# Source: Microsoft Building Footprints
# Type: geoparquet
# Catalog: STACConnector
# Generated by: folia catalog import
# Generated at: 2026-02-08T00:48:48.386386+00:00
#
# Do not edit manually - will be overwritten on next import.

source:
  id: planetary-computer-ms-buildings
  name: Microsoft Building Footprints
  type: geoparquet
  url: https://planetarycomputer.microsoft.com/api/stac/v1/collections/ms-buildings
  description: 'Bing Maps is releasing open building footprints around the world.
    We have detected over 999 million buildings from Bing Maps imagery between 2014
    and 2021 including Maxar and Airbus imagery. The data is freely available for
    download and use under ODbL. This dataset complements our other releases.


    For more information, see the [GlobalMLBuildingFootprints](https://github.com/microsoft/GlobalMLBuildingFootprints/)
    repository on GitHub.


    ## Building footprint creation


    The building extraction is done in two stages:


    1. Semantic Segmentation – Recognizing building pixels on an aerial image using
    deep neural networks (DNNs)

    2. Polygonization – Converting building pixel detections into polygons


    **Stage 1: Semantic Segmentation**


    ![Semantic segmentation](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/GlobalMLBuildingFootprints/main/images/segmentation.jpg)


    **Stage 2: Polygonization**


    ![Polygonization](https://github.com/microsoft/GlobalMLBuildingFootprints/raw/main/images/polygonization.jpg)


    ## Data assets


    The building footprints are provided as a set of [geoparquet](https://github.com/opengeospatial/geoparquet)
    datasets in [Delta][delta] table format.

    The data are partitioned by


    1. Region

    2. quadkey at [Bing Map Tiles][tiles] level 9


    Each `(Region, quadkey)` pair will have one or more geoparquet files, depending
    on the density of the of the buildings in that area.


    Note that older items in this dataset are *not* spatially partitioned. We recommend
    using data with a processing date

    of 2023-04-25 or newer. This processing date is part of the URL for each parquet
    file and is captured in the STAC metadata

    for each item (see below).


    ## Delta Format


    The collection-level asset under the `delta` key gives you the fsspec-style URL

    to the Delta table. This can be used to efficiently query for matching partitions

    by `Region` and `quadkey`. See the notebook for an example using Python.


    ## STAC metadata


    This STAC collection has one STAC item per region. The `msbuildings:region`

    property can be used to filter items to a specific region, and the `msbuildings:quadkey`

    property can be used to filter items to a specific quadkey (though you can also
    search

    by the `geometry`).


    Note that older STAC items are not spatially partitioned. We recommend filtering
    on

    items with an `msbuildings:processing-date` of `2023-04-25` or newer. See the
    collection

    summary for `msbuildings:processing-date` for a list of valid values.


    [delta]: https://delta.io/

    [tiles]: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/bingmaps/articles/bing-maps-tile-system

    '
  provider: Microsoft
  license: ODbL-1.0
  metadata:
    stac: true
    stac_api: true
    connector_id: planetary-computer
    tags:
    - Bing Maps
    - Buildings
    - geoparquet
    - Microsoft
    - Footprint
    - Delta
    dataset:
      tier: 1
      thematic_group: Atmosphere & Air Quality
      format: geoparquet
      crs: EPSG:4326
      temporal:
        range: 2014-01-01/..
        type: snapshot
        default_range: latest
      quality:
        coverage: global
      layout:
        type: tiled
      stac_collection_id: ms-buildings
      homepage: https://planetarycomputer.microsoft.com/api/stac/v1/collections/ms-buildings