Estimating Google API Usage
Get clarity about Google's API pricing, when your Google plan charged for location features, and experiment with the estimator tool.
Skill Level: Intermediate
Before You Begin
Note that each time your app uses a location feature, your Google plan will be charged.
You will need a paid Adalo plan to use Adalo location features.
Walkthrough
1.) It is important to note that Google provides a free $200/month credit for locations and maps usage, but should you go over this amount within a given month, your billing account will be charged. You can find more information about how this works on Google's Map Platform Pricing Page.
2.) If you are on the 90 day free trial, which affords an additional $300 credit on your account, your trial will only be charged if you go over the $200/month allowance. Once your trial expires or you run out of funds, any usage over the $200/month free allowance will be charged to your billing account like normal.
3.) Confused yet? I guess that's why Google created a handy calculator on their other pricing page to help you figure out your potential usage and costs.
4.) It's also difficult to use the calculator if you are unsure of 1) what qualified as a request and 2) how many requests your users will use each. Here is a table that breaks down how many requests each Adalo action makes when a user interacts with a maps or location feature.
| Feature/Action | Number of Requests |
|---|---|
Location Search/Autocomplete - upon input selection and closing (learn more) | 1 |
Maps Pins Display (single pin using address) | 2 (1 to convert address to lat/long and 1 to display pin) |
Maps Pins Display (multiple pins using address) | 2 (1 to batch convert addresses to lat/long and 1 to display pins) |
Maps Pins Display (single pin using lat/long) | 1 |
Maps Pins Display (multiple pins using lat/long) | 1 |
Location List Filtering (upon | 1 |
Location List Sorting | 1 |
Using User Device Location | 1 |
HINT: When possible, use latitude and longitude in the maps component rather than addresses to save on requests.
If you're unsure about whether or not a maps or location feature needs to make a requests, it's safe to assume any action taken by the user where new information is displayed to them constitutes a request to Google.
5.) As for estimating your users request usage, this is a more broad and complex issue that varies based on a number of factors such as:
The design and flow of your app
The time your users spend in the app
The prevalence of location and maps features in your app
The prominence of location and maps features in your app (for example, an EV charging station location app will likely use more requests than a social app that tags location to posted photos).
For this reason, it's impossible to estimate on a general basis the number of requests your app will need. The best approach is to take your number of estimated active users per month (an app with 500 users total typically has 20-100 active users per month), then multiply that the number of requests for each user when they perform a specific action your app provides.
Example
As an example, say we have an app that tags location to photos that are posted. For this functionality we only need to get the user's location when they post the picture which is just 1 request. So for 30 active users to post an average of 1 picture per day, that would be 30x1 or 30 requests in total that is charged to your Google Maps Platform billing plan.
Learn More
Learn more about how location search/autocomplete batches requests to save you money
Help
If you need additional help with this article, you can always ask in our community forum! Be sure to paste the link to this article in your post as well!
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