Public Cell ID databases

Question

Hi.

I'm building a location aware mobile application which uses GPS, but i'd like to be able to add cell location too.

The best thing I have found so far is to use Google Gears, which has a location API available, but my application is not web based.

Are there any good public cell id databases that can be accessed from any kind of application?

I have found a few interesting projects out there like OpenCellID, but the database is very poor right now.

Answer 1

http://www.opencellid.org/ This is the only one that i've used.

Answer 2

edit:
update on database stats, 2009 Oct 31, including answer from ericsson, sorting by number of cells:

• labs.ericsson.com/apis/mobile-location/: 3,900,000
• opencellid.org: 585,058 cells, 167 countries (mcc), 196 operators (mnc), 48482937 measures
• cellid.telin.nl: 125,976, 59, 159, 783540
• cellspotting.com: 109,890

• celldb.org: 70,746, 194, 501, 1593783

• fireeagle.yahoo.net/developer: no info

original answer:
beside opencellid.org, lead by 8Motions, containing 112,118 cells as of today, there are also

• http://cellid.telin.nl/ (106,757 cells)
• http://www.cellspotting.com/ (103,246)
• http://celldb.org/ (32,955 cells)
• http://developer.yahoo.com/yrb/zonetag/ (?)

and probably more (just google for "cellid db" or any combination of above urls).

there are also people using google's cell id db via a hidden api, but then i guess this doesn't count for "Public Cell ID databases" :)

Answer 3

Ericsson Labs has a cell-ID db with a free look-up service: https://labs.ericsson.com/apis/mobile-location/documentation/cell-id-look-up-api

It has really good global coverage of cells.

Answer 4

Sorry for the late reply,

The database has 3.9M unique cells now and new cells are added every day.

Richard, Ericsson Labs

Answer 5

Ericsson Labs 3.9M!

Impressive!

Answer 6

There's also http://www.location-api.com/

Answer 7

Hi!

Location-API.com has now more than 5.7M cells in the database. Started to include WIFI cells as well.