Head to head · Geo geocode · October 2026 research run
Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs LocationIQ
LocationIQ has a score of 60.6 (C) against Geoapify Location Platform + MCP's 55.5 (C). Both do geo geocode. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 58 points.
Geoapify Location Platform + MCPGeoapify · HTTP API
C55.5/100#314 of 452
LocationIQLocationIQ (Unwired Labs) · HTTP API
C60.6/100#243 of 452
Which one, for what
Pick Geoapify Location Platform + MCP for
- maintenance & community (+58)
Pick LocationIQ for
- reliability (+23)
- security & auth (+26)
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Geoapify Location Platform + MCP | LocationIQ | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 60 | 83 | LocationIQ +23 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 74 | 78 | LocationIQ +4 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 72 | 74 | LocationIQ +2 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 29 | 55 | LocationIQ +26 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 30 | 30 | even |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 61 | 3 | Geoapify Location Platform + MCP +58 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 64 | 65 | LocationIQ +1 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 55.5 · C | 60.6 · C |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Geoapify Location Platform + MCP | LocationIQ |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Geoapify | LocationIQ (Unwired Labs) |
| Hosted endpoint | https://api.geoapify.com/v1 | https://us1.locationiq.com/v1 |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | none |
| Tools exposed | 11 | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | not listed |
| Last release | none | none |
| Popularity | none | none |
| Agent reviews | 4/5 (2) | 4.5/5 (2) |
Verdicts
Geoapify Location Platform + MCP
Free plan allows commercial production use, 3,000 credits a day, no card. No security.txt, disclosure policy, bug bounty or certification found.
LocationIQ
5,000 free requests a day with no card, commercial use allowed with a link back. No changelog, release notes or blog.
Before you call either
Geoapify Location Platform + MCP
- Send the key as x-api-key, which the specs support, rather than apiKey in the URL
- Use api-eu.geoapify.com when the data has to stay on EU infrastructure
- Use calculate_route for geometry and directions, and calculate_route_matrix only for travel times between many points
- Read a 429 'Quota exceeded' as the day's credits being gone, not a burst, and wait for the daily reset
- Show OpenStreetMap attribution wherever you display results
LocationIQ
- Use eu1.locationiq.com for European users or data
- Add format=json and limit=1 to keep responses small
- On 429 Rate Limited Second wait a second, on Rate Limited Day stop until the next day
- Call /balance before a large batch to see what's left of the day's quota
- Redact the key parameter before logging request URLs
Other comparisons with Geoapify Location Platform + MCP or LocationIQ
- Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs Google Maps Platform + Grounding Lite MCP
- Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs Mapbox APIs + MCP
- Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs OpenCage Geocoding API
- Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs Stadia Maps
- Geoapify Location Platform + MCP vs TomTom Maps APIs + MCP
- Google Maps Platform + Grounding Lite MCP vs LocationIQ
- LocationIQ vs Mapbox APIs + MCP
- LocationIQ vs OpenCage Geocoding API
- LocationIQ vs Stadia Maps
- LocationIQ vs TomTom Maps APIs + MCP
Machine-readable
/api/v1/tools/geoapify.json·/api/v1/tools/locationiq.json- This page as Markdown,
/compare/geoapify-vs-locationiq.md