HERE
Enterprise-grade location platform offering map tiles, geocoding, routing, autocomplete, and traffic APIs with generous per-API free tiers under a pay-as-you-grow Base Plan.
Use Cases
Free Tier
30,000 free transactions/month each for vector tiles, raster tiles, geocoding, autocomplete, and routing; 5,000 for Discover/Search and Autosuggest; 2,500 for EV routing
How to Maximize the Free Tier
HERE's Base Plan gives you separate free allowances per API, so you can use 30,000 vector tile requests AND 30,000 geocoding requests in the same month — the quotas don't share a pool. There are no daily transaction limits, which suits bursty indie traffic. Spend the 30k buckets on tiles/geocoding/routing (your core app) and treat the 5,000 Discover/Autosuggest limits as search-enhancement budgets, not primary paths. Signup requires identity verification, and usage restrictions apply (see the Base Plan Restrictions page) — read them before building. Combine HERE vector tiles with MapLibre GL JS for rendering. Beyond the free tiers you pay per transaction (e.g. €0.70 per 1,000 geocoding calls), so monitor the dashboard to stay at $0.
Getting Started
1) Sign up at here.com and complete the identity verification step. 2) Create a project in the HERE platform console. 3) Generate an API key under 'Credentials'. 4) Test geocoding: curl 'https://geocode.search.hereapi.com/v1/geocode?q=Berlin&apiKey=YOUR_KEY'. 5) Render a map by loading HERE vector tiles in MapLibre GL JS. 6) Track per-API transaction usage in the dashboard.
Pros
- Per-API free quotas: 30,000 free transactions/month for each core API (tiles, geocoding, routing) — quotas don't share a pool
- Commercial-friendly: Free tier allows commercial use with attribution, unlike MapTiler's non-commercial restriction
- No daily limits: Pay-as-you-grow model has no daily transaction caps, so traffic spikes don't break your app
Cons
- Identity verification: Signup requires identity verification, adding friction versus instant email signups
- Usage restrictions: Base Plan restrictions may limit some use cases; must review the official policy page before building
- Complex pricing model: Transaction billing across many APIs makes cost prediction harder than flat free tiers