Esri partners with Foursquare to provide Places and Points of Interest (POI) datasets that are extracted from a comprehensive global data inventory. These datasets contain information for more than 46 million places covering approximately 170 countries and regions.
Points of Interest data are available only through ArcGIS Business Analyst and Esri basemaps. Visit Places and Points of Interest for more information.
Foursquare datasets are derived from over 14 billion consumer interactions and from numerous third-party sources, which vary by country or region. Available POI include locations such as businesses, community services, parks, and transportation hubs.
Note that some address attributes will vary in completeness. For instance, a record may be missing postal code information if it is in a country that does not use postal codes. An address may be missing if the source of the information didn't provide the address. In other cases, a feature may not be associated with a street address—examples include natural features, such as a pond or a forest; built features, such as bridges or statues; or nonpermanent places, such as street markets. Where applicable, places may also include an associated chain name, such as a franchise location.
Some dataset attribute details are available in multiple languages; this varies by country and location.
Categorization code
Details available for each POI include a place-name, country assignment, various address details, and a globally consistent Foursquare categorization code. There are ten major Foursquare categorization groups; each has a five-digit associated code. These categorization groups and codes include the following:
- Arts and Entertainment (10000)
- Business and Professional Services (11000)
- Community and Government (12000)
- Dining and Drinking (13000)
- Event (14000)
- Health and Medicine (15000)
- Landmarks and Outdoors (16000)
- Retail (17000)
- Sports and Recreation (18000)
- Travel and Transportation (19000)
The last three digits of each category code are used to provide specificity. For example, 19006 is the Foursquare category code for Travel and Transportation—Electric Vehicle Charging Station.
POI points can have more than one category code; for example, a location that is both a preschool and a daycare has category codes for both. Either category code can be used to find the location in ArcGIS Business Analyst.
NAICS
POI data also features a translation from Foursquare category to North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) for almost the entire Foursquare dataset. The NAICS values utilize the 2017 NAICS categorization.
Open confidence score
Points contain an open confidence score, indicating the likelihood that the location is open for business on a scale of low, medium, or high. This measure is based on indicators provided by Foursquare and can be used as a criteria to filter Foursquare POI data.
Vintage
January 2023.
Available geographies
Foursquare Places is a point-level dataset.
These datasets contain information for more than 46 million places covering approximately 170 countries and regions.
Update frequency
Quarterly (ArcGIS Business Analyst and ArcGIS Community Analyst, and Esri basemaps).
Methodology
Prior to publication, Esri applies a set of criteria to filter for the highest-quality locations possible from the full dataset of POI provided by Foursquare. These criteria select for POI that contain a Foursquare category, that are likely to truly exist, are likely to be open, and do not have clear spatial reference errors such as missing latitude or longitude. Records where the place-name indicates the location is closed or that contain website addresses or social media addresses are also removed.
If a POI is associated with multiple Foursquare categories, Esri converts these to a comma-delimited list for presentation in the software.
Country values are as provided by Foursquare with the exception of the Åland region of Finland; these are recategorized as part of Finland for consistency within ArcGIS Business Analyst.
Note that for structures such as college campuses, landmarks, or transportation hubs, there may be more than one point in the dataset that indicates the location. For example, an airport may have separate points for the international terminal, on-site restaurants, and parking structures. Or at a landmark such as the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, for example, there are separate POI points indicating the main structure, the Burj Khalifa Lake, and the Dubai Fountain. Esri does not de-duplicate POI data received from Foursquare.
Sample reports
- What's in my Community sample POI report
Field attribution
| Field name | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
Name | Name associated with POI—Can be a business name, natural feature name, school or public building name, and so on. | Buckingham Palace Garden |
Address | Street address associated with POI, formatted in country locality. | Buckingham Palace Rd |
(Region) | Region associated with POI; for example, state in U.S. or province in Canada. | London |
Postal Code | Postal code, if applicable for selected country. | SW1A 1AA |
Country | ISO2 abbreviation for country. | GB |
Foursquare Code | Proprietary Foursquare category code, applied to all POI globally. | 16017 (Landmarks and Outdoors—Garden) |
NAICS Code | NAICS code (2017) based on crosswalk from proprietary Foursquare category codes. | 53 (Nature Parks and Other Similar Institutions) |
Chain Name | Chain name associated with POI. | (none) |
Open Confidence Score | Estimate of how likely the location is to be open; values are low, medium, and high. | high |
Source | Always Foursquare. | Foursquare |
Esri PID | Unique identifier of Foursquare POI, generated by Esri. Perpetual over time. | 438b3df3d5b039e52d9e88b17c902519 |
Variable lists
The following lists are available:
Data availability
Foursquare POI locations data is available in various products including the following:
- ArcGIS Business Analyst and ArcGIS Community Analyst Standard License—Conduct a business and facilities search; use search results in the Nearby Restaurants standard infographic.
- ArcGIS Business Analyst and ArcGIS Community Analyst Standard License—All capabilities Void Analysis workflow; build custom infographics using the Nearby location panel.
For information about purchasing EsriDemographics data as stand-alone datasets, contact datasales@esri.com.