GIS & Spatial Data: World Data

Access, view, and download information from geospatial databases containing a broad spectrum of data produced by the USGS and other government agencies.

This database is a global collaborative effort to construct a database of the world's administrative boundaries (e.g. Countries, Provinces, Counties). GADM maps 116,996 administrative boundaries areas in Shapefile or ESRI geodatabase formats.

Public domain map dataset available at 1:10m, 1:50m, and 1:110 million scales; make your own maps with cartography or GIS software.

Search and/or browse for geospatial data by geographic area or topic.

OpenStreetMap is a map of the world, created by people like you and free to use under an open license.

The HWSD is a 30 arc-second raster database with over 16,000 different soil mapping units that combines existing regional and national updates of soil information worldwide (SOTER, ESD, Soil Map of China, WISE) with the information contained within the 1:5,000,000 scale FAO-UNESCO Soil Map of the World (FAO, 19711981). Supplementary data includes Soil Quality, Land Cover and Terrain Data.

This a project designed to monitor the world's glaciers primarily using data from optical satellite instruments, such as ASTER.

The Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center (LP DAAC) is one of several discipline-specific data centers within the NASA Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS). Includes the Warehouse Inventory Search Tool (WIST), USGS Global Visualization Viewer (GloVis), LP DAAC Data Pool, MODIS Reprojection Tool on the Web (MRTWeb), Earth Remote Sensing Data Analysis Center (ERSDAC) and ASTER Tasking.

The information system PANGAEA is operated as an Open Access library aimed at archiving, publishing and distributing georeferenced data from earth system research. The system guarantees long-term availability of its content through a commitment of the operating institutions. Most of the data are freely available and can be used by referencing the related publication or the dataset citation. A few password protected data sets are under moratorium from ongoing projects. The description of each data set is always visible and includes the principle investigator (PI) to ask for access. PANGAEA is a designated archive for the journal Earth System Science Data (ESSD).