// platform
What Honua replaces.
One platform, product by product, against the three ways teams run GIS today: ArcGIS, an assembled open-source stack, and SaaS mapping tools. Each row names the Honua product, what it stands in for in each column, and how mature it is right now.
Your clients keep working. ArcGIS Pro, Field Maps, QGIS, Esri Leaflet, and existing ArcGIS JavaScript apps connect to Honua Server through the GeoServices surface and the migration codemod.
platform · release maturity
GA Honua Server · SDK protocol clients
PREVIEW Console & Studio · SDK support
EXPERIMENTAL Mobile SDK · Collect · 3D scene
RULE a row never claims more than the capability catalog
RULE a dash means no equivalent exists
// honua server
One server. Several server products.
Honua Server exposes GeoServices REST, OGC API, WMS/WFS/WMTS/WCS, STAC, OData, vector tiles, gRPC, and MCP from one deployment. The rows below are the server roles and hosted services it takes over.
| Honua product | Replaces in ArcGIS | Replaces in the open-source stack | Replaces in SaaS (Mapbox, CARTO, Felt) | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Honua Server feature, map, geometry, geocode, geoprocessing, scene services |
ArcGIS Server and the GIS Server role of ArcGIS Enterprise | GeoServer; MapServer and pygeoapi where they serve the same data; pg_featureserv; stac-fastapi | Mapbox Tiling Service and hosted tilesets; CARTO Maps API and hosted data; Felt hosted layers | GA |
| Imagery, terrain, and 3D COG serving, temporal mosaics, NetCDF/Zarr datacubes, elevation, 3D Tiles |
ArcGIS Image Server | GeoServer coverage stores and image mosaics; TiTiler; py3dtiles pipelines | Mapbox raster and terrain tile APIs; Felt raster layers | Cloud rasters GA; ImageServer protocol Preview; 3D scene serving and ingest Experimental |
| Analytics and geoprocessing clustering, spatial join, buffer, density, H3, terrain analysis, GPServer, OGC API Processes |
GeoAnalytics Server and the Spatial Analyst server extension | GeoServer WPS; ZOO-Project; pygeoapi processes; PostGIS functions behind a custom API | CARTO Analytics Toolbox | GA |
| Tiles and styles MVT, TileJSON, PMTiles, Terrain-RGB, generated MapLibre styles, OGC API Styles |
ArcGIS vector tile services and hosted tile layers | GeoWebCache and GeoServer SLD/CSS styling; pg_tileserv, Martin, tegola, TileServer GL; Tippecanoe and Planetiler pipelines | Mapbox tiling, hosting, and Mapbox Studio styles; CARTO Maps API tiles; Felt tiling | GA |
| Geocoding and routing GeocodeServer surface, provider failover, batch, multi-stop routing |
ArcGIS geocode and network analysis services | Nominatim, Pelias, or Photon and pgRouting, OSRM, or Valhalla fronted by custom code. Honua fronts the configured provider; it does not replace the engine | Mapbox Geocoding and Directions APIs | GA |
| Portal facade token issuance, read-only sharing and item discovery |
Portal for ArcGIS, for sign-in and content discovery by Esri clients only. Content management moves to Console below | — | — | GA |
| OData v4 | The connector layer between ArcGIS and Power BI, Excel, and other OData consumers | — | CARTO BI connectors | GA |
Scope per operation is in the capability catalog and the compatibility matrix. Preview and Experimental rows are not part of the GA surface and are labeled where they appear.
// console, studio, sdks, field, agents
The rest of the platform.
Authoring, operations, developer tooling, field collection, and agents. Studio is part of Console. The SDKs build on MapLibre rather than replacing it.
| Honua product | Replaces in ArcGIS | Replaces in the open-source stack | Replaces in SaaS (Mapbox, CARTO, Felt) | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Honua Console Catalog · Operate · Share |
Portal for ArcGIS content management; ArcGIS Server Manager and ArcGIS Enterprise Manager; ArcGIS Monitor; ArcGIS Hub and open-data pages | GeoServer web admin; GeoNode and GeoNetwork for catalog, metadata, and sharing; CKAN for open data; hand-built Grafana dashboards for server health | Mapbox Studio dataset and tileset management; CARTO Workspace; the Felt workspace and sharing | Preview |
| Honua Studio describe the app; map, style, app, and process editing; drafts, versions, publish, rollback |
ArcGIS Experience Builder, Web AppBuilder, and Instant Apps; Map Viewer; ArcGIS Dashboards | MapStore, QGIS Web Client (QWC2), Lizmap, and TerriaJS as app builders and viewers. Studio embeds Maputnik rather than replacing it | Mapbox Studio for style design; CARTO Builder; Felt map making and sharing | Preview |
| Honua JS SDK @honua/sdk-js · @honua/sdk-esri-compat · ArcGIS codemod · MapLibre runtime |
ArcGIS Maps SDK for JavaScript; Esri Leaflet; ArcGIS REST JS | Hand-written OpenLayers and Leaflet integration code against each protocol | Mapbox GL JS as the proprietary renderer path; CARTO for deck.gl; Felt embeds | Preview support |
| Honua Python SDK typed client, admin client, ArcPy migration tooling |
ArcGIS API for Python; ArcPy scripts used for service administration and publishing. Desktop analysis in ArcPy is out of scope | OWSLib, pystac-client, and GeoServer REST client libraries stitched together | CARTO and Felt Python SDKs | Preview support |
| Honua .NET SDK GeoServices, OGC API, STAC, OData clients; gRPC; Admin API; offline sync |
ArcGIS Maps SDK for .NET where it is used as a data and service client | Hand-written HTTP clients; Mapsui where it is used for data access | — | Preview support |
| Honua Mobile SDK .NET MAUI, GeoPackage storage, forms, routing, background sync |
ArcGIS Maps SDK for .NET (MAUI) as the offline field-app foundation | Hand-rolled GeoPackage sync on top of Mapsui or MapLibre Native | Mapbox mobile Maps SDKs, as the map layer only | Experimental |
| Honua Collect offline-first smart forms, encrypted storage, conflict review, photo, signature, barcode, bulk export |
ArcGIS Survey123 and ArcGIS Field Maps | QField and Mergin Maps; ODK Collect and KoboToolbox for forms | — | Experimental |
| Agents MCP discovery and query, validated agent operations, approval workflows, the open geospatial MCP standard |
— | — | — | Discovery and query GA; operations and approvals labeled by edition |
| honua-migrate assess, plan, codemod, service import, reconcile |
Consulting-led migration projects off ArcGIS Server | Hand-run GeoServer catalog migrations and ogr2ogr scripts | — | Available; JavaScript codemod, Python from source, .NET and MAUI guided |
| Deployment Helm, Terraform, CloudFormation, Bicep, Docker Compose, serverless |
ArcGIS Enterprise Cloud Builder and ArcGIS Enterprise on Kubernetes deployment tooling | One container image or chart per component in the assembled stack | Not applicable: hosted only. Mapbox Atlas is the on-premises exception and is not compared here | Available; marketplace listings planned |
Agents have no incumbent product; describing the application you want and getting a composed, versioned, reversible map application is the row with no equivalent in any column.
// the difference, stated once
Three facts that hold across every row.
VS SAAS
Self-hosted
your cloud, your data, your network
- Honua runs in your AWS or Azure account, on your Kubernetes, or on a single host. Mapbox, CARTO, and Felt are hosted services.
- Source is available for the server and Apache-2.0 for the SDKs, Console, and Studio.
VS OPEN SOURCE
One image
instead of an assembled stack
- The open-source column is many projects, each with its own container, configuration, upgrade cadence, and authentication story.
- Honua Server is one deployment with one capability manifest, one admin surface, and one set of credentials.
VS ARCGIS
Flat annual capacity pricing
no named-user seats, request credits, or data-volume billing
- Price follows serving capacity, not head count. Analysts, field crews, and public viewers do not change the bill.
- Your existing ArcGIS clients keep working against Honua Server while you decide what else to move.