AHN Streamer Plugin for QGIS

24/10/2026

With my new QGIS plugin AHN Streamer, you can look at the AHN point cloud of any place in the Netherlands in a few clicks, without downloading a single file.

Until recently, working with AHN point clouds meant finding the right sheet in the sheet index, downloading a LAZ file of hundreds of megabytes, and often converting it before QGIS could display it smoothly. For a quick look at a dike, a building or a patch of forest, that is a lot of work. The AHN now publishes its point clouds as COPC files, and that changes everything.

AHN Streamer works in QGIS 3.34 and newer, including QGIS 4, and needs no extra Python packages. For now it's an experimental plugin that you can find in the QGIS Plugins Manager.

Watch this video to see how to install and use the plugin:

COPC: the key that unlocks streaming

The big step forward is not the plugin but the data: the official AHN storage now offers its point clouds as Cloud Optimized Point Clouds (COPC). You can find the links in the AHN sheet index (bladwijzer) in the AHN dataroom. They are available for AHN2, AHN3, AHN4 and AHN5 as re-derived sheets of 1×1 km, and for the new AHN6 as it is being acquired.

A COPC file is an ordinary LAZ file with the points arranged in an octree: coarse levels of detail first, finer levels after that. A small index in the file says where each part sits. A GIS client therefore doesn't need the whole file. It reads the index and then asks the server only for the byte ranges it needs, using HTTP range requests.

For you as a user, this means:

No downloads. QGIS streams the points straight from the AHN server, and a sheet of 100 to 370 MB opens in seconds.
Only what you see. Zoomed out you get a thinned-out cloud, zoomed in all points; QGIS fetches more detail as you zoom.
No conversion. The files are already indexed, so there is no need to create a COPC or an index yourself.
Always the official version. You work directly on the source, not on a copy that may be outdated.

This works in any client that can read remote COPC, such as QGIS, PDAL and web viewers. The plugin makes it easy in QGIS.

What AHN Streamer does

AHN Streamer finds the right AHN sheets for whatever is in your map canvas and loads them as streamed layers. You no longer need to know sheet numbers or file names: zoom to your area and click one button.

Behind that button, the plugin:

Divides the map extent into the 1×1 km sheets of the AHN, in any project CRS.
Checks in the background which COPC files exist for the chosen version. For AHN6 it also finds the acquisition year.
Adds one streamed point cloud layer per sheet, or one virtual point cloud (see below).

What you can choose in the panel:

Option	Choices
Version	AHN2, AHN3, AHN4, AHN5, AHN6, or newest available (AHN6 where it exists, otherwise AHN5)
Points	All points, ground only, ground + water, buildings, civil structures, or everything except vegetation/other
Style	AHN classification colours, height above NAP, intensity, number of returns, or the QGIS default (RGB for AHN6)
Extras	A sheet layer that shows the status of each sheet; the 3D view follows the 2D style

The RGB option is worth a try: AHN6 is coloured from the aerial photos, so in the 3D view the Netherlands looks almost real. The availability of each sheet is remembered, so panning back to an area you visited before is instant. The interface is in English or Dutch, following your QGIS language setting.

A VPC: your study area in one layer

For a study area larger than a few sheets, tick Merge into one virtual point cloud (VPC). The plugin then puts all sheets into a single layer instead of one layer per sheet.

A virtual point cloud is a small text file (STAC JSON) that lists point cloud files with their extent and number of points. QGIS treats that list as one point cloud. AHN Streamer writes a VPC whose entries point to the remote COPC files on the AHN server. The VPC is a few kilobytes; the points stay on the server and are still streamed.

That makes a VPC a handy way to save the sheets of your study area:

One layer instead of dozens. One style, one filter, one entry in the layers panel for the whole area.
It grows with your area. Load a neighbouring area with the same version, and its sheets are added to the same VPC.
It is lightweight and reusable. The .vpc file is stored in your QGIS profile folder and your project refers to it, so next time your study area opens again without searching or downloading.
It works with processing tools. QGIS point cloud tools accept a VPC as input, for example to create a DTM or to clip the cloud to a polygon of your study area.

Because a VPC is so small, it is also easy to share: send the .vpc file to colleagues or students and they open the same set of sheets, streamed from the official source.

Good to know

Zoomed-out VPC. A VPC with remote files has no overview point cloud. Zoomed out, QGIS shows the sheet outlines; zoom in and the points appear.
Fixed value ranges. QGIS calculates no statistics for a remote VPC, so the plugin's height and intensity styles use a value range you set in the panel. Adjacent sheets then get identical colours, which is a bonus.
AHN6 is still coming. AHN6 is acquired from 2025 to 2027. With newest available you get AHN6 where it exists and AHN5 everywhere else.
Coverage. The plugin covers the European Netherlands.

Attribution

AHN data is open data. AHN1 to AHN4 are CC0; AHN5 and AHN6 are CC BY 4.0, so a map or product made from them must credit the source: Bron: AHN (www.ahn.nl). The plugin puts this attribution in the metadata of each layer.

Try it and let me know

AHN Streamer is free and open source (GPL v2 or later). Try it on your own study area and let me know what you think: questions, ideas and bug reports are very welcome. You can find the source code, documentation and issue tracker on GitHub.