Google tiles api no longer required, how does pricing work?

I see that in the 2.0 Cesium for unreal plugin, there is an option to quick add Cesium Google photorealistic tiles to a project without needing to use the api key from google directly.

How does this work regarding pricing and the request threshold?
In the past once a threashold of use of tiles had been reached they would begin charging. Do we get charged from our Cesium account once that threashold is reached now instead?
More information would be excellent since this seems like a great feature that we would utilise.

Hello -

I’m glad to hear Photorealistic 3D Tiles data is valuable to you. Currently all Cesium ion accounts include a quota of 1000 root tiles per month. If you go over, you are over on your ion account quota - not a Google Maps Platform account quota. We are using this time period to assess typical usage of this data by various account types and will not automatically charge for overage. We will consider adjusting the quotas based on what we learn.

However, if you do exceed your quota, we’ll likely be in touch about your expectations for usage and the best plan that would work for you. If you have insight into likely usage now, especially if you expect it to exceed the quota, please let us know and we’ll reach out directly to you to learn more.

And of course, we monitor for excessive use and take appropriate action if we see it.

Regards,
Lisa

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Maybe i’m missing something here…
But it looks like Google gives us 300 Root Tile requests per-day.
If Cesium Ion is giving us 1000 a month, that’s obviously a lot less than 300 a day. Is it possible to pay for a higher number of requests?

Also, is it still possible in 2.0 to use our own Google API key like we did previously?

thx-e

Hi @Eric_Carney ,

we are using CESIUM 2.0 plugin with UE5.3.2 and I’m still using my “old” Google API key, works like a charm.

Best
Andreas

Also, is it still possible in 2.0 to use our own Google API key like we did previously?

Yes, this is still possible, and works the same way it did before.

The exact quotas, as well as options for upgrading for a higher quota, will be evolving over time. Reach out to us privately if you have immediate needs or concerns.

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Thanks @lisabos and @Kevin_Ring for your clarification, that all sounds good!

Using a Cesium ion account to handle this certainly would be preferable to stock google keys in my mind. We plan on using ion as our development progresses further, so it would be interesting to see how the quota structure develops over time :slight_smile:

Its great that you have a partnership with google

You’re certainly the most powerful and accessible platform to utilise map data that ive come across. So I imagine that you already have strong communication between you.

Ive contacted google sales regarding their fee structure and they have said that economies of scale apply to pricing with their maps fee structure: the more usage the cheaper per unit pricing is. And that custom deals can be utilised if the usage is large enough. 7822/image.png?ex=6655ce68&is=66547ce8&hm=518a2eb5b620a472b22bd9e15c5e44d0d9328ab5e64d9332f7aa819f29aba821&

So perhaps an agreement could be reached that would allow ion users to have a more cost effective fee structure than stock google api plans if enough cesium users utilise ion for google api calls: then there could be some kind of arrangement reached for having the calls under the umbrella of cesium and bulk quotas are forwarded to the ion users on the behalf of google. This would be a win-win as far as I see it.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1196296495444545607/124462881237801

We have recently finished a demo for our development and are excited to continue to utilise cesium and bring it to life. When we get closer to releasing a public facing version, ill sure to be in touch with more questions :slight_smile: