ForHosting KIT · Developer Utilities

Web Mercator meters per pixel

Web Mercator ground resolution answers a practical mapping question: at this zoom level and this latitude, how many meters on the ground does one map pixel represent?

● BetaFree · in your browser

Run — free How it works & API

Use it from WebAPIEmailTelegramApp soon

Tile servers, mobile SDKs, and GIS notebooks all need that number to size buffers, draw scale bars, pick sensible cluster radii, and convert screen distances into geographic distances without round-tripping through a full projection library. The classic formula multiplies the equatorial circumference of the WGS84 sphere used by EPSG:3857 by the cosine of latitude and divides by the number of pixels across the world at that zoom—two hundred fifty-six times two to the power of the zoom level. At the equator and zoom zero you recover the well-known constant about one hundred fifty-six thousand five hundred forty-three meters per pixel; each zoom step halves that value, and higher latitudes shrink it by cos(latitude). This capability returns meters per pixel plus helpers such as meters per tile edge and circumference at latitude so you can wire scale UI, snap thresholds, and API payloads from one deterministic parse path. Negative zoom and latitude outside the geographic range are rejected with a clear validation error instead of inventing a fake resolution.

How to use it

Enter your values in the form above. The tool checks them before calculating and shows the result on the same page.

Check your inputs

Use the labels and units shown next to each field. If something is missing or outside the allowed range, the page points to the field to fix.

Use it again or automate it

Use the browser tool for individual checks and the API when you need the same capability in an automated workflow.

What you can do with it

Get an answer now

Enter one set of values and see the result without building a spreadsheet or script.

Compare scenarios

Change one value at a time and rerun the calculation to understand what affects the result.

Automate repeated work

Use the API when the same calculation needs to run inside your product or workflow.

FAQ

How do I use this capability?

Complete the fields above and run it on this page. The form highlights anything that needs attention.

For developers — API access

Everything on this page is available programmatically. This section is for teams who want to wire it into their own systems; everyone else can just use the tool above.

API endpoint

POSThttps://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel

Prefer to automate it? One authenticated POST creates the task; the result comes back by webhook or a signed link. The same capability also runs here on the web, by email and from Telegram — and soon from our app too.

Call it from your stack

curl -X POST https://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $KIT_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"zoom":12,"latitude":0}'

const res = await fetch("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    "Authorization": `Bearer ${process.env.KIT_KEY}`,
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    "zoom": 12,
    "latitude": 0
  })
});
const { task_id } = await res.json();

import os, requests

res = requests.post(
    "https://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['KIT_KEY']}"},
    json={
    "zoom": 12,
    "latitude": 0
},
)
task_id = res.json()["task_id"]

<?php
$res = file_get_contents("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel", false, stream_context_create([
  "http" => [
    "method"  => "POST",
    "header"  => "Authorization: Bearer " . getenv("KIT_KEY") . "\r\nContent-Type: application/json",
    "content" => '{"zoom":12,"latitude":0}',
  ],
]));
$task = json_decode($res, true);

body := bytes.NewBufferString(`{"zoom":12,"latitude":0}`)
req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", "https://api.kit.forhosting.com/geo/meters-per-pixel", body)
req.Header.Set("Authorization", "Bearer "+os.Getenv("KIT_KEY"))
req.Header.Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)

Example request

{
  "zoom": 12,
  "latitude": 0
}

Example response

{
  "task_id": "tsk_a1b2c3d4e5f6a1b2c3d4e5f6",
  "type": "geo.meters_per_pixel",
  "status": "queued",
  "_links": {
    "result": "/tasks/tsk_…/result"
  }
}

The API is asynchronous: the call returns a task_id immediately and the result arrives by webhook. Polling is capped at 1 req/s per task.

Pricing

Per request$0.002

Published price — no tokens, no invented credits. A failed task is never charged.

Errors

HTTP	Code	Meaning
`401`	`unauthorized`	Missing or invalid API key.
`402`	`insufficient_balance`	Your balance doesn't cover the task price.
`404`	`unknown_type`	That task type doesn't exist.
`429`	`rate_limited`	Too many requests. Use the webhook instead of polling.

Read the full KIT documentation →

Run — free