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Location and Recognition Entity Types

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Note

Bing Maps Location Recognition API retirement

Bing Maps Location Recognition API is deprecated and will be retired. Free (Basic) account customers can continue to use Bing Maps Location Recognition API until June 30th, 2025. Enterprise account customers can continue to use Bing Maps Location Recognition API until June 30th, 2028. To avoid service disruptions, all implementations using Bing Maps Location Recognition API will need to be updated to use Azure Maps by the retirement date that applies to your Bing Maps for Enterprise account type.

Azure Maps is Microsoft's next-generation maps and geospatial services for developers. Azure Maps has many of the same features as Bing Maps for Enterprise, and more. To get started with Azure Maps, create a free Azure subscription and an Azure Maps account. For more information about azure Maps, see Azure Maps Documentation. For migration guidance, see Bing Maps Migration Overview.

The response returned by the Location Recognition API contains one or more entity types. This article provides descriptions of the various fields associated with each entity type.

Businesses at Location

Entities like local businesses, offices, museums, parks, and points of interest are grouped under the businessesAtLocation element in the response. Each businessesAtLocation element contains the following fields.

Field Name Description
BusinessLocationEntity Container element (XML only) for the businessAddress and businessInfo fields.
businessesAddress Address of the business entity. Multiple entities can be situated at the input location, in such cases each entity has its own address.
businessInfo Name, type and other information about the business entity.

Example

The following example shows a businessesAtLocation element in the Location Recognition API response.

"businessesAtLocation": [
{
              "businessAddress": {
                "latitude": 47.6427448210338,
                "longitude": -122.12949670889715,
                "addressLine": "1 Microsoft Way",
                "locality": "Redmond",
                "adminDivision": "WA",
                "countryIso2": "US",
                "postalCode": "98052",
                "formattedAddress": "1 Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052, US"
              },
              "businessInfo": {
                "id": "873x2278110160718493824",
                "entityName": "Microsoft",
                "url": "https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/",
                "phone": "(425) 882-8080",
                "typeId": 91600,
                "otherTypeIds": [
                  91046,
                  90100
                ],
                "type": "IndustrialStructure",
                "otherTypes": [
                  "Information Technology Companies",
                  "B2B Business Services",
                  "Business-to-Business"
                ]
              }
}

Business Address

A businessAddress element contains the following fields.

Field Name Description
latitude,longitude Latitude and longitude of the business or location.

Note that business locations are approximate and aren't guaranteed to be accurate.

Note

For the other fields in business address refer to Location and Area Types.

Business Information

A businessInfo element contains the following fields.

Field Name Description
entityName Name of the business entity.
url Website URL of the business entity.
phone Phone number of the business entity.
type Type of business entity representing the primary nature of business of the entity. Refer to the Business Entity Types list for a full list of supported types.
otherTypes List of types that represent the secondary nature of business of the entity.

Business Entity Types

The list of supported entity types.

  • Arts & entertainment
  • Automotive
  • Banking & finance
  • Beauty & spa
  • Business-to-business
  • Education
  • Food & drink
  • Government
  • Healthcare
  • News & media
  • Professional services
  • Real estate
  • Religion
  • Retail
  • Sports & recreation
  • Travel

Note

Granular categories are available under these top-level categories (e.g. different cuisines are available under ‘restaurants’ which itself is under ‘Food & drink’).

Natural Points of Interest at Location

Natural entities like beaches, etc., are placed in the naturalPOIAtLocation element. Each natural entity has the following fields.

Field Name Description
entityName Name of the natural entity or point of interest.
latitude,longitude Location coordinates of the entity.
type Type of natural entity. See the following list of supported types.

The complete list of supported natural entity types.

  • Bay
  • Beach
  • Canal
  • Forest
  • Island
  • Lake
  • Mountain
  • Plateau
  • Reserve
  • River
  • Sea
  • Valley