GeeFetch is a Python library and command-line tool for downloading large-scale satellite data from Google Earth Engine directly to your computer. Built as a higher-level wrapper around geedim, GeeFetch focuses on reproducibility, scalability, and ease of use, especially for those who want to use satellite data without being remote sensing experts.

Why GeeFetch?

• Reproducible data acquisition through a declarative configuration approach
• Scalable downloads for national or international coverage
• Robust execution resume your download after your internet went down
• Pre-configured defaults for popular satellite sources
• Simple CLI for straightforward data access without programming expertise

GeeFetch doesn't aim to be a general-purpose tool for crafting custom algorithms on Earth Engine data. Instead, it provides a streamlined way to get standardized satellite data that you can then use for your own applications, such as machine learning, deep learning, or other analytical workflows.

Supported Datasets

Currently, geefetch supports the following datasets:

• Sentinel-1 (SAR imagery)
• Sentinel-2 (multispectral imagery)
• GEDI (forest structure)
• Dynamic World (land use/land cover)
• Landsat-8 (multispectral imagery)
• Palsar-2 (SAR imagery)
• NASADEM (elevation data)

Installation

geefetch requires Python 3.9 or higher. To install the library, ensure that GDAL is available on your system. The simplest is to install GDAL using conda:

conda install gdal

Once GDAL is available, install geefetch via PyPI:

pip install geefetch

For developers interested in contributing or modifying geefetch, clone the repository and install the development dependencies:

git clone git@github.com:gbelouze/geefetch.git
cd geefetch
conda env create -f environment.yml
pip install -e '.[dev, doc]'

Usage

$ geefetch --help
Usage: geefetch [OPTIONS] COMMAND [ARGS]...

  Download satellite data from Google Earth Engine.

Options:
  -v, --verbose
  --quiet / --no-quiet
  --logfile PATH        File to output the log messages in addition to
                        stdout/stderr.
  --debug
  --help                Show this message and exit.

Commands:
  all       Download all satellites given in the config.
  custom    Download Custom images.
  dynworld  Download Dynamic World images.
  gedi      Download GEDI images.
  landsat8  Download Landsat 8 images.
  nasadem   Download NASA-DEM images.
  palsar2   Download Palsar-2 images.
  s1        Download Sentinel-1 images.
  s2        Download Sentinel-2 images.

Read the docs for more details.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! If you encounter issues or have suggestions for improvements, please open an issue or submit a pull request on the GitHub repository.

License

This project is licensed under the BSD-2-Clause License. See the LICENSE file for more details.

How to cite us ?

@misc{geefetch2025,
  author = {G. Belouze, D. Purnell, H. Rechatin},
  title = {GeeFetch},
  year = {2025},
  url = {https://github.com/gbelouze/geefetch},
  note = {v0.6.0}
}