Skip to main content

Add a georeferenced image

This example overlays a georeferenced historical image on top of a Mapbox map.

Georeferencing is the process of assigning geographic coordinates to a raster image to define its location in the world based on a map coordinate system.

The georeferenced image used in this example is from a historical map of Portland, Oregon provided by the Library of Congress. You can georeference using a free, open-source tool like QGIS. To learn more, see the QGIS georeferencing tutorial. To use a georeferenced image in a Mapbox map, upload it as a tileset to Mapbox, then add it to your map using addSource.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>Add a georeferenced image</title>
<meta name="viewport" content="initial-scale=1,maximum-scale=1,user-scalable=no">
<link href="https://api.mapbox.com/mapbox-gl-js/v3.8.0/mapbox-gl.css" rel="stylesheet">
<script src="https://api.mapbox.com/mapbox-gl-js/v3.8.0/mapbox-gl.js"></script>
<style>
body { margin: 0; padding: 0; }
#map { position: absolute; top: 0; bottom: 0; width: 100%; }
</style>
</head>
<body>
<div id="map"></div>
<script>
// TO MAKE THE MAP APPEAR YOU MUST
// ADD YOUR ACCESS TOKEN FROM
// https://account.mapbox.com
mapboxgl.accessToken = 'YOUR_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN';
const map = new mapboxgl.Map({
container: 'map', // container ID
// Choose from Mapbox's core styles, or make your own style with Mapbox Studio
style: 'mapbox://styles/mapbox/streets-v12', // style URL
center: [-122.619991, 45.536023], // starting position [lng, lat]
zoom: 10.5 // starting zoom
});

map.on('load', () => {
map.addSource('portland', {
'type': 'raster',
'url': 'mapbox://examples.32xkp0wd'
});

map.addLayer({
'id': 'portland',
'source': 'portland',
'type': 'raster'
});
});
</script>

</body>
</html>
This code snippet will not work as expected until you replace YOUR_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN with an access token from your Mapbox account.
Was this example helpful?