GeoNames Forum

Hi,

Which one would be more complete?

Having played around with geonames it is truly a massive db. Is it close to what can be achieved by geocoding with Google?

I see geonames has very nice findnearby and hieararchy services, which are close to google geocoding results, but which one would be more complete?

Cheers,
G

Hi giorgio,

I have no idea about the completeness but I think there is more involved than data completeness. I use GeoNames as they have a Creative Commons By Attribution license. Depending on where you want to use the data it may/may not be more convenient to use one or the other.

Hi Giorgio

As often in life the answer is 'it depends'.

GeoNames has better global coverare for cities and other populated places whereas google has coverage for street level geocoding in some countries, something GeoNames is missing completely.
Depending on your focus either GeoNames or Google is more complete.

Best

Marc