Open Places API

Data rights

The Places API where you own the results.

Price gets attention. Data rights are the durable difference. Open Places API is built on permissively licensed open Overture Places data, so your application can cache, store, redistribute, and combine returned places with its own records.

What you can do with Open Places API results.

Cache

Keep results so repeated product flows do not need to call the API again for the same place data.

Store

Persist place records in your database for lead lists, listing enrichment, matching, QA, and audit trails.

Redistribute

Ship returned place facts in your product, exports, CRM workflows, and customer-facing pages.

Mix

Combine Overture-backed places with private corrections, suppressions, account layers, and your own data.

Why this differs from proprietary Places APIs.

Many proprietary Places APIs are excellent data products, but their terms usually restrict storage. That matters when your actual job is building a durable list, enriching properties, deduplicating local entities, or letting an agent remember what it found. Here is what each provider's current terms allow you to keep, checked against the official pages in August 2026 — the full walkthrough with the fine print covers each rule in detail.

Provider What you may keep Source
Open Places API Everything, indefinitely — cache, store, redistribute, and mix, backed by permissive open Overture source licenses. Overture Places docs · attribution and licensing
Geoapify Everything, with attribution — OpenStreetMap credit always, "Powered by Geoapify" on the free plan. The other open-data-based provider. Geoapify Places API
LocationIQ Response data may be stored; caching full request–response pairs is limited to 48 hours on the free tier and to the life of the subscription on paid plans. LocationIQ pricing
Radar 30 days — terms bar longer retention of address and POI data, and separately bar building an address or POI database from the APIs. Radar terms
HERE 30 days under standard terms; permanent geocoding rights are excluded from the self-serve Base plan. HERE platform terms
Google Places Place IDs only. Coordinates may be cached 30 days; names, addresses, ratings, and photos have no caching exception. Places policies · Maps service terms
Foursquare Places IDs only (place, photo, and address IDs) for pay-as-you-go accounts; all other fields stay on the meter. API license · usage guidelines
Mapbox Search Box Nothing — results are for temporary use only, and persisting them requires a sales contract. Mapbox's separate Permanent Geocoding product covers addresses, not POI search. Search Box API docs

The licenses behind the result set.

Overture Places is a multi-source, per-record licensed dataset. Current source documentation lists permissive licenses including CDLA-Permissive 2.0, Apache 2.0, and CC0 depending on the contributor. Open Places API does not describe the dataset as one single license because that would hide the source-level reality.

The API keeps the operational burden out of your backlog: hosted search, usage limits, monthly updates, and account-owned layers. The returned place facts remain usable open-data results, not proprietary content you must delete after a short cache window.

Data rights FAQ.

Can I cache Open Places API results?

Yes. Open Places API results are built from permissively licensed open Overture Places data, so you can cache and store returned place data in your product.

Can I redistribute the results?

Yes, subject to the underlying open-data licenses and attribution requirements. Overture Places records use permissive source licenses such as CDLA-Permissive 2.0, Apache 2.0, and CC0 depending on source.

Is this legal advice?

No. This page explains the product posture and links to source terms. Your team should review current vendor and open-data terms for your exact use case.