How Much Does a Google Maps API Cost in 2026? Real Prices per 1,000 Places
Method note: Pricing below was verified August 6, 2026 against each vendor's public pricing page and the live Serpent API. Every provider reprices; treat the numbers as a dated snapshot, not a permanent guarantee.
Every "cheapest Google Maps API" article I have read compares a monthly subscription price against a per-call price and calls one of them cheaper. That is not pricing. It is marketing.
So I priced the same workload — one thousand fully-delivered place records — on five providers: the official Google Places API, Apify, DataForSEO, SerpApi, and my own Serpent Maps. Every number below was verified against the vendor's pricing page in August 2026. The spread is wild: $0.75 to roughly $34 per 1,000 places. This is the same exercise I ran for general SERP API pricing, applied to local business data.
How I Priced the Same Workload
One workload, five providers, one unit. The workload: deliver 1,000 complete place records for a local business search. I logged the billing unit (per call, per record, or subscription credit), the headline rate, and what one thousand records actually cost. I did not run a statistically-powered crawl of every provider; I priced the identical job from each vendor's own published rates.
| Provider | Billing unit | Headline rate | Per 1,000 places |
|---|---|---|---|
| Serpent Maps — Deep | Per call (up to 100 places) | $0.075 / call | $0.75 |
| Apify Maps actors | Per 1,000 records | $1.00 – $5.00 | $1.00 – $5.00 |
| DataForSEO SERP API | Per 1,000 SERP pages | ~$5.00 | ~$5.00+ |
| SerpApi | Subscription credit per search | ~$0.01 – $0.025 / search | Varies; credits expire monthly |
| Official Google Places API | Per 1,000 calls | ~$17 Search + ~$17 Details | ~$32 – $34 |
Why Per-Unit Pricing Is Confusing
Every Google Maps API prices differently, and the units are not interchangeable:
- Per call. You pay once and receive a ranked list. Serpent Maps, DataForSEO, and the official Places API price this way. The cost per place depends on how many places a call returns.
- Per 1,000 records. You pay per place delivered. Apify actors price this way. Simple and predictable, but enrichment is often a separate line item.
- Subscription credits. You buy a monthly search budget. SerpApi prices this way, and unused credits expire at month-end.
Convert everything to "cost per 1,000 places" and the picture changes fast. A $0.075 call that returns 100 places is $0.75 per 1,000. A $5.00 per-1,000 flat rate is 6.7× more expensive even though the headline looks similar.
1. Official Google Places API — ~$32 / 1,000 Businesses
Place Search bills around $17 per 1,000 calls and Place Details another $17 per 1,000. A typical workflow calls both, so the real number is ~$32 to $34 per 1,000 businesses. You also pay per field via field masks, and the API requires a Google Cloud project and API keys on every request. It is the most reliable option on paper and the most expensive.
2. Apify Maps Actors — $1.00 to $5.00 per 1,000
Apify hosts several community-maintained Google Maps scrapers. Popular actors list $1.00, $1.50, $1.95, and $5.00 per 1,000 places — but the headline rate is for the base scrape. Enrichment add-ons (emails, contacts, reviews, photos) add $0.20 to $2.00 per 1,000 each, and Apify applies platform/compute fees on top. A fully enriched record can land near the top of that range.
3. DataForSEO SERP API — ~$5.00 per 1,000 SERP Pages
DataForSEO prices ~$5.00 per 1,000 SERP pages for Google Maps & organic results. That is a per-page price, so a 20-place result set still costs a full page. Fine for SERP-level work, less economical when you only want the local pack.
4. SerpApi — ~$0.01 to $0.025 per Search, Credits Expire
SerpApi sells subscription credits at roughly $0.01 to $0.025 per search depending on plan. There is no separate Maps tier; Maps results are a search type on the same credit meter. The recurring catch is that credits expire monthly, so partial utilization raises your effective per-search cost significantly.
5. Serpent Maps — $0.75 per 1,000 Places
Disclosure: I run Serpent API, so I will state this plainly and let the numbers stand next to everyone else's. Serpent's Google Maps API is per call, with four endpoints:
| Endpoint | Returns | Default | Growth | Scale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maps Quick | Up to 20 places | $15.00 | $13.50 | $10.50 |
| Maps Deep | Up to 100 places | $75.00 | $67.50 | $52.50 |
| Maps Place | One place detail | $1.50 | $1.35 | $1.05 |
| Maps Reviews | Up to 20 reviews | $3.00 | $2.70 | $2.10 |
Prices are per 1,000 calls. Growth and Scale tiers discount against Default.
Because the rate is per call rather than per record, the per-place cost depends on how full the response is. A Deep call that returns the full 100 places costs $0.75 per 1,000 places; even a 50-place response stays under $1.50 per 1,000. New accounts get a shared 10-call free pool usable on every Maps endpoint — enough to evaluate the wire shape before paying anything.
The Per-Place Pricing Trap
Base scrapes look cheap until you need the fields that make local data useful — phone, website, hours, reviews. The pattern across managed providers is identical: the cheap rate covers name, address, and rating; everything else is an add-on. An "enriched" record can cost 3 to 5× the base rate. Compare on the fully-enriched record, and include the fields you actually need before you pick a provider.
Field coverage matters for this math. On Serpent, the August 2026 measurement across 97 complete places: business status, opening hours, images, rating, and plus code at 100%; amenities 96%; website 92%; phone 70%. Phone is the gap that matters for lead-gen — roughly a third of places simply do not expose one. The provider comparison goes field by field.
How to Decide
- You want the cheapest possible bulk export. → Serpent Maps Deep at $0.75/1K, or Apify at $1.00–$5.00/1K if you prefer per-record billing.
- You need official Google data and have a Cloud budget. → The Places API, at ~$32–$34/1K for a search-plus-details pipeline.
- You want one enriched lead with emails and verification. → Pair a cheap scrape with an email-verification service, or build the enrichment step yourself on top of a cheaper scrape.
- You already run a task-based SEO pipeline. → DataForSEO, at ~$5.00/1K SERP pages.
- You need many engines on one credit meter. → SerpApi, and watch the monthly credit expiry.
| Scenario | Serpent (per 1,000) | Typical managed competitor |
|---|---|---|
| 10,000 places, search only | ~$7.50 (Deep, full) | $10 – $50 |
| 10,000 places + place details | ~$22.50 | $30 – $140 |
| 10,000 places + reviews | ~$37.50 | $40 – $150 |
Rough at-volume math at Default rates. Your real mix of search / place / reviews calls changes the total.
Price Your Workload on 10 Free Calls
Serpent's Google Maps API is pay-per-call with no subscription — Deep search from $0.75 per 1,000 places. Every new account gets 10 free calls, no credit card, to run your own 1,000-place math before paying anything.
Get Your Free API KeyExplore: Maps API · Pricing · Playground
FAQ
What is the cheapest Google Maps API in 2026?
On the same 1,000-place workload, Serpent Maps Deep is the cheapest at $0.75 per 1,000 places, followed by Apify at $1.00-$5.00. The official Google Places API costs roughly $32 to $34 per 1,000 businesses for a search-plus-details pipeline.
Is the official Google Places API expensive?
Yes relative to data APIs. Place Search and Place Details both bill near $17 per 1,000 calls, so a full search-plus-details pipeline runs roughly $32 to $34 per 1,000 businesses.
Why do per-record prices hide the real cost?
A cheap base scrape can still cost $9 to $14 per 1,000 once you add emails, verification, reviews, and photos as separate line items. Compare on the full enriched record, not the headline rate.
How were these prices verified?
Every provider price in this article was checked against the vendor's own pricing page in August 2026. Serpent's numbers are our own live rates. Prices change, so treat this as a dated snapshot.
Is per-call or per-record pricing cheaper?
It depends on how full each call is. A $0.075 Deep call returning 100 places is $0.75 per 1,000 places; a short response costs more per place. Per-record pricing is predictable but enrichment is usually a separate line item.
Do SerpApi credits expire?
Yes. SerpApi sells subscription credits at roughly $0.01 to $0.025 per search, and unused credits expire at month-end, which raises your effective per-search cost if you under-utilize.
