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So, we're looking to develop a mobile website. On this mobile website, we'd like to automatically populate a user's location (with proper fallback) based on their IP address. I'm aware of geocoding a location based on IP address (mapping to latitude, longitude and then getting the location with that information).

However, I'm curious how accurate this information is? Are mobile devices assigned IP's when they utilize 3G, EDGE, and GPRS connections? I think so. If that is so, does it map to a relatively accurate location? It doesn't have to be spot on, but relatively accurate would be nice.

Skyhawk
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StephenPAdams
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2 Answers2

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I don't think there's any real mapping between a phone's IP address and its location. If you're trying to get the location of a mobile device, why not use some kind of location API?

There's a Geolocation API for HTML 5 that you could use. I think further discussion of that kind of thing belongs on StackOverflow.

Kamil Kisiel
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  • Yeah, I was battling whether or not to post this here or there. It's just kind of a murky area. The issue with that API is that not all phones support that kind of functionality (they're really at the whim of the browser). Ideally, if I can get the user's location without an external API, that'd be awesome. That is, get the user's IP address, map it properly, and then return the location that way. I just don't know if it's possible or not. – StephenPAdams Apr 27 '10 at 04:17
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I'm an AT&T Mobility subscriber, in Ohio. While I don't routinely check the map location of the IPs that they dynamically assign me, the few times I have checked, they indicated that I was in Illinois.

I suppose that 300 miles could be "relatively accurate"... just depends on your perspective. ;)

aNullValue
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