Is there a way to use Mapbox GL JS for Free?

Question

I am hosting my own map tiles on my server. Is there a way to use Mapbox GL JS completely for free or do I have to pay for it anyway, when I am using the framework? Their website is a bit contradictive, on the one hand they have a pricing on the other hand they say it is an open source project, which is free. So I am confused.

Principalities

Answer 1

Mapbox-GL-JS is completely free, up to version 1.13 (as in free beer, and also as in free speech). However, the Mapbox styles (and their associated resources, such as glyphs and sprites) are not, so you will need to find an alternative source, such as Maptiler for those.

From version 2.0 it is different. Any use of the Mapbox GL JS library consumes API credits, which are "free as in beer" up to a certain point, then paying. The source code is proprietary, open source (as in you can browse it) but not free (you are very limited in what you can do with it).

Asperges

This answer is unfortunately no longer correct, as of v2. See next answer. – Bamford

Answer 2

Since version 2.0, Mapbox gl js is no longer open source

However there are two open source forks of Mapbox GL libraries:

• For javascript Maplibre GL JS
• For Android and iOS Maplibre GL Native

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