super confused: geo-ip api lookup shows wrong country for *some* users, why is that?

hey everyone, so i was following up on a previous thread about geolocation issues, and i'm running into my own little problem now with my new app.

• The Core Issue: my simple geo-ip api lookup is showing the WRONG country for *some* users, but it's fine for others, which is super confusing and really impacting the overall geolocation accuracy of my tool.
• What I've Done So Far:
  • i tried two different free geo-ip api services (like ip-api.com and ipinfo.io). i thought maybe one was just bad, but both gave me similar inconsistent results.
  • i double-checked my basic javascript code where i call the api and log the result. i’m pretty sure the fetch request and parsing are correct, at least for the users it *does* work for.
  • i even asked a few friends in different locations to test, and some reported incorrect data, while others were spot on. it’s not just me seeing it.
• Specific Example of Weirdness:

  a friend in canada got identified as being in the US. here's a made-up console output i saw for similar cases:

  // example console output
  {
    "ip": "192.0.2.1",
    "country": "United States",
    "countryCode": "US",
    "region": "California",
    "city": "Los Angeles"
  }
  // but my friend is definitely in Toronto, Canada! this is where the geolocation accuracy just falls apart.
          

• My Request for Help: is there something fundamental about geo-ip api usage i'm missing as a complete noob? could it be a caching issue, or something with user VPNs/proxies that i need to account for in my code? i’m really trying to improve the geolocation accuracy for all users. any pointers on debugging this would be amazing.

thanks in advance!