Back to Main Help

Upload to OSM

Keyboard shortcut: CTRL+SHIFT+U

When you're happy with the data you generated and/or changed, you need it to upload to the OSM server to be available for everyone.

If the ​Validator plugin is installed, JOSM now performs a quick check on the data. If it finds warnings or errors you'll be presented with a list of them and get the chance to correct the problems and try again or upload anyway. It's not necessary to fix all of that, but please don't go over it easily, especially not the errors.

Finally JOSM will present you with a list of changed or newly created elements for reviewing it. You're also asked to provide a short freetext summary of your edits. This description will be saved with your data on the server and serves information purposes like for example the ​Recent Changes list. If you fixed an error in the data by deleting a way not existing anymore in reality, this is something you should definitely mention.

With your final click on "Upload changes" your data will be uploaded and visible for everyone else.

Please be careful with editing and uploading data. When in doubt that everything is ok, rather refrain from uploading and save the area locally on disk to check back to it later.

There is no simple answer to the question when and how often to upload. You neither should edit the whole day and then upload everything at one nor upload every minute after adding a way. The former to keep data in memory small, make uploads faster and minimize the risk of your edits colliding with someone else editing the same ways in the same area. The latter to minimize the overhead each upload poses on the server in means of CPU time and also database size since each change also means processing and saving some meta information.

If possible group your edits. In logical as well as in geographically units, this also makes it easier to give a good upload summary.