# MapQuest vs NextBillion.ai (slim)

> NextBillion.ai scores 55.4 (C) to MapQuest's 35.4 (F) for geocoding. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/mapquest-vs-nextbillion.md (~4,700 tokens) · this version ~2,680 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/mapquest-vs-nextbillion.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/mapquest-vs-nextbillion
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-07
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

NextBillion.ai scores 55.4 (C) on agent readiness against MapQuest's 35.4 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. MapQuest leads on payments & pricing. Both do geocoding.

- MapQuest: F 35.4, rank #1373 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mapquest.min.md
- NextBillion.ai: C 55.4, rank #869 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nextbillion.min.md
- MapQuest, good for An agent that needs US-centred geocoding, routing with truck profiles, traffic and place search behind one account, with an MCP server ready to connect. Ahead on Payments & pricing, 30 against 20.
- NextBillion.ai, good for Fleet and delivery routing, distance matrices and route optimisation with truck profiles, plus geocoding and POI search, for companies ready for an annual contract. Ahead on Reliability, 45 against 23; Schema & documentation, 73 against 47; Agent ergonomics, 77 against 60; Security & auth, 46 against 28; Maintenance & community, 73 against 23; Transparency & trust, 58 against 31. Also Free to start without a card.

| Category | MapQuest | NextBillion.ai |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 23 | 45 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 47 | 73 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 60 | 77 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 28 | 46 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 30 | 20 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 23 | 73 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 31 | 58 |

| Fact (where they differ) | MapQuest | NextBillion.ai |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | MapQuest (System1) | NextBillion.ai Pte. Ltd. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://www.mapquestapi.com` | `https://mcp.nextbillion.io` |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Paid |
| Licence | Proprietary service. No API terms were found published without a login | none |
| Tools exposed | none | 27 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-07-16 | 2026-10-30 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | no date given |
| Customer content may train models | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Agent reviews | 2.8/5 (4) | none |

Why the edge:
- Maintenance & community, NextBillion.ai +50: MapQuest 23 (The newest dated product changes are two blog announcements on 16 July 2026 (the Geolocation API and a 10,000 by 10,000 async route matrix), 84 days before the check (20). Two dated entries in 90 days. The MCP guide's version 1.2 is dated 7 July 2026, 93 days before (0). No changelog. Support is by email, untested (3). The MCP registry returns no server for 'mapquest', and the only current SDKs are browser libraries with no dated releases found (0). No package to judge (0).); NextBillion.ai 73 (MCP server 0.5.3 on 30 October 2026 (30). Eleven tagged MCP releases between 7 October and 30 October, adding hosted mode, truck routing and geometry tools (20). Support by email, a public MCP repository with a changelog, but no public API changelog (8). The MCP server isn't in the official MCP registry, and we didn't check the mobile SDK versions (7). The MCP repository runs CI with unit and end-to-end tests (8). 30+20+8+7+8 = 73.)
- Transparency & trust, NextBillion.ai +27: MapQuest 31 (Closed service. The only terms linked are System1's website terms of 26 February 2021, which allow personal, non-commercial use and do not mention the APIs. The plans page states the storage rule (5). The System1 group privacy policy of 5 July 2023 gives no retention periods and describes sale and sharing of personal information, while the plans page says 'we don't collect or sell user data' (8). No deprecation policy. Dated notices exist from 2018 only (5). The policy names categories of service providers, with no list or locations. The geocoding docs name TomTom for international queries (3).); NextBillion.ai 58 (Editorial half only. Closed service under terms that name NextBillion.ai Pte. Ltd. and Singapore law, and an Apache-2.0 MCP server (18). The privacy policy keeps personal data while a legitimate business need exists, with no periods given. The MCP README says only tool arguments are sent to the API and nothing is retained between requests (14). No deprecation policy or dated notices found. The terms promise 10 days' notice of material changes to the terms (3). Data is mainly processed in Singapore, with transfers abroad under standard clauses. No sub-processor list found (8). 18+14+3+8 = 43.)
- Schema & documentation, NextBillion.ai +26: MapQuest 47 (`https://developer.mapquest.com/openapi.json` describes the marketing site and has an empty `paths` object, so the product APIs have no machine-readable contract. The MCP tool definitions sit behind OAuth and were not read (0). `llms.txt` indexes every API with a one-line purpose (10). The reference states each endpoint's purpose and each parameter's effect, without when-not-to-use guidance (12). Parameter tables give ranges and allowed values in prose (8). Example requests and responses on each page, and status-code pages per API (12). Versions in the path (v1, v2, v4, v5) but no changelog (5).); NextBillion.ai 73 (No OpenAPI document for the REST APIs was found in llms.txt or the docs. The hosted MCP server's 27 tools are defined with Zod schemas, so they carry typed JSON Schema inputs (15 of 25). llms.txt, llms-full.txt and a Markdown file for each docs page (10). Endpoint pages explain each parameter, and MCP tool descriptions say when not to use a tool, such as the geometry tools being straight-line rather than road distance (16). Parameter tables give types, allowed values and defaults, such as `types` and `limit` (default 10), though `in` packs several filters into one string (12). curl examples and a per-endpoint error table with causes (13). The MCP server has a dated changelog. No API changelog or versioned path was found (7). 15+10+16+12+13+7 = 73.)
- Reliability, NextBillion.ai +22: MapQuest 23 (Graded as a hosted service. No status page is linked from the developer site, the docs or the plans page (0). With no page there is no readable incident history (5). The reference marks endpoints 'Rate Limited Yes' and gives functional maximums (100 locations a batch, 50 a route, 25 a matrix) but no request-rate numbers (5). No 429, Retry-After or backoff guidance found (0). The Enterprise plan lists a service-level agreement, with no text published (3). The REST API is generally available and the MCP page calls the server production-ready (10).); NextBillion.ai 45 (Hosted lines, for the REST APIs at api.nextbillion.io and the hosted MCP server. A status page at status.nextbillion.io, 'NextBillion.AI API Status', renders only in a browser, and its Statuspage-style JSON paths return 404, so we couldn't see its components (10) or read any history. That's our limit, not a finding, and the rubric gives 5 (5). The API reference states 2,400 queries a minute, or 40 a second, for continuous requests (15). Each endpoint's error table lists 429 as 'QPM or API request count quota reached', with no Retry-After or backoff guidance (5). No SLA found; the terms say access isn't warranted to be uninterrupted (0). The REST APIs are GA. The MCP server is at version 0.5.3 (10). 10+5+15+5+0+10 = 45.)
- Security & auth, NextBillion.ai +18: MapQuest 28 (REST uses API keys, several per account, created in the dashboard or by API. The MCP server uses OAuth with one scope, `mcp:tools`. That earns 20, less 10 because the `key` query parameter is the documented way to send the secret (10). No key scopes, referrer or IP restrictions, or read-only mode found in the docs (3). Place and address text is returned with no prompt-injection guidance (7). The usage endpoint reports transactions by key, service and hour (8). No security.txt, disclosure policy, bug bounty or certification found (0).); NextBillion.ai 46 (The REST APIs take a single `key` query parameter, so a plain key that travels in URLs, which earns 20 less 10. The MCP server adds OAuth 2.1 with PKCE, seals the key into tokens with AES-256-GCM, accepts a Bearer header and stores nothing server-side, so 5 back (15). Every tool is read-only, and keys can carry an IP allowlist (12). Places results are POI and address text with no prompt-injection guidance (7). Usage alerts at 50, 75 and 90 per cent of credits, per the pricing FAQ. No per-call log found (5). /.well-known/security.txt returns 404, and we found no disclosure policy or bug bounty. The about page says the company follows ISO 27001 standards, without naming a certificate (7). 15+12+7+5+7 = 46.)
- Agent ergonomics, NextBillion.ai +17: MapQuest 60 (The MCP page names 13 tools. Their definitions were not read, so context cost is scored from the count and from REST controls such as `maxResults`, `thumbMaps=false` and `outFormat` (15). Place search pages with `pageSize` 1 to 50 and filters by category, circle, bounding box or corridor (16). Status codes are documented, with geocoding and directions errors carried in the response body and problem+json on the Account API (12). Most calls read and are safe to retry. Data Manager writes have no idempotency key, and MCP annotations were not read (10). Geocoding needs only `key` and `location`. The only current SDKs are browser libraries (7).); NextBillion.ai 77 (MCP reading, since the hosted server is the agent surface. 27 tools, four of them for documentation and seven local geometry tools, with shapes simplified to a 500-vertex budget to save context (18). limit, types, country, bbox and circle filters, and batch geocoding of up to 100 queries (16). The error table explains each code, and the MCP masks the key in error text (15). Every API tool is marked readOnlyHint, idempotentHint and not destructive in the source (18). Few required parameters and explicit latitude and longitude objects, but no official server-side SDK, only mobile and web map SDKs (10). 18+16+15+18+10 = 77.)