What is Bing Local Business Search?

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Warning

On October 30, 2020, the Bing Search APIs moved from Azure AI services to Bing Search Services. This documentation is provided for reference only. For updated documentation, see the Bing search API documentation. For instructions on creating new Azure resources for Bing search, see Create a Bing Search resource through the Azure Marketplace.

The Bing Local Business Search API is a RESTful service that enables your applications to find information about local businesses based on search queries. For example, q=<business-name> in Redmond, Washington, or q=Italian restaurants near me.

Features

Feature Description
Find local businesses and locations The Bing Local Business Search API gets localized results from a query. Results include a URL for the business's website and display text, phone number, and geographical location, including: GPS coordinates, city, street address
Filter local results with geographic boundaries Add coordinates as search parameters to limit results to a specific geographic area, specified by either a circular area or square bounding box.
Filter local business results by category Search for local business results by category. This option uses reverse IP location or GPS coordinates of the caller to return localized results in various categories of business.

Workflow

Call the Bing Local Business Search API from any programming language that can make HTTP requests and parse JSON responses. This service is accessible using the REST API.

  1. Create an Azure AI services API account with access to the Bing Search APIs. If you don't have an Azure subscription, you can create a free account.
  2. URL encode your search terms for the q="" query parameter. For example, q=nearby+restaurant or q=nearby%20restaurant. Set pagination as well, if needed.
  3. Send a request to the Bing Local Business Search API
  4. Parse the JSON response

Note

Currently, Local Business Search:

  • Only supports only the en-US market.
  • Does not support Bing Autosuggest.

Next steps