Whether you are a business or an app developer that needs a robust and scalable forward and reverse geocoding API, you should check out Positionstack. It offers an affordable and easy-to-use API interface for global forward and reverse geocoding in real-time. Most services provide good forward geocoding API features, however, there are very few that also nail the reverse geocoding. If you are not familiar with the terms, forward geocoding is the process of looking up a plain-text address or place name while the reverse geocoding is performed by passing latitude and longitude values of the desired location to the API. Positionstack API excels at both these tasks. In this article, we are going to take a quick look at its features to see what it has to offer.
Positionstack API: Why Should You Use it?
Positionstack API is built to offer an affordable and straightforward REST API interface for global forward and reverse geocoding in real-time. It is highly scalable and handles anywhere between thousands of requests per month to millions of requests per hour. Positionstack API is also highly accurate thanks to its data being sourced from multiple, highly reliable sources, such as Nominatim, GeoNames, Pelias and OpenStreetMap.
If you choose to use Positionstack API, here are the features that you can expect from the service:
- Get real-time and accurate forward and reverse geocoding data.
- Positionstack API is highly scalable thanks to the cloud infrastructure it is hosted on. It and can handle millions of requests per hour.
- Positionstack API supports all the countries in the world with 2+ billion addresses covered around the world.
- You can look up location components, country, and timezone data, make batch requests, and more.
- Positionstack API supports embeddable maps thus allowing you to easily embed a map on your website.
- Data is sourced from high-quality and reliable data vendors such as Nominatim, GeoNames, Pelias and OpenStreetMap.
- The API supports multiple programming languages including JSON, XML, GeoJSON, and more.
- Positionstack API comes with clear documentation which makes it easier to implement. It is beginner-friendly and doesn’t require much effort from your side.
- Positionstack has a fast response time with average API response times ranging between 10ms and 100ms depending on the size of your request.
- The API is also capable of returning astrology data along with forward and reverse geocoding requests.
Apart from the above-mentioned main features Positionstack API also features many other cool features such as a timezone module, a bounding box module, output formats, and more. As you can see, Positionstack API is incredibly powerful. Apart from its features, the best part about Positionstack API is the pricing structure. It is priced in a way that individuals, enterprises, and companies of every size in between can make use of its API without having to break the bank. So, let’s discuss its pricing structure in more detail.
Pricing and Availability
As I said, Positionstack API offers a very generous pricing structure. It all starts with its incredible free plan that allows users to make up to 25,000 API requests per month for free. Not only that, even the free version supports both forward and reverse geocoding. That said, there are restrictions. For example, the free version offers a personal license that means you can not use it for commercial purposes. Also, it doesn’t offer any encryption. Still, the free version is a great resource for individuals and companies who want to just check out the reliability of service before buying.
Talking about the paid plans, it starts as low as $9.99/month ($7.99 if billed yearly). This plan gives you access to all the features including forward and reverse geocoding, HTTPS encryption, embed support for maps, and more. Under this plan, you can make up to 250,000 API requests. The only missing feature is the “Batch Request”. If you need the Batch Request feature you will have to go for the Professional Plan which costs $49.99/month ($39.99 if billed annually). The plan also increases your API requests to 1 million per month.
Finally, there’s the business plan which costs $99.99/month ($79.99 if billed yearly) which lets you make 3 million API requests. If your company demands are even greater than these plans, you can also directly contact them by clicking on the link below and get a custom quote for your needs.
Positionstack API: Get Fast and Reliable Forward & Reverse Geocoding Data
Positionstack API is powerful, scalable, and most importantly affordable. The API delivers fast and accurate forward and reverse geocoding data (within 10 to 100 ms). It offers different tiers of pricing plans making it accessible to businesses and individuals alike. If you are a business that needs a forward and reverse geocoding API that also offers exceptional additional features, Positionstack API is just for you.
