I'm getting more queries that return ZERO_RESULTS with the geocoder. What's going on?
In the geocoder, ambiguous, incomplete and badly formatted queries, such as
misspelled or nonexistent addresses, are prone to produce ZERO_RESULTS.
If the address cannot be found, ZERO_RESULTS is preferable to a partial
result (for example returning only the suburb in lieu of an address).
If your application deals with user input of addresses, the
Place Autocomplete feature
in the Places API may produce better quality results.
Place Autocomplete allows users to select from a set of results based on what
they've typed, which allows users to choose between similarly named results,
and to adjust their query if they misspell an address.
I need fast responses, and the geocoder is too slow for my application. What can
I use for faster responses?
We recommend that applications that respond to user input, and therefore are highly
latency-sensitive, use the Place Autocomplete
feature in the Places API (also available in
JavaScript,
Android, or
iOS) rather than address geocoding.
Place Autocomplete is optimized to be used interactively, and thus has very low latency.
Address geocoding in the Geocoding API is optimized for use with
complete, unambiguous, well formatted addresses, such as delivery addresses entered into
online forms, and thus has higher latency than Place Autocomplete. The forward geocoder
has greater coverage and better result quality, but with somewhat higher latency.
How can I mitigate the latency on the Directions API (Legacy) and
Distance Matrix API (Legacy)?
Instead of addresses, use place IDs to
specify waypoints, origin, and destination. Place IDs are best obtained from the
Place Autocomplete
feature in the Places API or the
Places library in the
Maps JavaScript API. See also the information on the
placeIdOnly option, which can be used to reduce the cost of
Place Autocomplete.
When the Directions API (Legacy) or Distance Matrix API (Legacy)
is queried with an address string rather than a place ID or latlng, they use the same
backend as the Geocoding API to convert that address into a
place ID prior to calculating directions. Place Autocomplete is faster than address
geocoding. For applications that use the Directions API (Legacy) or
Distance Matrix API (Legacy) in highly latency-sensitive situations, such as
responding to user input, we recommended you use Place Autocomplete to get the place IDs
corresponding to those addresses, and pass the place IDs to the
Directions API (Legacy) or Distance Matrix API (Legacy).
This approach reduces latency significantly. See our documentation for an
example of how to use Place Autocomplete with directions.
The geocoder isn't producing good results for my use case. What help is available?
Let us know using our public
issue tracker, sharing a few specific queries, so we can investigate to
see if there are any bugs or systemic issues causing problems with result
quality, or if there are any changes we can make to the
best practices guide
to help developers get better results.
How do I get the best results with the geocoder using component filtering?
In the geocoder,
component filtering enforces only postal_code and
country restrictions. The following examples illustrate how best to use component
filtering, depending on the results you need. In the sample request URLs, be sure to
replace `YOUR_API_KEY` with your actual API key.
To restrict postal codes to a specific country, be sure to specify the country restriction
using an ISO 3166-2 country code.
For example:
components=country:CH|postal_code:8000 returns "8000 Zürich, Switzerland".
To restrict queries to a specific country, be sure to specify the country restriction using
an ISO 3166-2 country code. Country
names and other abbreviations may not produce the same results as country codes.
Examples:
Geocoding for components=country:FRA|locality:gallus returns
the sublocality of Gallus in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. This is because the 3-letter
country code for France (FRA) isn't supported, thus results in any country are allowed
and the result in Frankfurt is a better fit than anything in France.
Using Place Autocomplete for
input=madrid&components=country:us&types=(regions), and also specifying
a viewport using location and radius to
bias the location results, generates a response with several cities
in the USA named "Madrid".
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Missing the information I need","missingTheInformationINeed","thumb-down"],["Too complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-18 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eThis FAQ addresses questions about the Geocoding API; for general Google Maps Platform questions, refer to the Google Maps Platform FAQ.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eFor applications with user input and latency sensitivity, Google recommends using Place Autocomplete instead of address geocoding for better results and speed.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eTo improve latency with the Directions or Distance Matrix APIs, use place IDs obtained from Place Autocomplete instead of addresses.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eYou can report bugs or request features for the Geocoding API through the public issue tracker.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eComponent filtering in the Geocoding API is primarily used to restrict results by country and postal code.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,["This FAQ covers questions specific to the Geocoding API.\nRefer to the [Google Maps Platform FAQ](/maps/faq) for questions\ncommon to all Google Maps Platform. See also\n[Best Practices When Geocoding Addresses](/maps/documentation/geocoding/best-practices).\n\nTroubleshooting\n\n- [I'm getting more queries that return ZERO_RESULTS with the geocoder. What's going on?](#trbl-zero-results)\n- [I need fast responses, and the geocoder is too slow for my application. What can\n I use for faster responses?](#trbl-slow)\n- [How can I mitigate the latency on the Directions API (Legacy) and\n Distance Matrix API (Legacy)?](#trbl-latency)\n- [How do I report bugs in the geocoder?](#trbl-report-bug)\n- [The geocoder isn't producing good results for my use case. What help is available?](#trbl-help)\n- [How do I get the best results with the geocoder using component filtering?](#trbl-component-filtering)\n\nTroubleshooting\n\n\nI'm getting more queries that return ZERO_RESULTS with the geocoder. What's going on?\n\n: In the geocoder, ambiguous, incomplete and badly formatted queries, such as\n misspelled or nonexistent addresses, are prone to produce ZERO_RESULTS.\n If the address cannot be found, ZERO_RESULTS is preferable to a partial\n result (for example returning only the suburb in lieu of an address).\n\n If your application deals with user input of addresses, the\n [Place Autocomplete](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/autocomplete) feature\n in the Places API may produce better quality results.\n Place Autocomplete allows users to select from a set of results based on what\n they've typed, which allows users to choose between similarly named results,\n and to adjust their query if they misspell an address.\n\n If you have an application dealing with ambiguous or incomplete queries or queries\n that may contain errors, we recommend you use the\n [Place Autocomplete](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/autocomplete) feature\n in the Places API rather than the forward geocoder\n available in the Geocoding API. For more details, see\n [Best Practices When Geocoding Addresses](/maps/documentation/geocoding/best-practices) and the\n [Address Geocoding in the Google Maps APIs blog post](https://mapsplatform.google.com/resources/blog/address-geocoding-in-google-maps-apis/).\n\n\nI need fast responses, and the geocoder is too slow for my application. What can\nI use for faster responses?\n\n: We recommend that applications that respond to user input, and therefore are highly\n latency-sensitive, use the [Place Autocomplete](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/autocomplete)\n feature in the Places API (also available in\n [JavaScript](/maps/documentation/javascript/places-autocomplete),\n [Android](/maps/documentation/places/android-sdk/autocomplete), or\n [iOS](/maps/documentation/places/ios-sdk/autocomplete)) rather than address geocoding.\n Place Autocomplete is optimized to be used interactively, and thus has very low latency.\n\n Address geocoding in the Geocoding API is optimized for use with\n complete, unambiguous, well formatted addresses, such as delivery addresses entered into\n online forms, and thus has higher latency than Place Autocomplete. The forward geocoder\n has greater coverage and better result quality, but with somewhat higher latency.\n\n\nHow can I mitigate the latency on the Directions API (Legacy) and\nDistance Matrix API (Legacy)?\n\n: Instead of addresses, use [place IDs](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/place-id) to\n specify waypoints, origin, and destination. Place IDs are best obtained from the\n [Place Autocomplete](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/autocomplete)\n feature in the Places API or the\n [Places library](/maps/documentation/javascript/places-autocomplete) in the\n Maps JavaScript API. See also the information on the\n [`placeIdOnly`](/maps/documentation/javascript/places-autocomplete#placeidonly) option, which can be used to reduce the cost of\n Place Autocomplete.\n\n When the Directions API (Legacy) or Distance Matrix API (Legacy)\n is queried with an address string rather than a place ID or latlng, they use the same\n backend as the Geocoding API to convert that address into a\n place ID prior to calculating directions. Place Autocomplete is faster than address\n geocoding. For applications that use the Directions API (Legacy) or\n Distance Matrix API (Legacy) in highly latency-sensitive situations, such as\n responding to user input, we recommended you use Place Autocomplete to get the place IDs\n corresponding to those addresses, and pass the place IDs to the\n Directions API (Legacy) or Distance Matrix API (Legacy).\n This approach reduces latency significantly. See our documentation for an\n [example of how to use Place Autocomplete with directions](/maps/documentation/javascript/examples/places-autocomplete-directions).\n\n\nHow do I report bugs in the geocoder?\n\n: If you have any\n [bug reports](https://issuetracker.google.com/savedsearches/558483) or\n [feature requests](https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/new?component=188871&template=788905) for the forward geocoder service, let us know using our public\n [issue tracker](https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/new?component=188871&template=788906).\n\n\nThe geocoder isn't producing good results for my use case. What help is available?\n\n: Let us know using our public\n [issue tracker](https://issuetracker.google.com/savedsearches/558483), sharing a few specific queries, so we can investigate to\n see if there are any bugs or systemic issues causing problems with result\n quality, or if there are any changes we can make to the\n [best practices guide](/maps/documentation/geocoding/best-practices)\n to help developers get better results.\n\n\nHow do I get the best results with the geocoder using component filtering?\n\n: In the geocoder, [component filtering](/maps/documentation/geocoding/overview#component-filtering) enforces only `postal_code` and\n `country` restrictions. The following examples illustrate how best to use component\n filtering, depending on the results you need. In the sample request URLs, be sure to\n replace \\`YOUR_API_KEY\\` with your actual API key.\n\n - To restrict postal codes to a specific country, be sure to specify the country restriction using an [ISO 3166-2 country code](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-2). For example: `components=country:CH|postal_code:8000` returns \"8000 Zürich, Switzerland\". \n\n ```scdoc\n https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?components=country:CH%7Cpostal_code:8000&key=YOUR_API_KEY\n ```\n - To restrict queries to a specific country, be sure to specify the country restriction using an [ISO 3166-2 country code](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-2). Country names and other abbreviations may not produce the same results as country codes.\n\n Examples:\n - Geocoding for `components=country:FRA|locality:gallus` returns the sublocality of Gallus in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. This is because the 3-letter country code for France (FRA) isn't supported, thus results in any country are allowed and the result in Frankfurt is a better fit than anything in France. \n\n ```scdoc\n https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?components=country:FRA%7Clocality:gallus&key=YOUR_API_KEY\n ```\n - Geocoding API won't necessarily return multiple results for ambiguous queries. Such queries are better answered by the Place Autocomplete. Examples:\n\n - Geocoding for `components=country:US|locality:madrid` returns \"Madrid, NM 87010, USA\" but none of the other cities in the USA named \"Madrid\". \n\n ```scdoc\n https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?components=country:US%7Clocality:madrid&key=YOUR_API_KEY\n ```\n - Using Place Autocomplete for `input=madrid&components=country:us&types=(regions)`, and also specifying a viewport using `location` and `radius` to [bias the location results](/maps/documentation/places/web-service/autocomplete#location_biasing), generates a response with several cities in the USA named \"Madrid\". \n\n ```carbon\n https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/place/autocomplete/json?location=37.386052,-122.083851&radius=10000&input=madrid&components=country:us&types=(regions)&key=YOUR_API_KEY\n ```"]]
