The following is a short list of the most common file formats you come across when working with geospatial data. A more comprehensive list can be found at https://gisgeography.com/gis-formats/
| format name | File exertion | Description | Used by |
| GeoPackage | *.gpkg | A geopackage is a file database that can contain multiple layers of both vector and raster data For QGIS the geopackage has become the default file format, | QGIS, ArcGIS |
| Personal Geodatabase | *.gdb | The personal Geodatabase can like the geopackage contain multiple vector and raster layers the file format is the default for ArcGIS. Note that a personal geodatabase is a folder not a file with the extension .gdb. | ArcGIS, QGIS |
| Shape files | *.shp, dbf … | A legacy file format for vector data. A shape file consists of several files with the same filename but different extensions | QGIS, ArcGIS, and many other |
| Mapinfo files | *.tab | A legacy file format used by the Mapinfo software (Can be converted for use in QGIS and ArcGIS pro) | |
| Geo TIFF | *.tiff | A common tif (image) fill with some extra information that enables it to store raster data | QGIS, ArcGIS and many others |
| Laser files | Las or laz | Binary format for storing Lidar point (elevation dat) | QGIS, ArcGIS CloudCompare |
| Geography Markup Language (GML) | *.GML | Xml file format for vector data | QGIS, ArcGIS |
| GeoJSON/ TopoJSON | *.json | Vector data in JavaScript Object Notation (typically used in web based applications and services) | QGIS, ArcGIS |
| Spreadsheet data | *.csv, *.xlsx *.tab | Spreadsheet data is often used when mapping statistical data such as GDP per Capita. |