The importance of geolocation APIs for businesses cannot be understated. It is crucial in improving customer engagement, satisfaction, and conversion rates. A geolocation API provides information about the geographical location of an internet-connected electronic device based on its IP address. Businesses across diverse industries leverage IP location APIs for various purposes, from personalized shopping experiences based on users’ location and content localization to logistics optimization and fraud prevention.
However, not all IP geolocation APIs are made equal. For instance, data accuracy is often an issue with many geolocation APIs, leading to financial losses. Hence, choosing a reliable and accurate geolocation API is essential. That’s why thousands of businesses worldwide choose Ipstack API for their geolocation needs. Ipstack is one of the leading IP geolocation APIs known for its high accuracy, next-level performance, scalability, and impressive features.
In this article, we’ll explore the features of Ipstack geolocation API and discuss why it’s considered a top choice.
Table of Contents
Understanding Geolocation APIs
A geolocation API is essentially an application programming interface that enables developers to retrieve geolocation data of an electronic device connected to the internet. The API determines the location of an electronic device based on its IP address. An IP address ( Internet Protocol address) is made up of a unique string of decimal-separated numbers. It is assigned to every internet-connected device and makes it easy to identify the device.
It’s essential to understand that an IP location data API provides the location information of the electronic device that your website visitor is using and not the user’s actual physical location.
A reliable geolocation API gathers data from dependable sources like leading Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Regional Internet Registries (RIRs). The location data returned by geolocation APIs typically include country, city, continent, and latitude and longitude coordinates. However, a robust and leading API like Ipstack also provides additional information, such as currency and timezone data. This data is valuable in providing personalized online user experiences.
Today, various geolocation APIs are available in the market. However, not all APIs are made equal. It’s crucial to compare the features of the best IP to location APIs to choose the right one for your business needs. For instance, assess factors like the API’s accuracy, speed, performance, coverage, scalability, ease of integration and pricing.
Also, read Differences Between IP Geolocation and GPS-Based Location Services.
Understanding IP Intelligence: The Core of Geolocation Services
Ipstack stands out with its advanced IP Intelligence capabilities, a cornerstone feature that sets it apart in the market. Our IP Intelligence technology goes beyond basic geolocation, offering in-depth insights about users based on their IP addresses. It’s not just about location; it’s about understanding the context, behavior, and needs of your audience. Learn more about how our IP Intelligence can revolutionize your approach to user engagement and security here.
Ipstack API: Key Features and Selling Points
Ipstack is a robust geolocation API widely used for locating and identifying website visitors by IP address. It empowers businesses with accurate geolocation data of users. The API is renowned for its high accuracy, next-level speed, efficiency, effortless integration, and impressive features. Thousands of developers and well-known organizations like Microsoft, Samsung, Airbnb, and Hubspot utilize Ipstack for their geolocation needs.
Here are the key features of the Ipstack API:
High Data Accuracy
When it comes to user location data accuracy, Ipstack is a top choice for thousands of businesses worldwide. Ipstack has partnered with large ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to deliver highly accurate data consistently. The robust API supports IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. The API also comes with a Connection Module that returns information regarding the hostname and ASN of the ISP your users/ site visitors use.
Detailed Location Data
Ipstack is designed to help businesses improve online user experiences. The API returns detailed location data, which includes continent, city, country, region, zip code, and latitude and longitude coordinates. This valuable data is helpful for content localization, delivering personalized experiences, targeted marketing, fraud prevention, and more.
Global Coverage
The coverage of an IP location API significantly impacts its data accuracy. Ipstack ensures you get accurate location data of every user, no matter which part of the world they’re accessing your website from. The efficient API covers over 2 million unique locations in 200,000+ cities across the world.
Bulk Lookup
Bulk Lookup is a handy and time-saving feature of Ipstack, loved by many users. With this endpoint, you can request location information of up to 50 IP addresses simultaneously. The API returns accurate data of each IP address instantly without compromising performance. This way, you don’t have to make an API call for each IP address separately.
Currency Module
Ipstack doesn’t just provide location data. It offers multiple other modules to retrieve additional information about the location returned against the requested IP address. For instance, you can use Ipstack’s Currency Module to request currency data, which includes the currency’s name, symbol, and code. This information is particularly useful for e-commerce businesses. They can use this data to display product prices in customers’ local currencies, delivering a personalized shopping experience.
Time Zone Module
Ipstack also offers a Time Zone module, which provides information like GMT offset, current time, and code associated with the location returned against your requested IP address. This data is valuable for optimizing your marketing campaign.
Security Module
As cyberattacks are constantly increasing, website security is crucial. Ipstack understands this and provides a security module to help you protect your website. This module enables you to monitor security threats and risks associated with suspicious IP addresses.
Detailed Documentation
The Ipstack API comes with detailed documentation that contains all the information about the API parameters, endpoints, functionality, and capabilities. The documentation also provides several coding examples to make the integration quick and easy.
Free Plan
Ipstack offers a generous free plan that supports the Location Module and provides up to 1000 monthly API requests. The API also has multiple flexible pricing plans with more monthly calls and additional features like Timezone, Currency, Network, and Security Modules.
Comparing Ipstack with Other Geolocation APIs
The table below shows the comparison between three popular IP geolocation APIs: Ipstack, Google Geolocation API, and Abstract IP Geolocation API.
| Aspects | Ipstack | Google Geolocation API | Abstract IP Geolocation API |
| Method of data collection | IP addresses of electronic devices | Wi-Fi and cell tower access points | Highly accurate API is widely trusted for its high accuracy. Even big companies like Microsoft and Airbnb trust the API for its accuracy. Data sources include large and reputable ISPs. Updates the database frequently to get real-time data- up to 24 database updates per day |
| Provides security, timezone, currency, and network information | Accurate is higher in areas with a higher density of cell towers and Wi-Fi networks. | Data Accuracy | Good data quality, but not as accurate as Ipstack. Main data sources include ISPs and regional internet registries like the African Network Information Centre and American Registry for Internet Numbers |
| Location Information | Continent Country City Region Zip code Latitude and longitude coordinates | Only latitude and longitude coordinates | City Region Country Continent Latitude and longitude coordinates |
| Other features | Currency, Time Zone, Security, and Network modules | Provides an accuracy radius that tells how precise the estimated location is | Provides security, timezone, currency and network information |
| Coverage | GlobalCovers 2 million+ unique locations in 200,000+ cities worldwide | Global | Worldwide – database includes around 4 billion IPsSupports over 2.25 million unique locations and more than 250,000 cities |
| Quality of documentation | Great documentation Contains all the details about the API endpoints, parameters, functionality, usage, and capabilities Provides coding examples to ease the integration process | Good documentation that includes details about making API requests and understanding API responses Provides sample codes | Good documentation consisting of necessary details about API requests and parameters Includes coding examples |
| Pricing | Offers a free plan with 1000 monthly API requests Pricing ranges from $12.99-$99.99 per month Offers a custom subscription plan | Pay-as-you-go pricing model $0.005 per request for monthly API requests between 0 and 100,000. For each request above 100,000, you’ll be charged 0.004 USD | Free plan with 1000 monthly requests Paid plan costs $49 per month Offers a custom plan |
| Use cases | Locating and identifying website visitors Show content to users in their local language based on their location Deliver a personalized shopping experience with the currency module Automatically determine and display the time zone of website visitors Assess security threats and risks associated with suspicious IP addresses | Navigation Mapping Asset tracking Ride-sharing services | Content localization Display the user’s location and timezone automatically Show personalized offers based on the user’s location Show product prices in the local currencies of users Targeted marketing Check whether an IP address is generated using a VPN |
Why Ipstack Stands Out
As evident from the above table, Ipstack and Abstract Geolocation APIs offer quite a few similar features. For instance, both APIs determine the location of users based on the IP address of their electronic device. In contrast, Google API relies on nearby cell towers and Wi-Fi information to determine a device’s location. Moreover, ipstack and Abstract API provide detailed location data, which includes country, city, region, continent, and latitude and longitude coordinates. However, Google Geolocation API provides latitude and longitude coordinates only.
If we compare Ipstack and Abstract IP Locations API, Ipstack is ahead in terms of accuracy. While both APIs cover millions of locations worldwide and update their database frequently, Ipstack has gained users’ trust by providing highly accurate data consistently. That’s why big companies like Microsoft, Samsung, Airbnb, and Hubspot leverage the Ipstack API for their geolocation needs. Users also love API’s next-level performance, an uptime of 99.9%, scalability, and ease of integration. The API also stands out with its impressive technical support and bank-grade security.
Customer Testimonials
Here are a few customer testimonials on Ipstack. These reviews are taken from G2, a reputable website that helps choose the right software based on the user/business needs:
- “I have been using Ipstack for a while now, and I absolutely love it! The accuracy of its geolocation data is simply amazing, and the speed and reliability of the service are impressive. I appreciate how easy it is to integrate with my applications, thanks to the simple API and a range of SDKs available for different programming languages. The additional data points that Ipstack provides, such as time zone and currency information, have also been extremely useful for my projects. Overall, I highly recommend Ipstack to anyone looking for a reliable and feature-rich IP geolocation API service.”
- “Locate and Identifying the website visitors is the best I like, which helps to identify the IP before entering into the secure domains…which helps to filter it fast and easily.”
- “I’ve been using Ipstack for over 6 years on a couple of different websites, and I’m really happy with what we’re getting. We needed a simple geolocation service that’s easy to integrate into our systems and provides accurate results for the user’s country, language, and currency.
The integration itself took no more than an hour, and the geolocation results are very accurate, with almost zero mistakes unless the visitor is using a VPN or something. We are using only the most basic features of their API, but that’s all we require, and it’s working like it should.
Overall, I would definitely recommend Ipstack to anyone looking for a reliable geolocation API. It’s easy to integrate, gets the job done, and the pricing is fair too.”
Getting Started with Ipstack
Here are the main steps to get started with Ipstack API to get the location from the IP address:
- Sign up to create your free Ipstack account.
- Obtain your free API key, which is available in your Ipstack dashboard.
- Here’s how to make an API call using the Standard Lookup endpoint:
https://api.ipstack.com/134.201.250.155
? access_key = YOUR_ACCESS_KEY
Below is an example PHP (cURL) code for using the Standard Lookup endpoint:
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// set IP address and API access key $ip = '134.201.250.155'; $access_key = 'YOUR_ACCESS_KEY'; // Initialize CURL: $ch = curl_init('https://api.ipstack.com/'.$ip.'?access_key='.$access_key.''); curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true); // Store the data: $json = curl_exec($ch); curl_close($ch); // Decode JSON response: $api_result = json_decode($json, true); // Output the "capital" object inside "location" echo $api_result['location']['capital']; |
Here is an example API response:
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{ "ip": "134.201.250.155", "type": "ipv4", "continent_code": "NA", "continent_name": "North America", "country_code": "US", "country_name": "United States", "region_code": "CA", "region_name": "California", "city": "Los Angeles", "zip": "90013", "latitude": 34.0453, "longitude": -118.2413, "location": { "geoname_id": 5368361, "capital": "Washington D.C.", "languages": [ { "code": "en", "name": "English", "native": "English" } ], "country_flag": "https://assets.ipstack.com/images/assets/flags_svg/us.svg", "country_flag_emoji": "🇺🇸", "country_flag_emoji_unicode": "U+1F1FA U+1F1F8", "calling_code": "1", "is_eu": false }, "time_zone": { "id": "America/Los_Angeles", "current_time": "2018-03-29T07:35:08-07:00", "gmt_offset": -25200, "code": "PDT", "is_daylight_saving": true }, "currency": { "code": "USD", "name": "US Dollar", "plural": "US dollars", "symbol": "$", "symbol_native": "$" }, "connection": { "asn": 25876, "isp": "Los Angeles Department of Water & Power" } } |
Conclusion
A geolocation API is an extremely helpful tool for businesses across various industries. The API allows you to determine the geolocation of your website visitors based on the IP address of the electronic device they use to access your website. You can use this valuable data to show content to users in their local languages, display product prices in the local currency of users, Send personalized offers based on users’ location, etc. When choosing an IP Location API, assess factors like the API’s accuracy, speed, performance, coverage, scalability, ease of integration, and pricing.
In this article, we compared three popular IP geolocation APIs. Based on our comparison, Ipstack is far ahead in terms of accuracy. Users also prefer the API because of its impressive performance, simplicity, ease of integration, and budget-friendly pricing plans.
Try the Ipstack IP Geolocation API for free and locate and identify your website visitors today!
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. How many requests can Ipstack API handle?
Ipstack is backed by a solid infrastructure, and it is designed to be highly scalable. Currently, the API can handle between 2 to 3 billion API requests per day.
Q. How often does Ipstack update its data?
Ipstack’s database is updated regularly (up to 24 database updates per day) to ensure the API delivers real-time data.
Q. What is Geolocation API used for?
An IP Location API is used to determine the location of an electronic device based on its IP address.
