Using and creating data with Ordnance Survey products

Ordnance Survey licenses a number of products for business use and commercial exploitation. Some of these are available free of charge at the point of use, with very few restrictions on their use and reuse. Others attract licence fees and are subject to more comprehensive terms and conditions. 

These pages discuss the creation of new data, and the use of third-party data, with Ordnance Survey licensed data. They have been divided into the following sections: 

• OS OpenData™
  This section covers the use of the datasets that Ordnance Survey makes available free of charge at the point of use. It provides links that will enable you to find out which datasets are available and how you can obtain them. There are very few restrictions relating to the use and reuse of these datasets.
• OS OpenSpace^®
  This section introduces the service we provide to help you create web applications using our mapping. Links enabling you to find out more about
  OS OpenSpace are provided. 
• Ordnance Survey Data that is Licensed on payment of a Licence Fee
  This section provides you with information relating to:

  • The use of independently sourced data with Ordnance Survey data.

  • The creation of ‘Free to Use Data’.

  • The creation of data that remains subject to an ongoing licence fee.

Each section provides guidance to help you identify what, if any, ongoing licensing implications will be associated with your intended use of Ordnance Survey data. 

Glossary of terms 

Our definition of ‘Crown copyright’ and ‘intellectual property rights’ is available.

Contact us 

If, having read these pages, you have questions that haven’t been answered, please contact us for further guidance.