gdalwarp

image mosaicing, reprojection, and warping utility

TLDR

Reproject a raster to a different coordinate system

$ gdalwarp -t_srs [EPSG:4326] [input.tif] [output.tif]

Reproject with source and target coordinate systems

$ gdalwarp -s_srs [EPSG:32611] -t_srs [EPSG:4326] [input.tif] [output.tif]

Change resolution while reprojecting

$ gdalwarp -tr [0.001] [0.001] -t_srs [EPSG:4326] [input.tif] [output.tif]

Use bilinear resampling method

$ gdalwarp -r bilinear -t_srs [EPSG:4326] [input.tif] [output.tif]

Mosaic multiple rasters into one output

$ gdalwarp [input1.tif] [input2.tif] [input3.tif] [output.tif]

Clip raster using a shapefile cutline

$ gdalwarp -cutline [boundary.shp] -crop_to_cutline [input.tif] [output.tif]

Specify output format and data type

$ gdalwarp -of GTiff -ot Float32 -t_srs [EPSG:4326] [input.tif] [output.tif]

SYNOPSIS

gdalwarp [OPTIONS] SRCFILE... DSTFILE

gdalwarp is an image mosaicing, reprojection, and warping utility from the GDAL library. It transforms raster datasets between coordinate reference systems, resamples to different resolutions, mosaics multiple inputs into a single output, and clips rasters using vector boundaries.
The utility supports all GDAL raster formats and can apply ground control points (GCPs) stored with images. Various resampling algorithms are available, from fast nearest-neighbor to high-quality Lanczos windowed sinc interpolation.
gdalwarp is essential for GIS workflows requiring coordinate system transformations, data integration from multiple sources, or preparing raster data for specific analysis requirements.

PARAMETERS

-s_srs SRS

Source spatial reference system (EPSG code, PROJ.4, or WKT).

-t_srs SRS

Target spatial reference system for output.

-r METHOD

Resampling method: near, bilinear, cubic, cubicspline, lanczos, average, mode, max, min, med, q1, q3, sum.

-tr XRES YRES

Target resolution in georeferenced units.

-ts WIDTH HEIGHT

Target size in pixels.

-te XMIN YMIN XMAX YMAX

Target extent in georeferenced coordinates.

-of FORMAT

Output format (GTiff, PNG, JPEG, etc.).

-ot TYPE

Output band data type (Byte, UInt16, Float32, etc.).

-cutline FILE

Vector file for clipping (shapefile, GeoJSON, etc.).

-crop_to_cutline

Crop output extent to cutline boundary.

-overwrite

Overwrite existing output file.

-multi

Use multithreaded warping.

-co NAME=VALUE

Creation option for output format.

CAVEATS

Large rasters may require significant memory; use -wm to limit memory usage. Reprojection can introduce artifacts at high compression or with inappropriate resampling methods. Source coordinate system must be defined or specified with -s_srs. NoData values should be handled explicitly with -srcnodata and -dstnodata.

HISTORY

gdalwarp is part of GDAL (Geospatial Data Abstraction Library), originally developed by Frank Warmerdam starting in 1998. GDAL became an OSGeo project and has grown into the fundamental library for geospatial raster operations, used by virtually all GIS software including QGIS, ArcGIS, and countless specialized tools.