Google Maps API Pricing in 2026: Every Provider, Same Unit
Method note: Pricing below was verified August 6, 2026 from public provider pages and the live Serpent API. Every provider reprices; treat the numbers as a dated snapshot, not a permanent guarantee.
Short answer: a managed Google Maps data API costs roughly $0.75 to $5.00 per 1,000 places, while the official Google Places API runs about $32 per 1,000 businesses for a search-plus-details pipeline. The catch is that providers rarely sell the same unit — some charge per record, some per call, some per month — so the cheapest headline number is often not the cheapest bill.
This comparison normalizes every provider to one unit: what one thousand fully-delivered place records cost. The Serpent numbers come from our own pricing; competitor numbers come from public pages and are cited where possible. It is the same exercise I ran for general SERP API pricing, applied to local business data.
| 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 |
| Outscraper | Per 1,000 records | $3.00 (basic) / ~$14 (enriched) | $3.00 – $14.00 |
| 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 |
The Unit Problem
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 and Outscraper 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.
Serpent Maps Pricing
Serpent's Google Maps API is per call, with four endpoints:
| Endpoint | Returns | Default | Growth | Scale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maps Quick | Up to 20 places | $15.00 | $7.50 | $3.75 |
| Maps Deep | Up to 100 places | $75.00 | $37.50 | $18.75 |
| Maps Place | One place detail | $1.50 | $0.75 | $0.375 |
| Maps Reviews | Up to 20 reviews | $3.00 | $1.50 | $0.75 |
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.
How the Competitors Compare
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.
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.
Outscraper — $3.00 basic, ~$14 enriched
Outscraper sells $3.00 per 1,000 basic listings and roughly $14 per 1,000 for an enriched lead that chains Maps plus emails plus verification. At very high volume (100K+ records) per-service rates drop toward $1.00 per 1,000, but you pay each service separately and the pipeline still stacks.
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.
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.
The Enrichment Trap
Base scrapes look cheap until you need the fields that make local data useful — phone, website, hours, reviews. The pattern across Apify and Outscraper 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.
What You Pay For at Serpent
The four endpoints cover the full local-data flow: ranked search (Quick and Deep), a single place detail with up to 23 documented fields, and paged reviews with an opaque next-page token. Fields Google does not expose come back null rather than fabricated — the honest-null contract documented in the API reference. There is no monthly fee and no minimum contract; pricing is strictly per call.
| 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.
Free Tier
Every new account gets 10 shared free calls usable on any endpoint — Maps Quick, Deep, Place, and Reviews, plus Web, News, Images, Videos, Shopping, AI Rank, LinkedIn, and Social. That is enough to test the search flow end-to-end: one Quick search, a place detail, and a reviews pull before you decide whether the data is worth paying for.
FAQ
What is the cheapest way to get Google Maps place data?
At volume, managed Google Maps data APIs land between $0.75 and $5.00 per 1,000 places, versus roughly $17 per 1,000 Place Search calls on the official Places API. The cheapest option depends on how many fields you need enriched.
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.
