Nobody seems to know where Tesla gets its map data for speed limits
Posted by penguian on 1 April 2020 in English.Right now, I suspect that Tesla gets its speed limit data from OSM, but I can’t prove this.
OpenStreetMap
Right now, I suspect that Tesla gets its speed limit data from OSM, but I can’t prove this.
Discussion
Comment from SomeoneElse on 1 April 2020 at 11:52
Who have you asked?
Comment from HeBri on 1 April 2020 at 13:43
If Tesla uses OSM for the navigation and map display, shouldn’t the OSM copyright notice be shown somewhere, at least in the car’s manual?
Your problems regarding the speed limit seems a common one for Tesla drivers as shown in this discussion.
Comment from andygol on 2 April 2020 at 08:36
Have you ever thought that they may have their own sources for this, such as data received from their cars?
Comment from penguian on 2 April 2020 at 12:01
@andygol Your comment makes no sense to me. 1. I own one of “their cars” and it is using incorrect data. 2. Tesla’s own manual says that they use “map data”, but doesn’t say where the map data is obtained from. 3. The speed limits that I see in Speed Assist in my car while it is on Northbourne Avenue and federal Highway agree with OSM and don’t agree with the street signs. 4. Please explain what happened in the case of this video where Telsa Life fixed a speed limit in Tesla’s Speed Assist by changing it in OSM.
Comment from DarkDays on 2 April 2020 at 17:55
I highly doubt Tesla exclusively uses a single source of data. It probably gets it from multiple sources, based on region. I expect OSM is one of those sources, Google Maps and user reports are probably used as well.
You might own the car, but Tesla owns any data collected my it. It’s possible that the cars report speed limits to Tesla that then has a policy to require multiple sources or cars to then change the speed limit they push to the UI. As such, you driving the road multiple times wouldn’t modify the data. However I don’t even know if the cars have cameras and computing power to read and parse signs on the fly.
I expect there will be an explanation somewhere, on one of the boring pages nobody reads.
There could be many reasons why Tesla updated after OSM. Based on that video, it took more than a year to update. So if Tesla is using OSM data they could be pulling it infrequently, sidenote, I remember that Tesla uses OSM data for parking aisles and it is pulled incredibly frequently. Alternatively Tesla could be using another data source, like Google Maps and it was corrected in that source during the year. Or somebody used the OSM data you provided to update Google Maps, not allowed but can happen.
I expect the data is in part from OSM, and your edit is what changed it. But I think unlike parking aisles it’s not directly from OSM. Tesla will periodically pull data from several sources, including data from customer reports, manually or automatically merge the data and only then is it updated in cars. Only Tesla know the exact details.