Microsoft Building Footprints
Quick answer: Microsoft Building Footprints is a 1.4-billion-polygon global building dataset detected from satellite imagery and released under CDLA Permissive 2.0 as line-delimited GeoJSON tiles.
Next step
Already have the export?
Open a GeoJSON result in the browser to inspect its map and attributes before sharing or converting it again.
Format
GeoJSON (line-delimited) / Parquet
Geometry
Polygon (building footprints)
Coverage
Global — 225 regions, 30,340 tiles
Resolution
Building-level polygons (EPSG:4326), many with height and confidence
About this dataset
1.4 billion building footprints derived from Bing Maps imagery (2014–2024) across 225 regions — released under CDLA Permissive 2.0.
Microsoft's Global ML Building Footprints release contains roughly 1.4 billion building polygons detected from Bing Maps imagery (Maxar, Airbus, IGN France, Vexcel) between 2014 and 2024, distributed as 30,340 tiles across 225 regions. Files arrive as line-delimited GeoJSON (.csv.gz); many footprints also carry a height estimate and a confidence score. The dataset is licensed CDLA Permissive 2.0, so commercial reuse is allowed with attribution.
How to download
- 1 Download dataset-links.csv and filter to the regions you need (quadkey tiling keeps files manageable).
- 2 Fetch the .csv.gz tiles listed for those quadkeys — the contents are line-delimited GeoJSON.
- 3 Rename or decompress with the make-gis-friendly.py helper in the repository.
- 4 Load the polygons in QGIS or GeoDataViewer for building density, height, and urban analysis.
FAQ
What regions does Microsoft Building Footprints cover?
225 regions worldwide across 30,340 tiles — effectively global coverage with gaps where imagery was dated before 2014 or detection probability was low.
What format is the data in?
Line-delimited GeoJSON inside .csv.gz files, partitioned by Bing quadkey. Planetary Computer serves the same data through STAC.
Is commercial use allowed?
Yes. The data is licensed CDLA Permissive 2.0, which allows commercial use with attribution to Microsoft. (Older documentation cited ODbL; the current licence is CDLA Permissive 2.0.)
Why is there no map preview on this page?
The release is 1.4 billion buildings — far above the site's 10 MB hosting rule. Even a single dense country exceeds it, so the page links straight to the tile index instead; use OSM/Overture building tiles for a browser preview.