IP Geo API

IP Geo API vs ipinfo.io in 2026: When the EU Alternative Wins (and When It Doesn’t)

5-minute read · 2026 pricing · honest assessment

If you’re reading this, you probably have a working ipinfo.io integration and are wondering whether switching is worth the migration friction. Short answer: it depends on whether you’re optimizing for EU residency + EUR pricing, or for the deepest IP intelligence dataset on the market. This post lays out the tradeoffs without marketing varnish.

Looking for the full feature matrix? Jump straight to the ipinfo.io alternative comparison →.

The 60-second take

What you care about Choose
EU-only data residency, EUR billing, iDEAL/SEPA IP Geo API
VPN/Proxy/Tor detection on free tier IP Geo API
Pay <€100/mo for 1M lookups/mo IP Geo API
Mobile carrier identification ipinfo.io
Offline / on-prem hosted database ipinfo.io
SOC 2 Type II audit evidence today ipinfo.io
10M+ requests/month at predictable price ipinfo.io (until our 2027 enterprise tier)

Pick the row that’s the dealbreaker. If two rows pull opposite directions, the row with audit/compliance pressure wins — that’s the one that will fail your security review.

The real reasons EU teams switch

The most common switch story we hear isn’t about price. It’s about an internal Article 44/45 transfer-impact-assessment that escalated. A DPO opens a ticket asking how IP visitor data ends up in US infrastructure, the engineering team can’t answer cleanly, and procurement is asked to evaluate alternatives. By the time IP Geo API enters the conversation, the customer already has a written compliance reason to switch — they just need a drop-in replacement that won’t break in production.

That’s the wedge:

  1. EU-only at infra, contract, and corporate level. IP Geo API runs Frankfurt + Amsterdam only. There is no US sub-processor. The DPA is EU-jurisdictional. The operating BV is in oprichting (Q2 2026), so there’s no Delaware parent quietly subject to CLOUD Act subpoenas.
  2. Threat detection on the free tier. ipinfo.io’s “Privacy Detection” module is a paid add-on that doubles your bill at scale. We made the call early that VPN/Proxy/Tor/datacenter flags are baseline IP intelligence, not a premium feature. They’re free on every plan including the 1.000-requests/day free tier.
  3. EUR pricing. €29/mo entry vs $99/mo. 1M lookups/mo at €99 vs $249. About 60% cheaper at the same quota tier, plus you avoid the hidden FX cost on USD invoicing.
  4. iDEAL, SEPA, Bancontact. Mollie checkout means EU finance teams don’t have to wrestle a US credit-card invoice through accounting.

If none of these matter for your stack, you don’t have a switching reason. Stay with ipinfo.io and skip the rest of this post.

The real reasons to not switch (yet)

We try to be straight about this because the fastest way to lose a customer is to oversell the migration.

What migration actually looks like

For most teams with a single ipinfo.SDK.lookup(ip) call site, migration is two function-signature changes and a field-name remap. We publish a compatibility shim — pass ?format=ipinfo and the response shape matches ipinfo.io’s flat JSON, so most code paths stop noticing the swap.

The non-obvious step is dual-write for 24-48h. Run both APIs in parallel, log every diff between responses, audit the diff list. The most common surprises are (a) ASN naming differences (“AS15169 Google LLC” vs split into network.asn + network.organization) and (b) loc string parsing — we split lat/lng into two fields rather than a comma-string.

After that: flip the env var. Keep the old credentials warm for 7 days as rollback insurance, then revoke.

Full migration guide with curl examples and field-mapping table is on the ipinfo.io alternative comparison page.

Pricing math at three common volumes

Monthly volume ipinfo.io list price IP Geo API list price Saving
100K req $99 (~€91) €29 ~68%
1M req $249 (~€229) €99 ~57%
5M req $499 (~€459) €399 (custom) ~13%

Numbers above are list-price snapshots from public pricing pages on 2026-04-16. ipinfo.io quotes USD; we converted at €1.00 = $1.09 for comparison. Negotiated annual contracts on either side land somewhere between list and a 25% volume discount.

The pricing gap closes at high volume — by 5M req/mo you’re in custom-contract land on both sides and the spread depends on negotiation, not list price. The comfortable indie / SMB / scaleup zone (100K-2M req/mo) is where IP Geo API’s cost story is unambiguously stronger.

Trust check: should you trust this comparison?

Honest disclosure: this post is on the IP Geo API blog. We have a commercial reason to suggest switching. We tried to compensate for that bias by:

If you spot a factual error, email hello@ipgeo.10b.app — we’ll edit and add a correction note above the fold within 48h. We’d rather be cited as accurate than aggressive.

Try IP Geo API in 5 minutes

# 1. Sign up — no credit card, 1.000 lookups/day on free tier
open https://ipgeo.10b.app/pricing

# 2. Test against a known IP (Google DNS)
curl https://ipgeo.10b.app/v1/lookup/8.8.8.8 \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $IPGEO_API_KEY"

# 3. If you want the ipinfo.io flat-shape response
curl 'https://ipgeo.10b.app/v1/lookup/8.8.8.8?format=ipinfo' \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $IPGEO_API_KEY"

Sign up free → · Full ipinfo.io comparison → · API reference →

FAQ

Is IP Geo API a fork or wrapper of ipinfo.io? No. We run our own ASN/geo dataset, threat-intel pipeline, and infra. The compatibility shim is a response-shape mapper, not a backend proxy.

Does the free tier really include VPN/Proxy/Tor detection? Yes — the same threat block is on every plan including 1K/day free. We monitor abuse patterns and reserve the right to throttle obvious scrapers, but normal product use is unrestricted.

What happens to my ipinfo.io billing if I switch? Cancel from the ipinfo.io dashboard after your migration cutover and the dual-write window closes. We don’t auto-cancel for you — that’s between you and them.

Is the BV oprichting going to delay anything for me as a paying customer? No. Invoicing and DPA are already EU-jurisdictional through Eric’s eenmanszaak structure pre-BV; the BV transition (Q2 2026) is internal restructuring, no contract changes for customers.

Where can I see service status and incidents? Public status page: https://status.ipgeo.10b.app (90-day rolling history). Incidents post-mortemed within 5 business days.

Related reading

Practical companion (highly recommended if you’ve decided to switch):

Drop-in migration guides for adjacent providers (in case you’re consolidating multiple sources onto IP Geo API):

If you’re evaluating IP geolocation APIs against multiple providers, the other head-on comparisons in this series may help:

Industry deep-dives

Last reviewed 2026-05-08 · IP Geo API team · Comments / corrections: hello@ipgeo.10b.app

Pairs with the full ipinfo.io alternative comparison page — has the complete feature matrix, migration guide, and pricing snapshot.

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