Elevation Service

  • This example demonstrates how to use the ElevationService to display the elevation of a clicked point on a map.

  • It uses an infowindow to show the elevation at the clicked location, retrieved using the getElevationForLocations method.

  • The sample code is provided in both TypeScript and JavaScript, with the JavaScript compiled from the TypeScript.

  • Users can click on the map to see the elevation at the clicked point, and error handling is included in case the service fails.

  • The HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code snippets are provided, along with options to try the sample in JSFiddle or Google Cloud Shell.

This example demonstrates the use of the ElevationService object. Click on the map to display the elevation at the clicked point. Read the documentation.

TypeScript

function initMap(): void {
  const map = new google.maps.Map(
    document.getElementById("map") as HTMLElement,
    {
      zoom: 8,
      center: { lat: 63.333, lng: -150.5 }, // Denali.
      mapTypeId: "terrain",
    }
  );
  const elevator = new google.maps.ElevationService();
  const infowindow = new google.maps.InfoWindow({});

  infowindow.open(map);

  // Add a listener for the click event. Display the elevation for the LatLng of
  // the click inside the infowindow.
  map.addListener("click", (event) => {
    displayLocationElevation(event.latLng, elevator, infowindow);
  });
}

function displayLocationElevation(
  location: google.maps.LatLng,
  elevator: google.maps.ElevationService,
  infowindow: google.maps.InfoWindow
) {
  // Initiate the location request
  elevator
    .getElevationForLocations({
      locations: [location],
    })
    .then(({ results }) => {
      infowindow.setPosition(location);

      // Retrieve the first result
      if (results[0]) {
        // Open the infowindow indicating the elevation at the clicked position.
        infowindow.setContent(
          "The elevation at this point <br>is " +
            results[0].elevation +
            " meters."
        );
      } else {
        infowindow.setContent("No results found");
      }
    })
    .catch((e) =>
      infowindow.setContent("Elevation service failed due to: " + e)
    );
}

declare global {
  interface Window {
    initMap: () => void;
  }
}
window.initMap = initMap;
index.ts

JavaScript

function initMap() {
  const map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map"), {
    zoom: 8,
    center: { lat: 63.333, lng: -150.5 }, // Denali.
    mapTypeId: "terrain",
  });
  const elevator = new google.maps.ElevationService();
  const infowindow = new google.maps.InfoWindow({});

  infowindow.open(map);
  // Add a listener for the click event. Display the elevation for the LatLng of
  // the click inside the infowindow.
  map.addListener("click", (event) => {
    displayLocationElevation(event.latLng, elevator, infowindow);
  });
}

function displayLocationElevation(location, elevator, infowindow) {
  // Initiate the location request
  elevator
    .getElevationForLocations({
      locations: [location],
    })
    .then(({ results }) => {
      infowindow.setPosition(location);
      // Retrieve the first result
      if (results[0]) {
        // Open the infowindow indicating the elevation at the clicked position.
        infowindow.setContent(
          "The elevation at this point <br>is " +
            results[0].elevation +
            " meters.",
        );
      } else {
        infowindow.setContent("No results found");
      }
    })
    .catch((e) =>
      infowindow.setContent("Elevation service failed due to: " + e),
    );
}

window.initMap = initMap;
index.js

CSS

/* 
 * Always set the map height explicitly to define the size of the div element
 * that contains the map. 
 */
#map {
  height: 100%;
}

/* 
 * Optional: Makes the sample page fill the window. 
 */
html,
body {
  height: 100%;
  margin: 0;
  padding: 0;
}

style.css

HTML

<html>
  <head>
    <title>Elevation Service</title>

    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="./style.css" />
    <script type="module" src="./index.js"></script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <div id="map"></div>

    <!-- 
      The `defer` attribute causes the script to execute after the full HTML
      document has been parsed. For non-blocking uses, avoiding race conditions,
      and consistent behavior across browsers, consider loading using Promises. See
      https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/load-maps-js-api
      for more information.
      -->
    <script
      src="https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/js?key=AIzaSyB41DRUbKWJHPxaFjMAwdrzWzbVKartNGg&callback=initMap&v=weekly"
      defer
    ></script>
  </body>
</html>
index.html

Try Sample

Clone Sample

Git and Node.js are required to run this sample locally. Follow these instructions to install Node.js and NPM. The following commands clone, install dependencies and start the sample application. 

  git clone -b sample-elevation-simple https://github.com/googlemaps/js-samples.git
  cd js-samples
  npm i
  npm start

Other samples can be tried by switching to any branch beginning with sample-SAMPLE_NAME. 

  git checkout sample-SAMPLE_NAME
  npm i
  npm start