Free tool

Free catchment check: how many competitors are within walking distance?

Pick a business type and an address. The check counts the competitors mapped in OpenStreetMap within an estimated 5, 10 and 15-minute walk, finds the nearest one and estimates how much housing each competitor shares within 10 minutes. It runs in your browser in a few seconds and costs nothing.

Updated 25 October 2026 · By AYKA TECHNOLOGIES

How does the check work?

1. Competitors: every place of the chosen type that OpenStreetMap lists within the 15-minute radius, read through the Overpass API. A place mapped twice under the same name is counted once.
2. Walking time: the straight-line distance, multiplied by 1.25 because streets are not straight, at 4.8 km/h, plus half a minute. That gives radii of about 290 m, 610 m and 930 m. It is the method of our Prague case study.
3. Housing index: the residential buildings within a 10-minute walk, weighted by type: dormitories 8, apartment blocks 6, residential buildings 3, terraced houses 1.5, houses and villas 1, buildings of unknown type 0.6. The index compares places with each other; it is not a population count, and the free check does not use floor counts.
4. Housing per competitor: the index divided by the number of competitors within 10 minutes. A higher number means more homes for every place that already competes for them.

What can the free check not see?

• Places that are not in OpenStreetMap, or that are mapped under another type. Coverage differs from city to city, so compare the list with the places you know.
• Footfall, rent, visibility from the street, opening hours and how attractive each place is.
• Where your customers really live. In the full analysis, your own anonymised customer data replaces the housing estimate.

What does the full analysis add?

The full location analysis adds the competitors you know that the map misses, estimates your share of local demand against each competitor with the Huff model, and ranks the candidate spots where a new branch would add the most customers. The Prague example shows a complete report.