Foursquare Places API vs OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) for AI agents
Foursquare Places API is Foursquare's pay-as-you-go API for searching and reading point-of-interest data from its global places database. Free, donation-run public servers for searching OpenStreetMap data: Nominatim for geocoding and place search, Overpass for querying OSM objects.
The short answer
- Foursquare Places API: A low-cost global POI API with phone, website and email at the cheaper Pro tier. Good for place lookup and matching where Google-style display rules are too tight.
- OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass): Free, openly licensed geocoding and occasional place lookups at low volume, or a base to self-host. It is not a backend for a public app at scale.
Side by side
| Foursquare Places API | OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) | |
|---|---|---|
| Searches | POIs worldwide: Place Search, Place Details, Autocomplete, Place Match, Tips and Photos. | OpenStreetMap data worldwide: addresses, places and mapped POIs. |
| Returns | JSON place records. Pro fields include fsq_place_id, name, coordinates, address, categories, chains, tel, website, email and social handles. Premium fields add hours, rating, price, photos, tips and popularity. | Nominatim returns xml, json, jsonv2 (the default), geojson or geocodejson. With extratags=1 it adds extra tags such as opening hours or a wikipedia link when mapped. |
| Before the first call | A Foursquare developer account and a Service API key. Usage beyond the free calls is paid through credits or a card on file. | No account or key. Nominatim requires a valid User-Agent or Referer that identifies your app, and visible attribution. |
| Free | 500 free Pro calls a month since June 1, 2026, by its docs; the pricing page also says “up to 10,000 free calls on Pro endpoints” | Free within strict limits. Nominatim allows an absolute maximum of 1 request per second. Overpass asks users to stay at or below roughly 10,000 requests and 1 GB a day. |
| Paid | Pro endpoints: $15.00 per 1,000 calls (501 to 100,000), falling to $9.00 at volume. Premium endpoints: $18.75 per 1,000 (up to 100,000). Ask endpoints: $30 (Pro) or $36 (Premium) per 1,000. | No paid tier. Heavy users are told to run their own instance or use commercial third-party providers. |
| Acting on a result | Phone (tel), website and email are Pro fields. There is no way to message a business through the API. | Phone or website appear only when mappers tagged them in OSM, through Nominatim's extratags. There is no messaging. |
| Limits on keeping or showing results | The Developer Master Terms forbid creating derivative works of the service or its underlying data. They also treat place data as Foursquare Confidential Information, even where the facts are public. No specific cache period was found. | Data is ODbL (share-alike), and you must credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors. Nominatim requires results to be cached for bulk jobs. It bans systematic queries, downloading all POIs in an area, autocomplete, and reselling results. |
| AI in its terms | The terms forbid accessing the service "to develop or improve any point-of-interest or venue dataset, algorithm, or machine learning operation(s)." The product page markets the API for AI agents through MCP. | Nominatim's policy has a "Usage in LLMs" section. LLMs may only suggest the service if they prominently point to the usage policy. The public API must not be built into or offered through no-code, low-code or vibe-coding platforms as a generic place-search service. |
| Coverage | Foursquare says 100M+ POI across 200+ countries. | Worldwide OpenStreetMap data. POI completeness depends on volunteer mapping. |
| MCP server | foursquare/foursquare-places-mcp on GitHub (https://github.com/foursquare/foursquare-places-mcp). The README says MCP is currently supported for local use only. | No official server listed |
Where Openpath fits
If the agent needs a local business to message in Austin, Texas, Openpath returns the listings themselves, free and with no key. See Openpath vs Foursquare Places API and Openpath vs OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass).
Questions people ask
What do I need before I can use Foursquare Places API?
A Foursquare developer account and a Service API key. Usage beyond the free calls is paid through credits or a card on file.
Is Foursquare Places API free?
500 free Pro calls a month since June 1, 2026, by its docs; the pricing page also says “up to 10,000 free calls on Pro endpoints”.
What do I need before I can use OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass)?
No account or key. Nominatim requires a valid User-Agent or Referer that identifies your app, and visible attribution.
Is OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass) free?
Free within strict limits. Nominatim allows an absolute maximum of 1 request per second. Overpass asks users to stay at or below roughly 10,000 requests and 1 GB a day.
Sources
Every line about another company comes from its own pages. Prices and terms change, so check the source before you rely on one.
Foursquare Places API, read on October 15, 2026:
- foursquare.com/pricing: “0 – 500 Calls 501 to 100,000 Calls 100,001 to 500,000 Calls 500,001+ Calls $0.00 CPM $15.00 CPM $12.00 CPM $9.00 CPM”
- foursquare.com/pricing: “0 – 100,000 Calls 100,001 to 500,000 Calls 500,001+ Calls $18.75 CPM $15.00 CPM $11.25 CPM”
- foursquare.com/pricing: “Pro Premium $30.00 CPM $36.00 CPM”
- foursquare.com/pricing: “Enjoy up to 10,000 free calls on Pro endpoints.”
- docs.foursquare.com/developer/reference/upcoming-changes: “Beginning June 1, 2026, the following Places API & V2 Pro endpoint rates go into effect for all users”
- docs.foursquare.com/developer/reference/upcoming-changes: “You will now receive 500 free Pro calls.”
- docs.foursquare.com/data-products/docs/places-pro-and-premium: “tel: Telephone number of a POI with local formatting”
- docs.foursquare.com/data-products/docs/places-pro-and-premium: “email: Primary contact email address of organization, if available”
- foursquare.com/legal/terms/enterprise-developermasterterms: “access the Foursquare Service to develop or improve any point-of-interest or venue dataset, algorithm, or machine learning operation(s)”
- foursquare.com/legal/terms/enterprise-developermasterterms: “create derivative works of the Foursquare Service or any underlying data”
- foursquare.com/legal/terms/enterprise-developermasterterms: “point of interest data for New York City would be confidential, even if individual venue commercial addresses are public”
- foursquare.com/products/places-api: “100M+ POI across 200+ countries”
- foursquare.com/products/places-api: “Build AI Agents that are situationally aware and tailored to the user's surroundings with a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server”
- github.com/foursquare/foursquare-places-mcp: “Currently MCP is only supported for local use”
OpenStreetMap (Nominatim and Overpass), read on October 15, 2026:
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “No heavy uses (an absolute maximum of 1 request per second ).”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “Provide a valid HTTP Referer or User-Agent identifying the application”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “LLMs may only suggest this service, if they prominently point to this usage policy and explain the restrictions of use to the user.”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “must not be built into, offered through, suggested by, or automatically generated by no-code, low-code, or vibe-coding platforms”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “This includes reverse queries in a grid, searching for complete lists of postcodes, towns etc. and downloading all POIs in an area.”
- operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim: “If your requirements are even larger you can install your own instance of Nominatim.”
- dev.overpass-api.de/overpass-doc/en/preface/commons.html: “users are expected to send a maximum of about 10000 requests per day and keep their download volume below about 1 GB per day”
- nominatim.org/release-docs/latest/api/Search: “the response include any additional information in the result that is available in the database, e.g. wikipedia link, opening hours”
- openstreetmap.org/copyright: “You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt our data, as long as you credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors.”