How accurate is IP-based location in miles or kilometres?

Country is right around 95–99% of the time. City-level accuracy is roughly 55–80% within about 50 km (30 miles), depending heavily on country and ISP. The latitude/longitude shown is the centre of a region or the ISP's hub, not a measured point — so the pin can land anywhere from a few kilometres to a few hundred away from where you actually are.

Is IP location more or less accurate than GPS?

Far less accurate. GPS resolves to about 5 metres; Wi-Fi positioning to tens of metres; cell-tower triangulation to a few hundred metres to a kilometre. IP geolocation is the coarsest method of all — typically city-level — because it infers location from network registration data rather than measuring your device's position.

Why does IP location show the wrong city?

The most common causes are a VPN or proxy (you get the exit server's location), mobile carrier-grade NAT (your traffic exits through a regional hub), or an ISP that registers a whole region to one billing city. The database isn't broken — it's reporting where your IP's network is registered, which often isn't where you are.

Can a website get my exact street address from my IP?

No. An IP address maps to a network, not a household. A website can estimate your city and ISP, but it cannot derive your street address from the IP alone. Exact location only comes from GPS or the browser's Geolocation API — and both require your explicit permission.

Does IP location accuracy vary by country?

Significantly. Dense, well-mapped markets like the US, UK, and Germany see better city-level accuracy because there are more probes and corrections. Countries with sparse measurement data, heavy carrier-grade NAT, or large regional IP allocations can be off by hundreds of kilometres.

June 8, 2026 · 8 min read

How Accurate Is IP-Based Location?

How close IP geolocation really gets — measured against GPS, Wi-Fi, and cell positioning — and the practical reasons your result shows the wrong city.

IP-based location is accurate to the country almost every time, to the right city roughly 55–80% of the time, and never to your street address. The coordinates a site shows are the centre of a region or your ISP's hub — not a measured point — so the pin is an estimate that can be off by a few kilometres or a few hundred. Here's how that compares to the other ways apps find you, and why your own result might look wrong.

Want the technical side — how the databases are built and what feeds them? See IP Geolocation: How Accurate Is It, Really?. This post is the practical, "how close does it get and why is mine off" companion.

The short answer, by granularity

Level	Typical accuracy	Trust it for…
Country	95–99%	Content licensing, fraud checks, language defaults
Region / state	75–90%	Coarse analytics, regional pricing
City	55–80% (within ~50 km)	"Near me" hints — with a margin
Postal code	Low / unreliable	Almost nothing — treat as a marketing radius
Street address	Never from IP alone	Nothing

See your own result on the What Is My Location tool — it now shows an OpenStreetMap pin so you can judge the gap between the estimate and where you actually are.

IP location vs the other ways apps find you

This is the key thing most people miss: IP geolocation is the least precise location method by a wide margin. The browser and OS have far better options — they just require permission.

Method	How it works	Typical precision	Needs permission?
GPS	Satellite ranging on the device	~5 m	Yes
Wi-Fi positioning	Nearby Wi-Fi networks matched to a database	~20–50 m	Yes (Geolocation API)
Cell tower	Triangulation between masts	~150 m – 1 km	Yes
IP geolocation	IP range matched to a registration database	City / region (often tens of km)	No

The practical takeaway: when a site asks "Allow location access?", that's the precise path (GPS/Wi-Fi via the browser's Geolocation API). What it knows without asking — from your IP — is the coarse estimate this tool shows. If a site seems to know your exact spot, you granted the permission; your IP didn't reveal it.

Why your result looks wrong

If the city is off, it's almost always one of these — and none of them mean the lookup is broken:

You're on a VPN or proxy. You inherit the exit server's location. Connect to a London server and you "are" in London. Confirm your real exit point with the VPN Leak Test, and see how a VPN changes your IP.
You're on mobile data. Carrier-grade NAT funnels many users through a regional gateway, so you can show up a city — or a whole region — away.
Your ISP registers a wide area to one city. Smaller or rural ISPs often map an entire region to their billing or POP city.
Your IP was recently reassigned. Databases lag reality by days or weeks; a freshly allocated block may still point to the previous holder's location.
You're behind a corporate or campus network. Traffic may egress through a headquarters in another city or country entirely.

How to check your own accuracy

Open the What Is My Location tool and note the city and the map pin.
Compare it to where you actually are. Off by a few kilometres? That's normal and expected.
Off by a city or country? Run the VPN Leak Test — a VPN, proxy, or mobile gateway is the usual explanation.
Want the precise version for comparison? Any maps app using GPS will show the real difference between measured and inferred location.

When IP location is accurate enough — and when it isn't

Good enough for: fraud and bot screening, content licensing and geo-blocking, choosing a default language or currency, and coarse analytics. These only need country or region, which IP nails reliably.

Not good enough for: navigation, emergency dispatch, delivery, or anything needing your actual address. Those rely on GPS or an address you provide — never on IP alone. That gap is a feature, not a flaw: it's a large part of why browsing doesn't broadcast your doorstep to every site you visit. For the flip side — what can be inferred from your IP — read what someone can do with your IP address.

Check what your IP reveals about your location right now — including a live OpenStreetMap pin — with the What Is My Location tool. For the database internals behind the estimate, see IP Geolocation: How Accurate Is It, Really?, and if you rely on a VPN to control your apparent location, make sure it isn't leaking with the VPN Leak Test.