canonical: https://jentic.com/apis/openchargemap.org/openchargemap # Open Charge Map API The Open Charge Map API provides programmatic access to the world's largest open database of electric vehicle charging locations. The /poi endpoint returns charging-station points of interest with coordinates, connection types, power levels, operator details, and user-submitted comments, while /referencedata returns the lookup tables used to resolve operator IDs, connection types, status codes, and country codes returned in POI responses. The dataset is community-maintained and free to query for non-commercial use, with API key registration required for any production integration. ## For AI agents Search the global Open Charge Map database for EV charging stations and retrieve reference data for operators, connection types, and status codes. ## Scope Does not handle real-time availability, live charger reservation, or payment authorisation - use for read-only EV charging-station POI lookup and reference data only. ## Capabilities - Find EV charging stations within a radius of a given latitude and longitude - Filter charging-station results by country code, operator ID, or connection type - Retrieve detailed point-of-interest records including charge speed and connector counts - Resolve numeric IDs in POI responses against the /referencedata lookup tables - Return user-submitted comments and check-ins for charging-station reliability signals - Page through large result sets using maxresults and modifiedsince filters ## Use cases ### EV Trip Planner Charger Search Surface charging-station options along an EV route by querying /poi with latitude, longitude, distance, and connection-type filters. Open Charge Map covers stations across more than 80 countries with crowd-sourced reliability comments, which makes it useful as a primary source for hobbyist EV planners and as an alternative source layered alongside paid OEM data. Example prompt: GET /poi?output=json&latitude=51.5074&longitude=-0.1278&distance=10&distanceunit=km&connectiontypeid=33 and return the top 10 chargers with operator and power kW. ### Charger Operator Analytics Build dashboards that compare charger coverage by operator, country, or connection type. The /poi endpoint can be paginated by maxresults and country code, while /referencedata supplies the operator and connection-type lookup tables needed to display human-readable names rather than numeric IDs in reports. Example prompt: Pull /poi for countrycode=DE in batches of 1000 and /referencedata once, then group POIs by operator name from the OperatorID lookup. ### Reliability and Reviews Lookup Surface user-submitted check-ins and comments returned in POI responses to flag chargers with recent failure reports. The same /poi endpoint includes a UserComments collection per station, which can drive a freshness or reliability score in consumer apps without a separate review service. Example prompt: GET /poi?chargepointid=12345&includecomments=true and return the most recent UserComments entry plus its CheckinStatusType. ### AI Agent EV Routing Assistant Through Jentic, an AI EV-routing agent can find chargers, resolve operator names, and report reliability without learning Open Charge Map's parameter conventions. The agent searches for the charger lookup operation, loads the schema, and executes the query with API-key handling delegated to your Jentic One instance. Example prompt: Through Jentic, search for 'find EV charging stations near a coordinate', load GET /poi, and execute it with latitude, longitude, and a 25km radius. ## Key endpoints | Method | Path | Description | | --- | --- | --- | | GET | /poi | Search and retrieve charging-station POIs | | GET | /referencedata | Retrieve reference lookup tables | ## Key resources - **POI** — Charging-station points of interest with coordinates, connections, and comments - **Reference Data** — Lookup tables for operators, connection types, status codes, and countries ## Why Jentic - **Setup:** Wiring the Open Charge Map API by hand means managing the API key and deciding per operation whether it rides in the 'key' query parameter or the 'x-api-key' header, then shaping POI and reference-data queries yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import the Open Charge Map API from the API Directory, store the key once, and your agent calls it. - **Permission scoping:** Open Charge Map is a read-only lookup API whose filters travel in the request parameters, so scope it by limiting the agent to the operations it needs, such as the POI query or the reference-data call. You choose the operations it may call, and nothing beyond that set runs. - **Credential handling:** Your Open Charge Map API key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and injected as either the 'key' query parameter or the 'x-api-key' header at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context. - **Discovery method:** Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'find EV charging stations near a coordinate' or 'list charging-station operators', and Jentic returns either the /poi or /referencedata operation with its parameter schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs. ## Related APIs - **Geocodio API** — Convert user-entered locations into coordinates before charger lookups. - **OpenCage Geocoder** — Worldwide open-data geocoder useful upstream of charger search. - **HERE Maps API** — Commercial maps platform with its own EV charging dataset. - **TomTom API** — Routing and EV-aware navigation with commercial data sources. ## FAQ ### What authentication does the Open Charge Map API use? The spec defines two API key schemes: 'apiKey' which expects the key as the 'key' query parameter, and 'apiKeyHeader' which expects it in the 'x-api-key' HTTP header. Either is accepted on /poi and /referencedata. Through Jentic, the key is stored encrypted in your Jentic One instance and injected into whichever location the chosen operation uses. ### Can I find chargers near a coordinate with this API? Yes. GET /poi accepts latitude, longitude, distance, and distanceunit query parameters and returns POIs within the specified radius. You can layer additional filters such as connectiontypeid, operatorid, levelid (charging speed level), and countrycode to narrow results to relevant chargers. ### What are the rate limits for the Open Charge Map API? Open Charge Map does not publish hard per-key limits in the spec; the project asks integrators to register an API key, cache results aggressively (the dataset changes slowly), and avoid tight polling. Production traffic above casual hobby levels should coordinate with the project via openchargemap.org rather than scaling clients indefinitely. ### How do I look up a charging station through Jentic? Search Jentic for 'find EV charging stations near a coordinate', load GET /poi, and execute it with latitude, longitude, distance, and any operator or connection-type filters. Jentic injects the API key from your Jentic One instance and returns the parsed POI list, including UserComments where present. ### Is the Open Charge Map API free? Yes. The Open Charge Map dataset is freely available under the project's open licence, and API keys are issued at no cost via openchargemap.org. Heavy commercial use is permitted but the project requests attribution and contributions back to the dataset. ### How do I resolve operator IDs returned in POI responses? Call GET /referencedata once and cache the response. The reference payload includes Operators, ConnectionTypes, StatusTypes, and CountryCodes lookup arrays - use the matching ID in each /poi response to display human-readable names without an extra round-trip per record. ### Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the Open Charge Map API? Yes. Because you run Jentic One yourself, your own rules decide which Open Charge Map operations the agent may call, and it can invoke nothing outside that set. Open Charge Map is a read-only lookup API with just two operations, the GET /poi charging-station query and the GET /referencedata lookup call, so you can allow only the ones the agent needs, for example the POI search while withholding the reference-data call. All filters such as latitude, longitude, connectiontypeid, and countrycode travel as request parameters your rules can constrain, and your API key stays stored encrypted in your own instance rather than being exposed to the agent.