Every free maps/geolocation tier that clears our bar in 2026: 14 offers meet the criteria and 6 offers are demoted with a named reason. Recorded changes and a published ranking method. We could not confirm today's terms for 6 of them: on 5 the page we cite did not answer, and on 1 our own read did not confirm them. Each row says why.
OpenStreetMap's free geocoding service, providing global address search functionality and reverse geocoding capabilities.
Per-SKU free usage (restructured March 2025): Essentials 10K calls/SKU/month, Pro 5K, Enterprise 1K. Covers Maps, Routes, Places, Environment APIs. Separate from one-time $300 trial credit
Geocoding and Geoparsing via API or CSV Upload — Free $0.00 /Month Save $0.00 on yearly plan 30,000 Calls/month 1 requests per/second Commercial use allowed Attribution Required Community Support Ecommerce Ready SLA Dedicated account manager
Geocoding, reverse geocoding, and routing API. Free plan: 5,000 requests/day, commercial use allowed with attribution
Geoapify offers map tiles, geocoding, places, routing and isolines APIs. The Free plan includes 3,000 credits/day, no credit card, and up to 5 requests/second. Geocoding costs 1 credit/request, map tiles 0.25 credits/tile, routing 1 credit/waypoint pair, and isochrones 1 credit/5 minutes.
IP geolocation and data API. IPinfo Lite (free plan): unlimited requests, country and continent-level geolocation only (no city/region/postal code), ASN name and domain. Does NOT include company, carrier, or privacy/anonymity detection (paid plans only). Community support.
Geocoding API with language correction and more. Worldwide coverage. 2,500 free daily queries. The page we cite for Geokeo api states in words that it is free, which confirms the price — the limits stated here come from our own record rather than from that page.
Geocoding and reverse geocoding API for US and Canada — free tier: 2,500 lookups/day. Includes address parsing, congressional districts, timezone, and census data fields
Send 100 monthly geocode requests for free — in case you ever need more, premium geocoding subscriptions start at just USD $9.99 per month.
Location discovery, venue search, and context-aware content. The first 500 Pro endpoint calls each month are free. Foursquare's pricing page also says "Test out Places API for free in our sandbox and then pay-as-you-go. Enjoy up to 10,000 free calls on Pro endpoints." It does not say whether the 10,000 is monthly or how it relates to the 500 in its price table. Pro endpoints are Place Search, Place Details, Autocomplete, Place Match and Geotagging Candidates with default fields. Premium endpoints are Tips, Photos, and Pro endpoints when requested with premium fields. They have no free calls. The first 100,000 each month cost $18.75 per 1,000 calls. Places API Pro endpoints: 0-500 Calls $0.00 CPM, 501 to 100,000 Calls $15.00 CPM, 100,001 to 500,000 Calls $12.00 CPM, 500,001+ Calls $9.00 CPM. Places API Premium endpoints: 0-100,000 Calls $18.75 CPM, 100,001 to 500,000 Calls $15.00 CPM, 500,001+ Calls $11.25 CPM. Note — 2026-06-01: Foursquare cut the free Places API allowance on Pro endpoints from 10,000 to 500 calls a month, effective 2026-06-01. Its docs: "Beginning June 1, 2026, the following Places API & V2 Pro endpoint rates go into effect for all users: 0 - 500 calls – $0.00 CPM ... You will now receive 500 free Pro calls." Source ↗
Stadia Maps offers map tiles, routing, navigation, geocoding and other geospatial APIs. The Free plan includes 200,000 credits a month with standard basemaps and basic APIs. Commercial use is not allowed on the Free plan. Starter at $20 a month allows commercial use.
Geocoding API aggregating OpenStreetMap and other open geo sources. Two thousand five hundred free queries/day.
Weather API — free tier: 1M API calls/month (60/min), current weather, 5-day forecast, air pollution, weather maps (15 layers), geocoding. Student plan includes historical data and extended forecasts at same limits. The page we cite for this offer does not name it when we last looked, on 2026-10-10, so we cannot confirm these terms today.
Maps, navigation and search APIs with monthly free tiers: 50,000 web map loads (GL JS), 25,000 mobile MAUs (Maps SDKs), 100,000 requests each for Temporary Geocoding, Directions and Tilequery, 200,000 vector tile requests, 50,000 Static Images requests; Navigation SDK v3.x up to 100 MAUs and 1,000 trips, then $0.30 per MAU and $0.08 per trip. Permanent Geocoding API is paid only.
Map tools that work like clockwork. Fifty thousand free monthly queries (map tiles, db2vector, elevation). The page we cite for this offer states no amount, tier or rate we can read when we last looked, on 2026-10-13, so we cannot confirm these terms today.
Free map tiles and tile hosting. The page we cite for this offer states no amount, tier or rate we can read when we last looked, on 2026-10-13, so we cannot confirm these terms today.
Vector maps, map services and SDKs for map visualization. Free vector tiles with weekly updates and four map styles. The page we cite for this offer states no amount, tier or rate we can read when we last looked, on 2026-10-13, so we cannot confirm these terms today.
Geocoding, search results ranked by the popularity of related Wikipedia page. We could not read the page we cite for this offer when we last looked, on 2026-11-11, so we cannot confirm these terms today.
| Vendor | Free Tier | Key Limits | Durability | Read / catalogue date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| nominatim.org | Free | OpenStreetMap's free geocoding service, providing global address search functionality and reverse geocoding capabilities... | stable | 2026-11-13 |
| Google Maps Platform | Free | Per-SKU free usage (restructured March 2025): Essentials 10K calls/SKU/month, Pro 5K, Enterprise 1K. Covers Maps, Routes... | watch effective 2025-03-01 |
2026-11-09 |
| geojs.io | Free | Highly available REST/JSON/JSONP IP Geolocation lookup API. | stable | 2026-10-24 |
| geocodify.com | Free | Geocoding and Geoparsing via API or CSV Upload — Free $0.00 /Month Save $0.00 on yearly plan 30,000 Calls/month 1 reques... | stable | 2026-10-30 |
| LocationIQ | Free | Geocoding, reverse geocoding, and routing API. Free plan: 5,000 requests/day, commercial use allowed with attribution | stable | 2026-11-10 |
| geoapify.com | Free | Geoapify offers map tiles, geocoding, places, routing and isolines APIs. The Free plan includes 3,000 credits/day, no cr... | stable | 2026-11-11 |
| ipstack | Free | Locate and identify Website Visitors by IP Address | stable | 2026-11-03 |
| ipinfo.io | Free | IP geolocation and data API. IPinfo Lite (free plan): unlimited requests, country and continent-level geolocation only (... | stable | 2026-11-07 / 2026-08-21 |
| Geokeo api | Free | Geocoding API with language correction and more. Worldwide coverage. 2,500 free daily queries not confirmed · page states a free price · 2026-11-03 | stable | 2026-11-03 |
| Geocodio | Free | Geocoding and reverse geocoding API for US and Canada — free tier: 2,500 lookups/day. Includes address parsing, congress... | stable | 2026-11-10 |
| positionstack | Free | Send 100 monthly geocode requests for free — in case you ever need more, premium geocoding subscriptions start at just U... | stable | 2026-11-09 |
| Foursquare | Free | Location discovery, venue search, and context-aware content. The first 500 Pro endpoint calls each month are free. Fours... | watch effective 2026-06-01 |
2026-11-02 |
| stadiamaps.com | Free | Stadia Maps offers map tiles, routing, navigation, geocoding and other geospatial APIs. The Free plan includes 200,000 c... | stable | 2026-10-25 |
| opencagedata.com | Free | Geocoding API aggregating OpenStreetMap and other open geo sources. Two thousand five hundred free queries/day. | stable | 2026-11-13 |
We publish no ranking of these. Nothing we record measures popularity or generosity, so naming a best or a top few would be our preference rather than our data. We hold 14 free maps/geolocation offers that clear our bar, each listed with the terms we publish and the date we last read them. Our ranking rule is published at /criteria.
14 offers meet our criteria for this category. Of those, 12 carry no recorded change to the terms we publish, and 2 a recorded narrowing. The Durability column below says which offer is in which group, and links the dated record behind every change. We do not rank these by how much you get, because the limits are not comparable without reading each vendor's page.