Sending and using Bing Local Business Search API queries and responses

Article
06/26/2018

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.

You can get local results from the Bing Local Business Search API by sending a search query to its endpoint and including the Ocp-Apim-Subscription-Key header, which is required. Along with available headers and parameters, Searches can be customized by specifying geographic boundaries for the area to be searched, and the categories of places returned.

Creating a request

To send a request to the Bing Local Business Search API, append a search term to the q= parameter before adding it to the API endpoint, and including the Ocp-Apim-Subscription-Key header. For example:

https://api.cognitive.microsoft.com/bing/localbusinesses/v7.0/search?q=restaurant+in+Bellevue

The full request URL syntax is shown below. See the Bing Local Business Search API quickstarts, and reference content for headers and parameters for more information on sending requests.

For information on local search categories, see Search categories for the Bing Local Business Search API.

https://api.cognitive.microsoft.com/bing/v7.0/localbusinesses/search[?q][&localCategories][&cc][&mkt][&safesearch][&setlang][&count][&first][&localCircularView][&localMapView]

Using responses

JSON responses from the Bing Local Business Search API contain a SearchResponse object. The API will return relevant search results in the places field. if no results are found, the places field will not be included in the response.

Note

Because URL formats and parameters are subject to change without notice, use all URLs as-is. You should not take dependencies on the URL format or parameters except where noted.

{
   "_type": "SearchResponse",
   "queryContext": {
      "originalQuery": "restaurant in Bellevue"
   },
   "places": {
      "totalEstimatedMatches": 10,
. . .

Search result attributes

The JSON results returned by the API include the following attributes:

_type
address
entityPresentationInfo
geo
id
name
routeablePoint
telephone
url

For general information about headers, parameters, market codes, response objects, errors, etc., see the Bing Local Search API v7 reference.

Note

You, or a third party on your behalf, may not use, retain, store, cache, share, or distribute any data from the Local Search API for the purpose of testing, developing, training, distributing or making available any non-Microsoft service or feature.

Example JSON response

The following JSON response includes search results specified by the query ?q=restaurant+in+Bellevue.

Vary: Accept-Encoding
BingAPIs-TraceId: 5376FFEB65294E24BB9F91AD70545826
BingAPIs-SessionId: 06ED7CEC80F746AA892EDAAC97CB0CB4
X-MSEdge-ClientID: 112C391E72C0624204153594738C63DE
X-MSAPI-UserState: aeab
BingAPIs-Market: en-US
X-Search-ResponseInfo: InternalResponseTime=659,MSDatacenter=CO4
X-MSEdge-Ref: Ref A: 5376FFEB65294E24BB9F91AD70545826 Ref B: BY3EDGE0306 Ref C: 2018-10-16T16:26:15Z
apim-request-id: fe54f585-7c54-4bf5-8b92-b9bede2b710a
Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains; preload
x-content-type-options: nosniff
Cache-Control: max-age=0, private
Date: Tue, 16 Oct 2018 16:26:15 GMT
P3P: CP="NON UNI COM NAV STA LOC CURa DEVa PSAa PSDa OUR IND"
Content-Length: 978
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
Expires: Tue, 16 Oct 2018 16:25:15 GMT

{
  "_type": "SearchResponse",
  "queryContext": {
    "originalQuery": "restaurant Bellevue"
  },
  "places": {
    "totalEstimatedMatches": 50,
    "value": [{
      "_type": "LocalBusiness",
      "id": "https:\/\/cognitivegblppe.azure-api.net\/api\/v7\/#Places.0",
      "name": "Facing East Taiwanese Restaurant",
      "url": "http:\/\/litadesign.wix.com\/facingeastrestaurant",
      "entityPresentationInfo": {
        "entityScenario": "ListItem",
        "entityTypeHints": ["Place", "LocalBusiness", "Restaurant"]
      },
      "geo": {
        "latitude": 47.6199188232422,
        "longitude": -122.202796936035
      },
      "routablePoint": {
        "latitude": 47.6199188232422,
        "longitude": -122.201713562012
      },
      "address": {
        "streetAddress": "1075 Bellevue Way NE Ste B2",
        "addressLocality": "Bellevue",
        "addressRegion": "WA",
        "postalCode": "98004",
        "addressCountry": "US",
        "neighborhood": "Bellevue",
        "text": "1075 Bellevue Way NE Ste B2, Bellevue, WA 98004"
      },
      "telephone": "(425) 688-2986"
    }],
    "searchAction": {
      "location": [{
        "name": "Bellevue, Washington"
      }],
      "query": "restaurant"
    }
  }
}

Throttling requests

The service and your subscription type determine the number of queries per second (QPS) that you can make. Make sure your application includes the logic to stay within your quota. If the QPS limit is met or exceeded, the request fails and an HTTP 429 status code is returned. The response includes the Retry-After header, which indicates how long you must wait before sending another request.

Denial-of-service versus throttling

The service makes a differentiation between a denial-of-service (DoS) attack and a QPS violation. If the service suspects a DoS attack, the request succeeds (HTTP status code is 200 OK). However, the body of the response is empty.

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