Add a Styled Map

Select platform: Android iOS JavaScript

This page is a quick guide to styling your map, using night mode as an example.

Overview

With style options you can customize the presentation of the standard Google map styles, changing the visual display of features like roads, parks, businesses, and other points of interest. This means that you can emphasize particular components of the map or make the map complement the style of your app.

Styling works only on the kGMSTypeNormal map type.

Applying styles to your map

To apply custom map styles to a map, call GMSMapStyle(...) to create a GMSMapStyle instance, passing in a URL for a local JSON file, or a JSON string containing style definitions. Assign the GMSMapStyle instance to the mapStyle property of the map.

Using a JSON file

The following examples show calling GMSMapStyle(...) and passing a URL for a local file:

Swift

import GoogleMaps

class MapStyling: UIViewController {

  // Set the status bar style to complement night-mode.
  override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
    return .lightContent
  }

  override func loadView() {
    let camera = GMSCameraPosition.camera(withLatitude: -33.86, longitude: 151.20, zoom: 14.0)
    let mapView = GMSMapView.map(withFrame: CGRect.zero, camera: camera)

    do {
      // Set the map style by passing the URL of the local file.
      if let styleURL = Bundle.main.url(forResource: "style", withExtension: "json") {
        mapView.mapStyle = try GMSMapStyle(contentsOfFileURL: styleURL)
      } else {
        NSLog("Unable to find style.json")
      }
    } catch {
      NSLog("One or more of the map styles failed to load. \(error)")
    }

    self.view = mapView
  }
}

Objective-C

#import "MapStyling.h"
@import GoogleMaps;

@interface MapStyling ()

@end

@implementation MapStyling

// Set the status bar style to complement night-mode.
- (UIStatusBarStyle)preferredStatusBarStyle {
  return UIStatusBarStyleLightContent;
}

- (void)loadView {
  GMSCameraPosition *camera = [GMSCameraPosition cameraWithLatitude:-33.86
                                                          longitude:151.20
                                                               zoom:12];
  GMSMapView *mapView = [GMSMapView mapWithFrame:CGRectZero camera:camera];
  mapView.myLocationEnabled = YES;

  NSBundle *mainBundle = [NSBundle mainBundle];
  NSURL *styleUrl = [mainBundle URLForResource:@"style" withExtension:@"json"];
  NSError *error;

  // Set the map style by passing the URL for style.json.
  GMSMapStyle *style = [GMSMapStyle styleWithContentsOfFileURL:styleUrl error:&error];

  if (!style) {
    NSLog(@"The style definition could not be loaded: %@", error);
  }

  mapView.mapStyle = style;
  self.view = mapView;
}

@end

To define the style options, add a new file to your project named style.json, and paste the following JSON style declaration for night-mode styling:

Using a string resource

The following examples show calling GMSMapStyle(...) and passing a string resource:

Swift

class MapStylingStringResource: UIViewController {

  let MapStyle = "JSON_STYLE_GOES_HERE"

  // Set the status bar style to complement night-mode.
  override var preferredStatusBarStyle: UIStatusBarStyle {
    return .lightContent
  }

  override func loadView() {
    let camera = GMSCameraPosition.camera(withLatitude: -33.86, longitude: 151.20, zoom: 14.0)
    let mapView = GMSMapView.map(withFrame: CGRect.zero, camera: camera)

    do {
      // Set the map style by passing a valid JSON string.
      mapView.mapStyle = try GMSMapStyle(jsonString: MapStyle)
    } catch {
      NSLog("One or more of the map styles failed to load. \(error)")
    }

    self.view = mapView
  }
}

Objective-C

@implementation MapStylingStringResource

// Paste the JSON string to use.
static NSString *const kMapStyle = @"JSON_STYLE_GOES_HERE";

// Set the status bar style to complement night-mode.
- (UIStatusBarStyle)preferredStatusBarStyle {
  return UIStatusBarStyleLightContent;
}

- (void)loadView {
  GMSCameraPosition *camera = [GMSCameraPosition cameraWithLatitude:-33.86
                                                          longitude:151.20
                                                               zoom:12];
  GMSMapView *mapView = [GMSMapView mapWithFrame:CGRectZero camera:camera];
  mapView.myLocationEnabled = YES;

  NSError *error;

  // Set the map style by passing a valid JSON string.
  GMSMapStyle *style = [GMSMapStyle styleWithJSONString:kMapStyle error:&error];

  if (!style) {
    NSLog(@"The style definition could not be loaded: %@", error);
  }

  mapView.mapStyle = style;
  self.view = mapView;
}

@end

To define the style options, paste the following style string as the value of the kMapStyle variable:

JSON style declarations

Styled maps use two concepts to apply colors and other style changes to a map:

  • Selectors specify the geographic components that you can style on the map. These include roads, parks, bodies of water, and more, as well as their labels. The selectors include features and elements, specified as featureType and elementType properties.
  • Stylers are color and visibility properties that you can apply to map elements. They define the displayed color through a combination of hue, color, and lightness/gamma values.

See the style reference for a detailed description of the JSON styling options.

Maps Platform Styling Wizard
Create custom styles for the Google Maps Platform APIs

Use the Maps Platform Styling Wizard as a quick way to generate a JSON styling object. The Maps SDK for iOS supports the same style declarations as the Maps JavaScript API.

Full code samples

The ApiDemos repository on GitHub includes samples that demonstrate the use of styling.

Next step

See how to hide features on the map with styling.