Provided by: osmium-tool_1.17.0-1_amd64 
NAME
osmium-diff - display differences between OSM files
SYNOPSIS
osmium diff [OPTIONS] OSM-FILE1 OSM-FILE2
DESCRIPTION
Finds all differences between two OSM files and displays them. This command compares all attributes of
all objects, so it will even find, say, differences in the user name or even the order of tags,
differences that should not happen in normal OSM data unless there is also a different object version.
Only differences between objects (node, ways, and relations) are found and displayed. Headers are
ignored.
Objects in both input files must be sorted in the same order.
Several output formats are supported, see the OUTPUT FORMATS section.
This command is intended for displaying the differences between files to humans. It can not be used to
create an OSM change file (.osc), use osmium-derive-changes for that.
OUTPUT FORMATS
The following output formats are supported and can be set with the --output-format/-f options. Default
is the compact format.
compact
A very compact format. For all objects a line is printed with the type of object (`n', `w', or
`r'), the object ID and then the version number. If objects appear in both files and are
identical they are preceded by a space (’ `) character, if they are in both files, but different,
they are preceded by an asterisk ('*`). Otherwise they get a minus ('-`) or plus ('+’) character
to show that they are only in the first or second file, respectively.
opl The usual OPL format with all lines preceded by space (’ `), minus ('-`), or plus ('+’) characters
depending on whether the object is in both, the first, or the second file.
debug The usual debug format with all lines preceded by space (’ `), minus ('-`), or plus ('+`)
characters depending on whether the object is in both, the first, or the second file. Color
support can be enabled (’debug,color').
None of the output formats print the headers of the input files.
OPTIONS
-c, --suppress-common
Do not output objects that are the same in both files.
-f, --output-format=FORMAT
See the OUTPUT FORMATS section.
--ignore-changeset
Ignore changeset id on OSM objects when comparing files. When used with the OPL output format the
`changeset' attribute is not written to the output.
--ignore-uid
Ignore user id on OSM objects when comparing files. When used with the OPL output format the
`uid' attribute is not written to the output.
--ignore-user
Ignore user name on OSM objects when comparing files. When used with the OPL output format the
`user' attribute is not written to the output.
-o, --output=FILE
Name of the output file. Default is `-' (STDOUT).
-O, --overwrite
Allow an existing output file to be overwritten. Normally osmium will refuse to write over an
existing file.
-q, --quiet
No output. Just report when files differ through the return code.
-s, --summary
Print count of objects that are only in the left or right files, or the same in both or different
in both to STDERR.
-t, --object-type=TYPE
Read only objects of given type (node, way, relation). By default all types are read. This
option can be given multiple times. This affects the output as well as the return code of the
command.
COMMON OPTIONS
-h, --help
Show usage help.
-v, --verbose
Set verbose mode. The program will output information about what it is doing to STDERR.
--progress
Show progress bar. Usually a progress bar is only displayed if STDOUT and STDERR are detected to
be TTY. With this option a progress bar is always shown. Note that a progress bar will never be
shown when reading from STDIN or a pipe.
--no-progress
Do not show progress bar. Usually a progress bar is displayed if STDOUT and STDERR are detected
to be a TTY. With this option the progress bar is suppressed. Note that a progress bar will
never be shown when reading from STDIN or a pipe.
INPUT OPTIONS
-F, --input-format=FORMAT
The format of the input file(s). Can be used to set the input format if it can’t be autodetected
from the file name(s). This will set the format for all input files, there is no way to set the
format for some input files only. See osmium-file-formats(5) or the libosmium manual for details.
DIAGNOSTICS
osmium diff exits with exit code
0 if the files are the same,
1 if the files are different, or
2 if there was an error
MEMORY USAGE
osmium diff doesn’t keep a lot of data in memory.
EXAMPLES
Show difference between Nepal files from January 2016 and February 2016 in compact format:
osmium diff nepal-20160101.osm.pbf nepal-20160201.osm.pbf
Show in color debug format only those objects that are different:
osmium diff nepal-20160101.osm.pbf nepal-20160201.osm.pbf -f debug,color -c
SEE ALSO
• osmium(1), osmium-file-formats(5), osmium-derive-changes(1) • Osmium website ⟨https://osmcode.org/osmium-tool/⟩
COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2013-2025 Jochen Topf <jochen@topf.org>. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>. This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
CONTACT
If you have any questions or want to report a bug, please go to https://osmcode.org/contact.html
AUTHORS
Jochen Topf <jochen@topf.org>. 1.17.0 OSMIUM-DIFF(1)