Merchant Locator

The Merchant Locator API can be used by developers in the sandbox. To use the API in production, client must be pre-approved by Visa to use the API. The Merchant Locator API licensing agreement and approval process are available as part of Production Onboarding. Use of the service is subject to the use restrictions and other terms and conditions set forth in the applicable agreement.

Merchant Data is only available for the U.S. Merchants at this point in time.  For additional queries, contact developer@visa.com.

Visa does not make any warranty or representation as to the present accuracy or completeness of the information provided via the Merchant Locator API, nor does Visa assume any liability or responsibility for claims or damages that may result from reliance on such information.

Merchant Locator uses location to help map Visa-accepting merchants. Find the local stores and places to shop by searching for specific merchants or merchant categories within a specified distance.

The Merchant Locator API lets clients find merchants by Merchant Name or Merchant Category Code within a defined distance from a location.

Location Search

To perform the Location search, the clients can enter both the latitude and longitude of the location or the postal code in the request. When the postal code is provided, the zip centric latitude and longitude are used to calculate the distance.

Group Names Search

All  clients are assigned one or more Group Name(s) that are configured with attributes. When the clients specifies the Group Name in the request, the attributes assigned to such Group Name will be sent in the response.

Wildcard Search

The clients can use the wildcard search with the Merchant Name when the Merchant Name is not known or to search for all merchants in that location.

Max Records Per Request

The clients can use the maximum record functionality to limit the number of records returned in response to each request. When maximum record is not defined, a default of up to 25 records will be returned in the response.

Records are unique and ordered from highest to lowest match score.

Match Score

A Match Score is assigned to each record based on the number of attributes in the record that matched the original request.

All the attributes in the record that matched the request will be returned in the response.

Start Index

Records are displayed based on the starting number defined by the clients in the Start Index. The default Start Index is set to 25 records and the first response to a request will display a maximum of 25 records. To see the next set of records, the clients can set the start index to 26.