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The well-known repeater listings/apps don't provide a database that you can download and use freely for any use in building your own app.

Is there a such a freely accessible repeater listing database online for amateur radio?

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  • $\begingroup$ Um, "open source" is something that describes the status of the binary and source code form of software. What you mean is "freely accessible database". $\endgroup$
    – Marcus Müller
    Commented Jan 18, 2020 at 10:28
  • $\begingroup$ Google is your friend -- In a couple of minutes on Google with a variety of search strings I found several repeater maps and several lists of repeaters in the US. I don't know your location but search with keywords describing your location. Some of these lists could be out of date so caveat emptor is the guiding principle. $\endgroup$
    – K7PEH
    Commented Jan 18, 2020 at 17:19
  • $\begingroup$ Also, consider RFinder.net although I hear it is out of date and possibly full of errors. However, there is an annual subscription of $9.95. $\endgroup$
    – K7PEH
    Commented Jan 18, 2020 at 17:24
  • $\begingroup$ @K7PEH He's looking for a database. Did you find anything like that? $\endgroup$
    – Mike Waters
    Commented Jan 18, 2020 at 21:51
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    $\begingroup$ RFinder is a database but unfortunately not free however I think the subscription fee is dirt cheap. Collecting and maintaining data such as this and making it available costs money. Even many OpenSoftware so-called "free" resources often request users to donate a small fee for their usage. I also just read on ARRL that the ARRL Repeater Directory (book and/or DVD) is now using RFinder data since 2017. $\endgroup$
    – K7PEH
    Commented Jan 19, 2020 at 1:19

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Since there was no such repeater listing out there, I started my own database:

https://hearham.com/repeaters

As a bonus, there is a service to comment on, and favorite to get status notifications about a repeater, something I haven't seen in other listings. Also, a topo map showing where each of the nearby repeaters is, is now available in Repeater-START for Linux.

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    $\begingroup$ It didn't exist so you created it! Excellent! $\endgroup$
    – rclocher3
    Commented Feb 26, 2020 at 21:14
  • $\begingroup$ Haha. Yeah. This will hopefully be good to power some good offline applications for repeaters. $\endgroup$
    – NoBugs
    Commented Feb 27, 2020 at 3:07
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There are several web sites, mobile phone apps, and printed books offering repeater lists. The hearts of these sites, apps, and books are surely databases. However, as @K7PEH says, collecting the information and making it easily available to the public costs time and money. Every example of such a site, app, or book that I've seen is trying to make money from the information, if only from advertising. I could be wrong, but I doubt that anybody would give away such a database for free, or keep it updated for free, at the present time.

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There is a JSON formatted data base at: https://www.radioid.net/static/rptrs.json This database is accessible from the main page by clicking on 'Database', then 'Database Dump Files', so I assume it is intended for public viewing. I don't know contents of these files or the license, but the Chirp software uses an old broken link for this repeater database.

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  • $\begingroup$ That site is about DMR, so the database may be DMR repeaters only. $\endgroup$
    – rclocher3
    Commented Jan 22, 2020 at 0:05
  • $\begingroup$ No lat/longitude numbers, unfortunately. $\endgroup$
    – NoBugs
    Commented Feb 29, 2020 at 23:06
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I've been using RepeaterBook. There's an app for Android or iOS, as well as a web site accessible with any modern browser. The app is free, to download and to use, though both the app and the web site request donations. Repeaterbook lists 10m, 6m, 2m, 1.25m, and 70cm repeaters in FM, DMR, and possibly other modes, and is searchable by band, call sign, or distance from a location. It also includes notations for networked repeaters and those that support services like Echolink.

RepeaterBook is also an option for Chirp software to automatically obtain repeater lists, and I've used it that way as well (when programming my mobile for the repeaters along my usual route to a coastal vacation spot).

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  • $\begingroup$ It's pretty good but I asked, they do not provide the database to use in your own application. $\endgroup$
    – NoBugs
    Commented Jan 24, 2020 at 4:28
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    $\begingroup$ If they have an API (seems likely, given Chirp uses them to populate its lists for programming radios) it might do the same job for you. Or Chirp might be simply sending queries via the usual web interface and stripping out the HTML. $\endgroup$
    – Zeiss Ikon
    Commented Jan 24, 2020 at 12:16

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