By using CartoDB libraries and the SQL API, you can apply location data services to your maps with unique data services functions. These functions are integrated with a number of internal and external services, enabling you to programatically customize subsets of data for your visualizations. These features are useful for geospatial analysis and the results can be saved, and stored, for additional location data service operations.
**Note:** Based on your account plan, some of these data services are subject to different [quota limitations](http://docs.cartodb.com/cartodb-platform/dataservices-api/quota-information/#quota-information).
_The Data Services API is collaborating with [Mapzen](https://mapzen.com/), and several other geospatial service providers, in order to supply the best location data services from within our CartoDB Platform._
By using the SQL API to query the Data Services API functions, you can manage specific operations and the corresponding geometries (a `polygon` or a `point`), according to the input information.
The Data Services API decouples the geocoding and isoline services from the CartoDB Editor. The API allows you to geocode data (from single rows, complete datasets, or simple inputs) and to perform trade areas analysis (computing isodistances or isochrones) programatically, through authenticated requests.
The geometries provided by this API are projected in the projection [WGS 84 SRID 4326](http://spatialreference.org/ref/epsg/wgs-84/).
**Note:** The Data Services API [geocoding functions](http://docs.cartodb.com/cartodb-platform/dataservices-api/geocoding-functions/#geocoding-functions) return different types of geometries (points or polygons) as result of different geocoding processes. The CartoDB Platform does not support multi-geometry layers or datasets, therefore you must confirm that you are using consistent geometry types inside a table, to avoid future conflicts in your map visualization.
It is discouraged to use the SELECT operation with the Data Services API functions in your map layers, as these type of queries consume quota when rendering tiles for your live map views. It may also result in sync performance issues, due to executing multiple requests to the API each time your map is viewed. See details about [Quota Consumption](http://docs.cartodb.com/cartodb-platform/dataservices-api/quota-information/#quota-consumption).
The Data Services API is **recommended** to be used with INSERT or UPDATE operations, for applying location data to your tables. While SELECT (retrieve) is standard for SQL API requests, be mindful of quota consumption and use INSERT (to insert a new record) or UPDATE (to update an existing record), for best practices.
All requests performed to the CartoDB Data Services API must be authenticated with the user API Key. For more information about where to find your API Key, and how to authenticate your SQL API requests, view the [SQL API authentication](/cartodb-platform/sql-api/authentication/) documentation.
## Errors
Errors are described in the response of the request. An example is as follows:
```json
{
error: [
"The api_key must be provided"
]
}
```
Since the Data Services API is used on top of the CartoDB SQL API, you can refer to the [Making calls to the SQL API](/cartodb-platform/sql-api/making-calls/) documentation for help debugging your SQL errors.
If the requested information is not in the CartoDB geocoding database, or if CartoDB is unable to recognize your input and match it with a result, the geocoding function returns `null` as a result.
## Limits
Usage of the Data Services API is subject to the CartoDB SQL API limits, stated in our [Terms of Service](https://cartodb.com/terms/#excessive).
