MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API

Name: MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API
Brand: MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API
Availability: InStock

★ Only Publicly Available OpenAPI DocumentData EnrichmentAddress Validationbasic3 EndpointsREST

For Agents

Install Jentic One Beta

Connect the MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API to your agent

Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API, or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.

Two steps, two machines. Install the instance in a safe environment, then register your agent from wherever it runs.

Step 1: Jentic One Host machine

# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh

Step 2: Agent machine

# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh
jentic register       # connects your agent to your Jentic One instance

Jentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.

Capabilities

What an agent can do with MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API.

Resolve country, continent, and registered country for an IPv4 or IPv6 address

Return city-level data including postal code, latitude, longitude, and time zone

Surface insights data such as user type, autonomous system number, and ISP

GET STARTED

Start building with MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API

Explore with Jentic

View OpenAPI Document

Use Cases

Patterns agents use MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API for, with concrete tasks.

★ Fraud Screening on Sign-Up

Score new account sign-ups by enriching the request IP with MaxMind insights data before the account is provisioned. The /insights/{ipAddress} endpoint returns user type (residential, hosting, anonymous proxy), ISP, and connection type, which feeds a rules engine to flag high-risk registrations. Combined with email and device signals, this is a standard layer of defence against bot and synthetic-identity fraud.

Call GET /insights/198.51.100.42, parse the user_type and traits.is_anonymous fields, and return 'high_risk' if user_type is 'hosting' or is_anonymous is true.

Content Localisation

Serve currency, language, and pricing variants tailored to the visitor's country without requiring an explicit selection. The /country/{ipAddress} endpoint returns ISO country codes that drive localisation rules, with /me as the address parameter when the lookup is for the current client. Latency is low enough to run in line with the initial page render.

Call GET /country/me, read the country.iso_code field, and choose between USD, EUR, and GBP pricing based on the result.

Session and Log Enrichment

Enrich web server logs and analytics events with city-level geographic data so analysts can break down traffic by region without storing raw IPs in their warehouse. The /city/{ipAddress} endpoint returns city, subdivisions, postal code, and approximate coordinates, which can be appended to events at ingest time. This satisfies regional reporting needs while keeping the underlying IP out of downstream BI tools.

For each IP in a batch of 100 log lines, call GET /city/{ip} and append city.names.en, postal.code, and country.iso_code to the corresponding event.

AI Agent for Suspicious Login Triage

Build an agent that, when alerted to a suspicious login, fetches MaxMind insights for the source IP, compares it to the user's historical countries and ISPs, and posts a triage summary back to the security channel. The agent searches Jentic for 'IP risk lookup', loads the insights schema, and executes the call with the IP in question. The result is a faster human-in-the-loop decision on whether to force a password reset.

For IP 203.0.113.7 from a login by user_id 42, call GET /insights/203.0.113.7, then return a one-paragraph summary noting country, ISP, anonymous-proxy flag, and whether the country differs from the user's last 90-day login history.

Key Endpoints

3 endpoints — maxmind's geoip and geolite web services return ip geolocation intelligence for any ipv4 or ipv6 address, including country, city, postal code, asn, isp, and risk insights.

METHOD

PATH

DESCRIPTION

GET

/country/{ipAddress}

Look up country and continent for an IP

GET

/city/{ipAddress}

Look up city, postal code, and coordinates

GET

/insights/{ipAddress}

Look up ISP, ASN, user type, and risk traits

GET

/country/{ipAddress}

Look up country and continent for an IP

GET

/city/{ipAddress}

Look up city, postal code, and coordinates

GET

/insights/{ipAddress}

Look up ISP, ASN, user type, and risk traits

Why Jentic?

Three things that make agents converge on Jentic-routed access.

Credential isolation

Your MaxMind account ID and license key are stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and combined into a Basic auth header at execution time. The license key never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context.

Intent-based discovery

Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'look up the risk score for an IP address', and Jentic returns the matching MaxMind operation, country, city, or insights, with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs.

Time to first call

Related APIs

Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.

Alternative

ipstack

IP geolocation API with a free tier and similar country/city/insights split

Choose ipstack when the agent needs a single-call response with country and city in one shot, or when you want a free tier without setting up a MaxMind subscription.

Alternative

ipapi

Lightweight IP geolocation with REST and JSONP support

Choose ipapi for very simple country and city lookups when MaxMind insights data is not required.

Alternative

Abstract IP Geolocation

IP geolocation as one of a suite of data-validation APIs

Choose Abstract when the agent already uses other Abstract APIs (email validation, phone validation) and wants to consolidate vendor relationships.

FAQs

Specific to using MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API through Jentic.

What authentication does the MaxMind GeoIP API use?

HTTP Basic authentication with the MaxMind account ID as the username and the license key as the password. Through Jentic, the credentials are stored in your Jentic One instance and attached to outbound requests at execution time, so the license key never enters the agent's context.

Can I detect anonymous proxies with the MaxMind API?

Yes, via the /insights/{ipAddress} endpoint. The response includes traits.is_anonymous, traits.is_anonymous_proxy, traits.is_hosting_provider, and traits.user_type, which together let you flag VPNs, Tor exits, and datacentre IPs that often correlate with fraudulent traffic.

What are the rate limits for the MaxMind GeoIP API?

MaxMind enforces request limits based on your subscription quota rather than a per-second cap; you draw down a pool of queries purchased in advance. Responses include headers indicating remaining queries on your account. The free GeoLite tier on geolite.info is more strictly throttled and intended for low-volume use.

How do I look up an IP's country with the MaxMind API through Jentic?

Search Jentic for 'look up country for IP', load the schema for GET /country/{ipAddress}, and execute with the IP in the path parameter. To resolve the requesting client's IP, pass 'me' as the path value. Jentic attaches the Basic auth header automatically.

What is the difference between GeoIP and GeoLite?

Both use the same v2.1 endpoint shape but are served from different hosts: geoip.maxmind.com is the paid, higher-accuracy service; geolite.info hosts the free, less precise GeoLite2 data. The agent points at the correct base URL depending on which subscription is in use.

Can the MaxMind API return latitude and longitude?

Yes, via the /city/{ipAddress} and /insights/{ipAddress} endpoints. The location object includes latitude, longitude, and accuracy_radius (in km). Coordinates are estimates derived from the IP block, not the device GPS, so accuracy is city-level at best.

Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the MaxMind GeoIP Web Services API?

Yes. Because you run Jentic One yourself, your own rules decide which MaxMind operations your agent may call and which credentials it may use, so you can allow only a country lookup while blocking the more detailed city or insights operations. The IP address is passed per request rather than being a stored resource you own, so the agent can only read data for the specific address it queries. Since all three endpoints, GET /country, GET /city, and GET /insights, are read-only, the agent enriches your data without any write access to your MaxMind account.