Comparisons

Overview

When building with location data, you've probably used or considered the Google Places API. It's powerful and the industry standard for a reason. However, it was designed for an earlier era. While Google Maps has user-facing features people love, many of those flows aren’t available via their Places API, and stitching them together takes multiple APIs, many calls, and lots of custom logic.

We built InBe to address the gaps we found while building modern applications. Here's a direct comparison of key features.

Feature comparison: InBe vs. Google Places API

Note: Google provides excellent global maps, navigation, and base place data. InBe focuses on intelligent matching, multi-user context, and deeply structured venue data for product flows.

The InBe difference: a practical example

Let's look at a common product requirement:

As a user, I want to invite a friend to dinner. The app should suggest restaurants halfway between us that are good for conversation and offer vegan options.

With the Google Places API, you would typically:

1. Geocode both user addresses (2 API calls).
2. Calculate the geographical midpoint yourself.
3. Perform a "nearby search" around that midpoint (1 API call).
4. Iterate through the results, making a "place details" call for each one to check for "vegan" in reviews (N API calls).
5. Manually filter out places that aren't "good for conversation."
6. Finally, present the list to the user.

With InBe, you make one API call:

{
  "mode": "midpoint",
  "locations": [
    { "lat": 51.5072, "lon": -0.1276 },
    { "lat": 51.5154, "lon": -0.1419 }
  ],
  "preferences": {
    "establishment": ["restaurant"],
    "caters": ["vegan"],
    "goodFor": ["conversation"]
  }
}

At a glance

On average, we are roughly 1/3 the cost of Google Places API.

When to use both

Google provides excellent global maps, navigation, and broad POI coverage. Many teams pair that with InBe for intelligent matching, multi-user context, and deeply structured venue data. Use your preferred maps SDK for visualization, and call InBe to power the decision flow (find, weigh, and return the best options in one response).

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