The Problem
I was researching international relocation and found the existing
tools deeply frustrating:
- Numbeo is the gold standard but costs $260/month for API access
- Most comparison sites cover 20–30 countries at best
- Nothing gives you a personalised recommendation based on YOUR priorities
What I Built
Placemappr (placemappr.com) is a free relocation research platform:
- 95 countries with composite relocation scores
- 668 cities with weather, air quality and quality of life data
- AI-powered 6-question quiz matching you to your top countries
- Currency and live exchange rates
- Political stability ratings with context (World Bank WGI data)
- Government type, languages spoken, major religions per country
- Blog with data-driven expat guides
Everything is free. No paywalls.
Tech Stack
- Next.js 15 + TypeScript + Tailwind CSS v4
- Supabase (PostgreSQL + Auth)
- Groq API for AI matching (free tier — llama-3.3-70b-versatile)
- Vercel for hosting
- Open-Meteo for air quality (free, no API key needed)
- OpenWeatherMap for city weather
Total infrastructure cost: $0/month
Data Sources
- Country scores: WhereNext (CC BY 4.0 — World Bank, WHO, OECD data)
- Cities: SimpleMaps free database (668 cities, population > 1M)
- Political stability: World Bank WGI with disclaimer explaining the index measures physical security perception not democratic strength
- Exchange rates: ExchangeRate-API (free tier)
Interesting Technical Challenges
Token limits with Groq: Sending all 95 countries to the LLM
exceeded the 12,000 token/minute free tier limit. Solution:
pre-filter to 25 most relevant countries based on budget and
region before sending to Groq. Dropped from ~12,500 to ~3,000
tokens per request.
City data without Teleport: The popular Teleport API is now
defunct. Derived city quality scores from country-level data
with population-tier adjustments instead.
REST Countries API redirects: Returns 301 redirects that
Node.js doesn't follow by default. Replaced with a hardcoded
currency map for all 95 countries — more reliable anyway.
Revenue Plan
Currently $0. Planning:
- Google AdSense (high CPC finance/relocation category)
- Affiliate links (Wise, SafetyWing, NordVPN)
- Premium tier (detailed reports, cost alerts)
Current Status
- Live at placemappr.com
- 23/766 pages indexed by Google so far (new domain)
- Working on backlinks and content to speed up indexing
What I'd Love Feedback On
- What data would make you actually use this for a relocation decision?
- Is the AI quiz useful or gimmicky?
- What countries or cities are missing that matter to you?
Happy to answer any questions about the tech stack or data!
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