Frequently asked questions
The things people ask most about this map.
How often is the data updated?
The National Police Agency refreshes its rolling data on the 1st and 15th of each month at 17:00, and this site follows. The complete annual dataset is published in the middle of the following year.
Why does the same place change colour when I zoom?
Because the colour is relative. Each cell is weighted by the log of its count divided by the log of the largest count currently on screen, so at national zoom only the six metros run red, and zooming into one city opens up the differences inside it. This is deliberate: a heatmap is for comparison, not absolute measurement.
Can I look up how many accidents happened at one junction?
You can zoom in, but do not treat that number as a conclusion. 26% of addresses in the raw data are road-segment reference points rather than exact positions, so at maximum zoom a position can be tens of metres off. The limitations page explains this in full.
Does the place with the most accidents mean the most dangerous place?
No. Places with heavier traffic have more accidents, and this open data contains no traffic volume, so a rate per ten thousand vehicle passes cannot be computed. A downtown arterial runs hotter than a mountain road because more vehicles use it.
Why only two years and eight months?
Open data with coordinates starts in 2024. The earlier records, 2013 to 2021, have addresses but no coordinates, and the address formats are irregular enough that geocoding them would be unreliable.
Can I download this data myself?
Yes. It all comes from Taiwan's open data platform under the Open Government Data License version 1, which permits commercial use. The dataset numbers are listed on the data source page.
Do you record what I look up?
No. The map needs no account, and neither your location nor the area you viewed is stored. When you press the locate button, the position is used only inside your browser and is never sent to the server. The one exception is Street View, which Google serves: the location is sent to Google only after you press the Street View button, and no request is made if you never press it.
Why do some accidents appear in the sea or on a mountain?
Geocoding in the raw data occasionally fails. Fallback coordinates that land on an administrative centre have been removed (19,542 accidents, 1.84%), but isolated errors remain.
Other tools on this site
- Old Photo Motion — Turn an old photo into a 6-second clip that blinks and smiles
- age-me — See the same person older or younger
- Campsite Legality Check — Which of 1,807 campgrounds comply, violate, or are not listed
- Flood Potential Map — WRA flood potential under 10 rainfall scenarios, by township
- Find My Pet — Lost & found pets across Taiwan on a map; list without a microchip, report sightings without login
All run on one machine at home; the data tools use Taiwan government open data and state their limits.