Uploads
Mapbox Tiling Service (MTS) has several beta endpoints that allow you to create custom vector tilesets. You can use these endpoints as an alternative to the Uploads API for tiling vector data using custom configuration rules. While these endpoints are in beta, they are subject to potential changes.
The Mapbox Uploads API transforms geographic data into tilesets that can be used with maps and geographic applications. Given a wide variety of geospatial formats, it normalizes projections and generates tiles at multiple zoom levels to make data viewable on the web.
The upload workflow follows these steps:
- Request temporary S3 credentials that allow you to stage the file. Jump to the Retrieve S3 credentials section.
- Use an S3 client to upload the file to Mapbox's S3 staging bucket using these credentials. Learn more about this process in the Upload to Mapbox using cURL tutorial.
- Create an upload using the staged file's URL. Jump to the Create an upload section.
- Retrieve the upload's status as it is being processed into a tileset. Jump to the Retrieve upload status section.
Note: This documentation discusses how to interact with the Mapbox Uploads API programmatically. For a step-by-step guide on how to use the Uploads API to stage a file to Amazon S3 and create an upload, use the Upload to Mapbox using cURL tutorial.
For information on how the Uploads API is billed, visit the Pricing by product guide.
Retrieve S3 credentials
Mapbox provides an Amazon S3 bucket to stage your file while your upload is processed. This endpoint allows you to retrieve temporary S3 credentials to use during the staging process.
Note: This step is necessary before you can stage a file in the Amazon S3 bucket provided by Mapbox. All uploads must be staged in this Amazon S3 bucket before being uploaded to your Mapbox account. To learn more about how to stage an upload to Amazon S3, read the Upload to Mapbox using cURL tutorial.
Required parameter | Description |
---|---|
username | The username of the account to which you are uploading a tileset. |
Example request: Retrieve S3 credentials
$ curl -X POST "https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}/credentials?access_token="
Mapbox wrapper libraries help you integrate Mapbox APIs into your existing application. The following SDKs support this endpoint:
See the SDK documentation for details and examples of how to use the relevant methods to query this endpoint.
Example AWS CLI usage
$ export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID={accessKeyId}
$ export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY={secretAccessKey}
$ export AWS_SESSION_TOKEN={sessionToken}
$ aws s3 cp /path/to/file s3://{bucket}/{key} --region us-east-1
Response: Retrieve S3 credentials
The response body is a JSON object that contains the following properties:
Property | Description |
---|---|
accessKeyId | AWS Access Key ID |
bucket | S3 bucket name |
key | The unique key for data to be staged |
secretAccessKey | AWS Secret Access Key |
sessionToken | A temporary security token |
url | The destination URL of the file |
Use these credentials to store your data in the provided bucket with the provided key using the AWS CLI or AWS SDK of your choice. The bucket is located in AWS region us-east-1
.
Example response: Retrieve S3 credentials
{
"accessKeyId": "{accessKeyId}",
"bucket": "somebucket",
"key": "hij456",
"secretAccessKey": "{secretAccessKey}",
"sessionToken": "{sessionToken}",
"url": "{url}"
}
Create an upload
After you have used the temporary S3 credentials to transfer your file to Mapbox's staging bucket, you can trigger the generation of a tileset using the file's URL and a destination tileset ID.
Uploaded files must be in the bucket provided by Mapbox. Requests for resources from other S3 buckets or URLs will fail.
Required parameter | Description |
---|---|
username | The username of the account to which you are uploading. |
The request body must be a JSON object that contains the following properties:
Request body properties | Description |
---|---|
tileset | The tileset ID to create or replace, in the format username.nameoftileset . Limited to 32 characters. This character limit does not include the username. The only allowed special characters are - and _ . |
url | The HTTPS URL of the S3 object provided in the credential request, or the dataset ID of an existing Mapbox dataset to be uploaded. |
name | Optional. The name of the tileset. Limited to 64 characters. |
private | Optional. A boolean that describes whether the tileset must be used with an access token from your Mapbox account. Default is true . |
If you reuse a tileset
value, this action will replace existing data. Use a random value to make sure that a new tileset is created, or check your existing tilesets first.
Note: You can only replace existing tilesets created with the Uploads API with this endpoint. You cannot replace a tileset created with Mapbox Tiling Service (MTS) with a tileset created with the Uploads API.
Example request: Create an upload
$ curl -X POST -H "Content-Type: application/json" -H "Cache-Control: no-cache" -d '{
"url": "http://{bucket}.s3.amazonaws.com/{key}",
"tileset": "{username}.{tileset-name}"
}' 'https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}?access_token='
Example request body: Create an upload (AWS S3 bucket not required)
{
"tileset": "{username}.mytileset",
"url": "mapbox://datasets/{username}/{dataset}",
"name": "example-dataset"
}
Mapbox wrapper libraries help you integrate Mapbox APIs into your existing application. The following SDKs support this endpoint:
See the SDK documentation for details and examples of how to use the relevant methods to query this endpoint.
Response: Create an upload
The response body is a JSON object that contains the following properties:
Property | Description |
---|---|
complete | Whether the upload is complete (true ) or not complete (false ). |
tileset | The ID of the tileset that will be created or replaced if upload is successful. |
error | If null , the upload is in progress or has successfully completed. Otherwise, provides a brief explanation of the error. |
id | The unique identifier for the upload. |
name | The name of the upload. |
modified | A timestamp indicating when the upload resource was last modified. |
created | A timestamp indicating when the upload resource was created. |
owner | The unique identifier for the owner's account. |
progress | The progress of the upload, expressed as a float between 0 (started) and 1 (completed). |
Example response: Create an upload
{
"complete": false,
"tileset": "example.markers",
"error": null,
"id": "hij456",
"name": "example-markers",
"modified": "{timestamp}",
"created": "{timestamp}",
"owner": "{username}",
"progress": 0
}
Retrieve upload status
Once an upload is created, you can track its status. Uploads have a progress
property that start at 0
and end at 1
when an upload is complete. If there's an error processing an upload, the error
property will include an error message.
Required parameters | Description |
---|---|
username | The username of the account for which you are requesting an upload status. |
upload_id | The ID of the upload. Provided in the response body to a successful upload request. |
Example request: Retrieve upload status
$ curl "https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}/{upload_id}?access_token="
Mapbox wrapper libraries help you integrate Mapbox APIs into your existing application. The following SDKs support this endpoint:
See the SDK documentation for details and examples of how to use the relevant methods to query this endpoint.
Response: Retrieve upload status
The response body is a JSON object containing the following properties:
Property | Description |
---|---|
complete | Boolean. Indicates whether the upload is complete (true ) or not complete (false ). |
tileset | The ID of the tileset that will be created or replaced if upload is successful. |
error | If null , the upload is in progress or has successfully completed. Otherwise, provides a brief explanation of the error. |
id | The unique identifier for the upload. |
name | The name of the upload. |
modified | The timestamp for when the upload resource was last modified. |
created | The timestamp for when the upload resource was created. |
owner | The unique identifier for the owner's account. |
progress | The progress of the upload, expressed as a float between 0 (started) and 1 (completed). |
Example response: Retrieve upload status
{
"complete": true,
"tileset": "example.markers",
"error": null,
"id": "hij456",
"name": "example-markers",
"modified": "{timestamp}",
"created": "{timestamp}",
"owner": "{username}",
"progress": 1
}
Retrieve recent upload statuses
Retrieve multiple upload statuses at the same time, sorted by the most recently created.
This endpoint supports pagination so that you can list many uploads.
Required parameter | Description |
---|---|
username | The username of the account for which you are requesting upload statuses. |
The results from this endpoint can be further modified with the following optional parameters:
Optional parameters | Description |
---|---|
reverse | Set this parameter to true to reverse the sorting order of the results. By default, the Uploads API returns the most recently created upload statuses first. |
limit | The maximum number of statuses to return, up to 100 . |
Example request: Retrieve recent upload statuses
$ curl "https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}?access_token="
# Return at most 10 upload statuses, in chronological order
$ curl "https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}?reverse=true&limit=10&access_token="
Mapbox wrapper libraries help you integrate Mapbox APIs into your existing application. The following SDKs support this endpoint:
See the SDK documentation for details and examples of how to use the relevant methods to query this endpoint.
Response: Retrieve recent upload statuses
This request returns the same information as an individual upload status request does, but for all an account's recent uploads. The list is limited to one MB of JSON.
Example response: Retrieve recent upload statuses
[{
"complete": true,
"tileset": "example.mbtiles",
"error": null,
"id": "abc123",
"name": null,
"modified": "2014-11-21T19:41:10.000Z",
"created": "2014-11-21T19:41:10.000Z",
"owner": "example",
"progress": 1
}, {
"complete": false,
"tileset": "example.foo",
"error": null,
"id": "xyz789",
"name": "foo",
"modified": "2014-11-21T19:41:10.000Z",
"created": "2014-11-21T19:41:10.000Z",
"owner": "example",
"progress": 0
}]
Remove an upload status
Remove the status of a completed upload from the upload listing.
Uploads are only statuses, so removing an upload from the listing doesn't delete the associated tileset. Tilesets can only be deleted from within Mapbox Studio. An upload status cannot be removed from the upload listing until after it has completed.
Required parameters | Description |
---|---|
username | The username of the associated account. |
upload_id | The ID of the upload. Provided in the response body to a successful upload request. |
Example request: Remove an upload status
$ curl -X DELETE "https://api.mapbox.com/uploads/v1/{username}/{upload_id}?access_token="
Mapbox wrapper libraries help you integrate Mapbox APIs into your existing application. The following SDKs support this endpoint:
See the SDK documentation for details and examples of how to use the relevant methods to query this endpoint.
Response: Remove an upload status
HTTP 204 No content
Uploads API errors
To see a list of possible upload errors, visit the Uploads errors page.
Uploads API restrictions and limits
- Tileset names are limited to 64 characters.
- The default rate limit for the Mapbox Uploads API endpoint is 30 requests per minute. If you require a higher rate limit, contact us.
- If you exceed the rate limit, you will receive an
HTTP 429 Too Many Requests
response. For information on rate limit headers, see the Rate limit headers section. - The Uploads API supports different file sizes for various file types:
File type | Size limit |
---|---|
TIFF and GeoTIFF | 10 GB |
MBTiles | 25 GB |
GeoJSON | 1 GB |
CSV | 1 GB |
KML | 260 MB |
GPX | 260 MB |
Shapefile (unzipped) | 260 MB (combined uncompressed size of .shp and .dbf files)Shapefiles must be uploaded as compressed .zip files. |
Mapbox Dataset | 1 GB |