Location AR

What is the cost of Niantic VPS for Web?

Niantic VPS for Web offers a generous free tier, allowing developers to make up to 25,000 calls per month without any charges. Once a developer exceeds this limit, they will be billed starting from their 25,001st call at the following rates:
From
VPS usage is billed monthly, with your usage resetting at the start of each billing period. This allows you to scale your WebAR experiences as needed while only paying for the calls that exceed the free tier.

What is the cost of Niantic VPS for Web on the Basic plan?
The Basic plan includes up to 25,000 VPS calls for free each month. After the free tier is exceeded, users will be billed at $10 per 1,000 calls up to 100,000 calls, with discounts available for higher usage tiers.

What is the cost of Niantic VPS for Web on the Pro plan?
The Pro plan offers the same pricing structure for VPS calls as the Basic plan: 25,000 free calls per month, with tiered pricing starting at $10 per 1,000 calls beyond that. Additional features like Private VPS may also incur costs.

How is usage calculated and billed?
VPS calls are calculated based on the number of successful calls to the VPS server. Calls are calculated across the workspace. You are billed monthly, and your usage resets at the start of each new billing period.

Do I need to enter payment information to access the free tier?
No, you can start building with Niantic VPS for Web without entering any payment information. You will only need to provide payment details if you exceed 25,000 calls in a month.

What is Niantic Map?

Niantic Map is our third-generation, 3D map that enables machines to determine their precise position and orientation in the world. It consists of many petabytes of geospatial data that are used by Lightship VPS to precisely orient (localize) users in their physical space. VPS uses computer vision algorithms to compare the scene in front of the user’s camera to location data stored in Niantic Map. This is the glue that binds the physical world to the digital world, making highly immersive location-based AR possible.

How does Niantic VPS work?

When a device makes a call to the VPS service, the service receives a query image from the user’s device along with their rough location (from GPS) as inputs and attempts to localize them using the map(s) that exist at that location on Niantic Map. If localization is successful, then the service returns the device’s position and orientation (pose) corresponding with the timestamp of the image that was transmitted. Because there is a time delay between when a VPS query image is captured and when a response is received from the VPS service, the device needs to have a motion tracking system in order to stay accurately localized while moving. When the VPS service returns a pose estimate to the device, the difference in pose from the device’s tracking system is added to the localization response so that VPS can “keep up” with how the device moved while waiting for the server’s response to the VPS query.

What is a scan?

AR scans from players, developers, and surveyors are the fundamental ingredient that Niantic uses to build its AR map of the world. AR scans are recorded and uploaded using Niantic's AR scanning framework, which is a module used inside Pokemon Go, Ingress, and the Wayfarer App. Each AR scan consists of a series of video frames with supporting data from accelerometers and GPS sensors that construct a 3D model of the world from multiple 2D images. AR scans are used by Niantic to build the maps and meshes of real-world locations that make up Niantic Map.

Where can I use Niantic VPS?

VPS is available at nearly 1 million real-world locations on Niantic Map, with more locations being added every day. Developers can scan locations at any time to add them to Niantic Map and enable VPS-powered experiences at them.

In order for a location to be available on VPS, a sufficient amount of AR scan data must be uploaded at that location and VPS activation must be requested and completed. Developers can see the activation status of locations in the Geospatial Browser.

How do I request VPS activation of a new location?

Once a location has enough scans uploaded to meet the VPS activation requirements (at least 10 total scans with at least a 5-hour time difference between the oldest and newest scans), developers can request VPS activation by selecting the location in the Wayfarer app or the Geospatial Browser and pressing the “activate” button. This will add the location to the activation queue. Typically, an activation request is completed within 2 hours. Developers also have the option to request reactivation of an existing location once 5 additional scans are uploaded.

What are the use cases for Niantic VPS?

Niantic VPS is a powerful way to make a user’s experience of their environment more magical or to deepen their understanding of a place. Some popular use cases include:

Social real-world games. VPS lets players interact with the same persistent content in augmented reality, opening up new possibilities for location-based play as well as enhancing classic experiences like geocaching. When combined with Shared AR, developers can create AR games for up to 10 users to play together in real time.
Scavenger hunts. Developers can turn entire cities into gameboards by challenging players to locate places or items and rewarding them when VPS validates they’ve found them.
Tours. Tourism boards and community organizations can reveal the histories and secrets of their towns by using VPS to display content about a location as a user points their device at it.
Storefront activations. Retailers can transform storefronts without needing to make physical changes by overlaying augmented reality content over them, triggered for potential customers by VPS.
AR Installations. Venues and artists can decorate spaces with highly immersive creations that blend perfectly with their surroundings using VPS.
Verified location. VPS enables powerful anti-spoofing functionality that uses visual information in addition to GPS to prove that a user is at a particular location.

What is Lightship Maps for Web?

Niantic Lightship Maps for Web is a module that provides easy-to-use and customizable real-world maps to build your location-based WebAR experiences. It makes it easy to create a variety of location-based experiences like:

Create a 3D character on a map with a user's GPS location.
Create city-wide WebAR experiences, like scavenger hunts.
Teleport to any location in the world.
Visualize project VPS locations and nearby VPS-activated locations on a map.
Help users understand the distance to various locations.

How is Lightship Maps for Web different than other mapping providers?

Unlike mapping providers that started by building maps for automotive or data visualization, Lightship Maps is specifically designed for AR use cases. Maps prioritize key features critical for AR like vector-based maps for smooth zooming and panning around the map and map caching for fast loading in areas of low connectivity.

As an integral part of the Lightship platform, developers have a one-stop shop for building map-based AR experiences without the hassle of managing multiple services.

What zoom levels are supported by Lightship Maps for Web?

Lightship Maps tiles span from zoom level 0 (one tile for the world) to zoom level 17 (17,179,869,184 tiles for the world).

These features are available at different zoom levels:

0-5 | Landmass, major water bodies, country/state labels
6-11 | Landmass, major water bodies, large parks (parks, woods, wetlands), railway, highways, city/town labels
12-14 | Landmass, all water bodies, large parks (parks, woods, wetlands), railway, highway, major roads
15-17 | Landmass, all water bodies, all land use, all roads/paths

Location AR

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