⏱️ Lectura: 10 min
Adding a store’s official website to OpenStreetMap now takes under 15 minutes thanks to Website Wizard, a new JOSM plugin that automates finding and saving that data. It was developed by an independent contributor and is already available to install from within the editor itself.
📑 En este artículo
The website tag might seem minor, but it’s the gateway to data like a business’s phone number, hours, and email: information that dozens of apps and services built on OpenStreetMap depend on.
TL;DR
- Website Wizard is a JOSM plugin that adds the website tag to OpenStreetMap businesses in under 15 minutes.
- JOSM weighs around 365 MB and runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux on top of Java.
- The plugin opens DuckDuckGo with the business name and a neighborhood prefix to find the official site.
- Its author added 66 new website tags in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood in a single changeset.
- The United States has more than 1 million businesses, according to a figure cited in the plugin’s own tutorial.
- Each shop or amenity with a website later makes it possible to derive phone, opening_hours, and email from the official site.
- The workflow uses a JOSM search filter to exclude places that already have website or contact:website.
What happened
The developer behind high5apps published a tutorial and a plugin called Website Wizard for JOSM, OpenStreetMap’s Java-based desktop editor. The goal is for anyone, with no prior mapping experience, to be able to add the website tag to a real business in under 15 minutes.
The guide explains that JOSM weighs about 365 MB and runs on Java on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Unlike iD, the editor that runs directly in OpenStreetMap’s browser, JOSM allows installing third-party plugins: that’s where Website Wizard comes in.
As a proof of concept, the author himself recounts that he added 66 new website tags in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood in a single changeset, using the same workflow described in the tutorial.
Context and history
OpenStreetMap was born in 2004 in the United Kingdom, driven by Steve Coast as a response to the closed commercial maps of the time. It works like Wikipedia, but for maps: anyone can edit it, and every change is recorded in a public history called a changeset. Its data is published under the ODbL license, which allows commercial and non-commercial reuse as long as the source is attributed.
Since the project’s earliest years, key-value tags like shop=bakery or amenity=restaurant have existed, among them the website tag. As high5apps’ tutorial explains, that tag is still missing from a huge portion of already-mapped businesses. That matters because almost any business’s official website already includes its phone number, hours, and email: data that can be added later as phone, opening_hours, and email tags once website exists.
Dozens of apps and services built on OSM data (business finders, navigation apps, local directories) depend on that chain of tags. Without website as a starting point, filling out the rest of a business’s profile requires much more manual work. In large Latin American cities, opening_hours and phone coverage tends to be even lower than in North America, which leaves a concrete opportunity for developers in the region.
| Editor | Where it runs | Learning curve | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| iD | Browser, built into openstreetmap.org | Low | One-off edits and getting started |
| JOSM | Desktop, Java, ~365 MB | Medium/high | Bulk edits with plugins like Website Wizard |
| StreetComplete | Mobile, Android | Low | Filling in missing data by walking around the location |
Website Wizard’s technical details
Website Wizard doesn’t replace JOSM’s standard workflow: it wraps around it. The tutorial recommends first downloading the data for a small, few-block area of interest (AOI) with Ctrl+Shift+↓, and then applying a search filter that excludes everything that already has a website loaded.
The exact filter the guide proposes uses JOSM’s internal search syntax:
name=* ((amenity=* "addr:housenumber"=*) | shop=*) -website=* -"contact:website"=*That query leaves visible only named elements that are either a business (shop=*) or an amenity with a street number (amenity=* plus addr:housenumber), and that still don’t have website or contact:website. That’s exactly the set of places where Website Wizard can add value.
⚠️ Heads up: the tutorial is explicit about not using social media profiles, review sites, or business aggregators as the website. If there’s any doubt about which is the official site, it’s better to leave the place unedited.
Once the plugin is enabled from JOSM’s preferences (puzzle piece icon, search for “WebsiteWizard” in the download list), a panel appears with a search prefix field (city or neighborhood) and a button that opens DuckDuckGo with that prefix plus the selected place’s name. The person manually reviews the result, copies the URL if it’s the official one, and saves it with a click.
flowchart TD
A["Create OSM account"] --> B["Install JOSM and the plugin"]
B --> C["Download area data (AOI)"]
C --> D["Filter businesses without website tag"]
D --> E["Find official site with Website Wizard"]
E --> F["Save website tag"]
F --> G["Upload changeset to OpenStreetMap"]The whole process is reversible: Ctrl+Z undoes any change before uploading it, and the final changeset remains visible in the edited element’s public history.
Getting started
To reproduce the full workflow, you need a free OpenStreetMap account and JOSM installed. Installation varies depending on the operating system:
# Windows (with winget)
winget install JOSM.JOSM
# macOS (with Homebrew)
brew install --cask josm
# Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)
sudo apt install josm
# Linux (Flatpak, any distro)
flatpak install flathub org.openstreetmap.josmAfter installing JOSM and confirming the OSM account’s email, the rest of the workflow happens inside the editor: download the area, apply the filter from the previous section, install the plugin from F12 → Plugins → Download list by searching for “WebsiteWizard”, and review each business.
To estimate how many places in an area still don’t have a website without opening JOSM, you can run the same filter logic against the Overpass API from your own script:
import requests
query = """
[out:json][timeout:25];
area["name"="Wallingford"]->.a;
(
node["shop"](area.a)["name"];
node["amenity"]["addr:housenumber"](area.a)["name"];
);
out count;
"""
resp = requests.post("https://overpass-api.de/api/interpreter", data={"data": query})
print(resp.json())The result returns a count of candidate nodes. The more that show up, the more room there is to contribute in that area, and that same pattern helps prioritize neighborhoods before opening JOSM.
💡 Tip: start with a small, few-block area. If the download in JOSM fails, the AOI you chose is too large.
After finishing saving tags, uploading the changeset with Ctrl+Shift+↑ asks for a comment and a data source. The tutorial recommends writing something like Add website to <neighborhood> shops and amenities and marking survey as the source when the data came from a direct search.
Impact and analysis
The tutorial itself acknowledges the limit of this approach: the United States has more than 1 million businesses, and that number doesn’t include amenities like schools, clinics, or restaurants. A plugin that saves minutes per edit doesn’t solve the scale problem on its own: it requires more people repeating the workflow in their own neighborhoods.
The more real limitation is data quality, not upload speed. Website Wizard automates the search, but deciding which result is the official site remains a human call. A rushed contributor could upload a social media profile or a third-party directory as if it were the official site, which degrades the reliability of everything that later depends on that tag.
Nor does it replace StreetComplete, the mobile app that answers similar questions by walking around the location instead of searching in a browser. They’re complementary workflows: JOSM and Website Wizard perform better in long desktop sessions, while StreetComplete works better for filling in specific data on the go.
What’s next
The author himself suggests two paths once an area is finished: repeat the filter to now look for businesses with a website but no phone, and fill in that data by reading the already-loaded official site. The second path is simply adding more contributors, given the size of the problem in any large LATAM city.
For data teams or developers in the region, the pattern is reusable beyond OpenStreetMap: any in-house business catalog can benefit from a similar workflow, with a filter that isolates incomplete records, an automated search for the missing data, and a final human validation before saving.
📖 Summary on Telegram: View summary
Try it yourself: install JOSM with the command for your operating system and add your first website tag to a business in your neighborhood today.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the website tag in OpenStreetMap?
It’s an attribute that stores a mapped location’s official URL. From there, it becomes much easier to add phone number, hours, and email, because that data is usually on that same page.
Do I need to know how to code to use JOSM?
No. The Website Wizard tutorial is designed for people with no prior experience in mapping or development. The steps are visual, with menus and clicks inside JOSM’s interface.
Does Website Wizard work with iD, OpenStreetMap’s web editor?
No. The plugin is exclusive to JOSM, because only JOSM allows installing third-party plugins. iD remains the simplest option for one-off edits without installing anything.
What happens if I make a mistake while editing?
Ctrl+Z undoes any change before uploading the changeset. If the mistake was already uploaded, it can be fixed with a later edit: the entire history remains public.
How do I check that my changeset uploaded correctly?
After uploading, JOSM opens the changeset in the browser with the list of modified elements. You can also check any node’s history directly from the OpenStreetMap website.
Can I use this to map businesses in my LATAM city?
Yes. The workflow doesn’t depend on the country: only the search prefix used in Website Wizard (city or neighborhood) and the language used to search for the official site change.
References
- high5apps: Make Your First Edit to OpenStreetMap in the Next 15 Minutes: original tutorial for the Website Wizard plugin.
- JOSM, OpenStreetMap’s official editor: download and documentation for the desktop editor.
- OpenStreetMap: account registration and collaborative map.
- OSM Wiki: Key:website: documentation for the website tag.
- Overpass API: API used to query OpenStreetMap data programmatically.
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Imagen destacada: Foto de National Cancer Institute en Unsplash
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