSBabel
GPX - GPS Exchange Format
GRASS Vector Format
GTFS - General Transit Feed Specification
SAP HANA
IDB
Idrisi Vector (.VCT)
"INTERLIS 1" and "INTERLIS 2" drivers
JML: OpenJUMP JML format
JSONFG -- OGC Features and Geometries JSON
KML - Keyhole Markup Language
LIBKML Driver (.kml .kmz)
Dutch Kadaster LV BAG 2.0 Extract
MapML
MEM -- In Memory datasets
Memory (deprecated)
MiraMon Vector
MapInfo TAB and MIF/MID
MongoDBv3
MSSQLSpatial - Microsoft SQL Server Spatial Database
MVT: Mapbox Vector Tiles
MySQL
NAS - ALKIS
NetCDF: Network Common Data Form - Vector
NGW -- NextGIS Web
OGC API - Features
Oracle Spatial
ODBC RDBMS
ODS - Open Document Spreadsheet
ESRI File Geodatabase vector (OpenFileGDB)
OSM - OpenStreetMap XML and PBF
(Geo)Parquet
PDF -- Geospatial PDF
PDS - Planetary Data Systems TABLE
PostgreSQL SQL Dump
ESRI Personal GeoDatabase
PostgreSQL / PostGIS
PLScenes (Planet Labs Scenes/Catalog API)
PMTiles
IHO S-57 (ENC)
Selafin files
ESRI Shapefile / DBF
Norwegian SOSI Standard
SQLite / Spatialite RDBMS
Storage and eXchange Format - SXF
TileDB -- TileDB vector
TopoJSON driver
VDV - VDV-451/VDV-452/INTREST Data Format
VFK - Czech Cadastral Exchange Data Format
VRT -- OGR Virtual Format
WAsP - WAsP .map format
WFS - OGC WFS service
XLS - MS Excel format
XLSX - MS Office Open XML spreadsheet
XODR -- OpenDRIVE Road Description Format
User
Raster Data Model
GDAL Band Algebra
Multidimensional Raster Data Model
Vector Data Model
Geographic Networks Data Model
Multi-threading
OGR SQL dialect and SQLITE SQL dialect
GDAL Virtual File Systems
Feature Style Specification
Coordinate epoch support
Configuration options
GDAL Python Utilities
Migration guide
Security considerations
API
Full Doxygen output
C API
C++ API
Python API
Java API
GDAL/OGR In Other Languages
Tutorials
Raster
Multidimensional raster
Vector
Geographic Network Model
Projections and Spatial Reference Systems tutorial (OSR - OGRSpatialReference)
Workshops
External tutorials
Development
Building GDAL from source
Setting up a development environment
Development practices
Automated testing
Building documentation
Using GDAL in CMake projects
Request For Comments (RFC) process for code changes
RFC list
Community
Code of Conduct
AI Tool Use Policy
Mailing List
GitHub
Chat
Social media
Conferences
Governance and Community Participation
GDAL Service Providers
Sponsors
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Supporter
Sponsorship Program
How to contribute?
FAQ
What does GDAL stand for?
What is this OGR stuff?
What does OGR stand for?
What does CPL stand for?
What does VSI stand for?
When was the GDAL project started?
Is GDAL/OGR proprietary software?
What license does GDAL/OGR use?
What operating systems does GDAL-OGR run on?
Is there a graphical user interface to GDAL/OGR?
What compiler can I use to build GDAL/OGR?
I have a question that's not answered here. Where can I get more information?
How do I add support for a new format?
What about file formats for 3D models?
Is GDAL thread-safe ?
Does GDAL provide a Section 508 information?
How do I cite GDAL ?
Glossary
Credits and Acknowledgments
License
License
Thanks
Index
Index