Place Autocomplete (Experimental)

Welcome to the experimental release for the new improved Place Autocomplete. Autocomplete is a feature of the Places library in the Maps JavaScript API. You can use autocomplete to give your applications the type-ahead-search behavior of the Google Maps search field. The autocomplete service can match on full words and substrings, resolving place names, addresses, and plus codes. Applications can therefore send queries as the user types, to provide on-the-fly place predictions.

Prerequisites

Welcome to the Place Autocomplete (New) (Experimental). To use Text Search (Preview), you must enable "Places API" on your Google Cloud project, and specify the alpha channel (v: "alpha") in your bootstrap loader. See Get started for details.

What's new

Place Autocomplete (Experimental) has been improved in the following ways:

  • The Autocomplete widget UI supports regional localization (including RTL languages), for the text input placeholder, predictions list logo, and the place predictions.
  • Enhanced accessibility, including support for screen readers and keyboard interaction.
  • The Autocomplete widget returns the new Place class to simplify handling of the returned object.
  • Better support for mobile devices and small screens.
  • Better performance and improved graphical appearance.

Add an Autocomplete widget

You can add an Autocomplete widget to a web page or a Google map. The Autocomplete widget creates a text input field, supplies place predictions in a UI pick list, and returns place details in response to a user click via the gmp-placeselect listener. This section shows you how to add an autocomplete widget to a web page, or a Google map.

Add an Autocomplete widget to a web page

To add the Autocomplete widget to a web page, create a new input element, then use that to create a new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement, and append it to the page as shown in the following example:

TypeScript

// Request needed libraries.
//@ts-ignore
const [{ Map }] = await Promise.all([
    google.maps.importLibrary("places"),
]);
// Create the input HTML element, and append it.
const input = document.createElement('input');
const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({ inputElement: input });
document.body.appendChild(pac.element as HTMLElement);

JavaScript

// Request needed libraries.
//@ts-ignore
const [{ Map }] = await Promise.all([google.maps.importLibrary("places")]);
// Create the input HTML element, and append it.
const input = document.createElement("input");
const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
});

document.body.appendChild(pac.element);

See the complete code example

Add an Autocomplete widget to a map

To add an Autocomplete widget to a map, create a new input element, use that to create a new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement instance, append the PlaceAutocompleteElement to a div, and push it onto the map as a custom control, as shown in the following example:

TypeScript

// Create the input HTML element, and add it to the map as a custom control.
const input = document.createElement('input');
input.id = 'pac-input';
//@ts-ignore
const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({ inputElement: input });

const card = document.getElementById('pac-card') as HTMLElement;
card.appendChild(pac.element as HTMLElement);
map.controls[google.maps.ControlPosition.TOP_LEFT].push(card);

JavaScript

// Create the input HTML element, and add it to the map as a custom control.
const input = document.createElement("input");

input.id = "pac-input";

//@ts-ignore
const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
});
const card = document.getElementById("pac-card");

card.appendChild(pac.element);
map.controls[google.maps.ControlPosition.TOP_LEFT].push(card);

See the complete code example

Constrain Autocomplete predictions

By default, Place Autocomplete presents all place types, biased for predictions near the user's location, and fetches all available data fields for the user's selected place. Set Place Autocomplete options to present more relevant predictions, by restricting or biasing results.

Restricting results causes the Autocomplete widget ignore any results that are outside of the restriction area. A common practice is to restrict results to the map bounds. Biasing results makes the Autocomplete widget show results within the specified area, but some matches may be outside of that area.

Restrict place search by country

To restrict place search to one or more specific countries, use the componentRestrictions property to specify the country code(s) as shown in the following snippet:

const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
  componentRestrictions: {country: ['us', 'au']},
});

Restrict place search to map bounds

To restrict place search to a map's bounds, use the locationRestrictions property to add the bounds, as shown in the following snippet:

const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
  locationRestriction: map.getBounds(),
});

When restricting to map bounds, be sure to add a listener to update the bounds when they change:

map.addListener('bounds_changed', () => {
  autocomplete.locationRestriction = map.getBounds();
});

To remove the locationRestriction, set it to null.

Bias place search results

Bias place search results to a circle area by using the locationBias property, and passing a radius, as shown here:

const autocomplete = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
  locationBias: {radius: 100, center: {lat: 50.064192, lng: -130.605469}},
});

To remove the locationBias, set it to null.

Restrict place search results to certain types

Restrict place search results to certain types of places by using the types property, and specifying one or more types, as shown here:

const autocomplete = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
  inputElement: input,
  types: ['establishment'],
});

For a complete list of supported types, see Table 3: Types supported in place autocomplete requests.

Get place details

To get place details for the selected place, add a gmp-place-select listener to the PlaceAutocompleteElement, as shown in the following example:

TypeScript

// Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results.
pac.addListener('gmp-placeselect', async ({ place }) => {
    await place.fetchFields({ fields: ['displayName', 'formattedAddress', 'location'] });

    selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = 'Selected Place:';
    selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = JSON.stringify(
        place.toJSON(), /* replacer */ null, /* space */ 2);
});

JavaScript

// Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results.
pac.addListener("gmp-placeselect", async ({ place }) => {
  await place.fetchFields({
    fields: ["displayName", "formattedAddress", "location"],
  });
  selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = "Selected Place:";
  selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = JSON.stringify(
    place.toJSON(),
    /* replacer */ null,
    /* space */ 2
  );
});

See the complete code example

In the preceding example, the event listener returns an object of Place class. Call place.fetchFields() to get the Place Details data fields needed for your application.

The listener in the next example requests place information and displays it on a map.

TypeScript

// Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results on the map.
pac.addListener('gmp-placeselect', async ({ place }) => {
    await place.fetchFields({ fields: ['displayName', 'formattedAddress', 'location'] });

    // If the place has a geometry, then present it on a map.
    if (place.viewport) {
        map.fitBounds(place.viewport);
    } else {
        map.setCenter(place.location);
        map.setZoom(17);
    }

    let content = '<div id="infowindow-content">' +
    '<span id="place-displayname" class="title">' + place.displayName + '</span><br />' +
    '<span id="place-address">' + place.formattedAddress + '</span>' +
    '</div>';

    updateInfoWindow(content, place.location);
    marker.position = place.location;
});

JavaScript

// Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results on the map.
pac.addListener("gmp-placeselect", async ({ place }) => {
  await place.fetchFields({
    fields: ["displayName", "formattedAddress", "location"],
  });
  // If the place has a geometry, then present it on a map.
  if (place.viewport) {
    map.fitBounds(place.viewport);
  } else {
    map.setCenter(place.location);
    map.setZoom(17);
  }

  let content =
    '<div id="infowindow-content">' +
    '<span id="place-displayname" class="title">' +
    place.displayName +
    "</span><br />" +
    '<span id="place-address">' +
    place.formattedAddress +
    "</span>" +
    "</div>";

  updateInfoWindow(content, place.location);
  marker.position = place.location;
});

See the complete code example

Get geocoding results for the selected place

To get geocoding results for the selected place, use google.maps.Geocoder to get the location, as shown in the following snippet:

const map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('map'), {
  center: {lat: 50.064192, lng: -130.605469},
  zoom: 3,
});

const marker = new google.maps.Marker({map});
const inputElement = document.getElementById('pac-input');
const autocomplete = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({inputElement});
const geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();

autocomplete.addListener('gmp-placeselect', async ({prediction: place}) => {
  const results = await geocoder.geocode({place.id});
  marker.setPlace({
    placeId: place.id,
    location: results[0].geometry.location,
  });
});

Example maps

This section contains the complete code for the example maps featured on this page.

Autocomplete element

This example adds an Autocomplete widget to a web page, and displays the results for each selected place.

TypeScript

async function initMap(): Promise<void> {
    // Request needed libraries.
    //@ts-ignore
    const [{ Map }] = await Promise.all([
        google.maps.importLibrary("places"),
    ]);
    // Create the input HTML element, and append it.
    const input = document.createElement('input');
    const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({ inputElement: input });
    document.body.appendChild(pac.element as HTMLElement);

    // Inject HTML UI.
    const selectedPlaceTitle = document.createElement('p');
    selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = '';
    document.body.appendChild(selectedPlaceTitle);

    const selectedPlaceInfo = document.createElement('pre');
    selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = '';
    document.body.appendChild(selectedPlaceInfo);

    // Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results.
    pac.addListener('gmp-placeselect', async ({ place }) => {
        await place.fetchFields({ fields: ['displayName', 'formattedAddress', 'location'] });

        selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = 'Selected Place:';
        selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = JSON.stringify(
            place.toJSON(), /* replacer */ null, /* space */ 2);
    });
}

initMap();

JavaScript

async function initMap() {
  // Request needed libraries.
  //@ts-ignore
  const [{ Map }] = await Promise.all([google.maps.importLibrary("places")]);
  // Create the input HTML element, and append it.
  const input = document.createElement("input");
  const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
    inputElement: input,
  });

  document.body.appendChild(pac.element);

  // Inject HTML UI.
  const selectedPlaceTitle = document.createElement("p");

  selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = "";
  document.body.appendChild(selectedPlaceTitle);

  const selectedPlaceInfo = document.createElement("pre");

  selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = "";
  document.body.appendChild(selectedPlaceInfo);
  // Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results.
  pac.addListener("gmp-placeselect", async ({ place }) => {
    await place.fetchFields({
      fields: ["displayName", "formattedAddress", "location"],
    });
    selectedPlaceTitle.textContent = "Selected Place:";
    selectedPlaceInfo.textContent = JSON.stringify(
      place.toJSON(),
      /* replacer */ null,
      /* space */ 2
    );
  });
}

initMap();

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;
}

p {
  font-family: Roboto, sans-serif;
  font-weight: bold;
}

[class$=api-load-alpha-banner] {
  display: none;
}

HTML

<html>
  <head>
    <title>Place Autocomplete element</title>
    <script src="https://polyfill.io/v3/polyfill.min.js?features=default"></script>

    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="./style.css" />
    <script type="module" src="./index.js"></script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <p style="font-family: roboto, sans-serif">Search for a place here:</p>

    <!-- prettier-ignore -->
    <script>(g=>{var h,a,k,p="The Google Maps JavaScript API",c="google",l="importLibrary",q="__ib__",m=document,b=window;b=b[c]||(b[c]={});var d=b.maps||(b.maps={}),r=new Set,e=new URLSearchParams,u=()=>h||(h=new Promise(async(f,n)=>{await (a=m.createElement("script"));e.set("libraries",[...r]+"");for(k in g)e.set(k.replace(/[A-Z]/g,t=>"_"+t[0].toLowerCase()),g[k]);e.set("callback",c+".maps."+q);a.src=`https://maps.${c}apis.com/maps/api/js?`+e;d[q]=f;a.onerror=()=>h=n(Error(p+" could not load."));a.nonce=m.querySelector("script[nonce]")?.nonce||"";m.head.append(a)}));d[l]?console.warn(p+" only loads once. Ignoring:",g):d[l]=(f,...n)=>r.add(f)&&u().then(()=>d[l](f,...n))})
        ({key: "AIzaSyB41DRUbKWJHPxaFjMAwdrzWzbVKartNGg", v: "alpha"});</script>
  </body>
</html>

Try Sample

Autocomplete map

This example shows you how to add an Autocomplete widget to a Google map.

TypeScript

let map: google.maps.Map;
let marker: google.maps.marker.AdvancedMarkerElement;
let infoWindow: google.maps.InfoWindow;
async function initMap(): Promise<void> {
    // Request needed libraries.
    //@ts-ignore
    const [{ Map }, { AdvancedMarkerElement }] = await Promise.all([
        google.maps.importLibrary("marker"),
        google.maps.importLibrary("places")
      ]);

    // Initialize the map.
    map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('map') as HTMLElement, {
        center: { lat: 40.749933, lng: -73.98633 },
        zoom: 13,
        mapId: '4504f8b37365c3d0',
        mapTypeControl: false,
    });
    // Create the input HTML element, and add it to the map as a custom control.
    const input = document.createElement('input');
    input.id = 'pac-input';
    //@ts-ignore
    const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({ inputElement: input });

    const card = document.getElementById('pac-card') as HTMLElement;
    card.appendChild(pac.element as HTMLElement);
    map.controls[google.maps.ControlPosition.TOP_LEFT].push(card);

    // Create the marker and infowindow
    marker = new google.maps.marker.AdvancedMarkerElement({
        map,
    });

    infoWindow = new google.maps.InfoWindow({});

    // Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results on the map.
    pac.addListener('gmp-placeselect', async ({ place }) => {
        await place.fetchFields({ fields: ['displayName', 'formattedAddress', 'location'] });

        // If the place has a geometry, then present it on a map.
        if (place.viewport) {
            map.fitBounds(place.viewport);
        } else {
            map.setCenter(place.location);
            map.setZoom(17);
        }

        let content = '<div id="infowindow-content">' +
        '<span id="place-displayname" class="title">' + place.displayName + '</span><br />' +
        '<span id="place-address">' + place.formattedAddress + '</span>' +
        '</div>';

        updateInfoWindow(content, place.location);
        marker.position = place.location;
    });
}

// Helper function to create an info window.
function updateInfoWindow(content, center) {
    infoWindow.setContent(content);
    infoWindow.setPosition(center);
    infoWindow.open({
        map,
        anchor: marker,
        shouldFocus: false,
    });
}

initMap();

JavaScript

let map;
let marker;
let infoWindow;

async function initMap() {
  // Request needed libraries.
  //@ts-ignore
  const [{ Map }, { AdvancedMarkerElement }] = await Promise.all([
    google.maps.importLibrary("marker"),
    google.maps.importLibrary("places"),
  ]);

  // Initialize the map.
  map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map"), {
    center: { lat: 40.749933, lng: -73.98633 },
    zoom: 13,
    mapId: "4504f8b37365c3d0",
    mapTypeControl: false,
  });

  // Create the input HTML element, and add it to the map as a custom control.
  const input = document.createElement("input");

  input.id = "pac-input";

  //@ts-ignore
  const pac = new google.maps.places.PlaceAutocompleteElement({
    inputElement: input,
  });
  const card = document.getElementById("pac-card");

  card.appendChild(pac.element);
  map.controls[google.maps.ControlPosition.TOP_LEFT].push(card);
  // Create the marker and infowindow
  marker = new google.maps.marker.AdvancedMarkerElement({
    map,
  });
  infoWindow = new google.maps.InfoWindow({});
  // Add the gmp-placeselect listener, and display the results on the map.
  pac.addListener("gmp-placeselect", async ({ place }) => {
    await place.fetchFields({
      fields: ["displayName", "formattedAddress", "location"],
    });
    // If the place has a geometry, then present it on a map.
    if (place.viewport) {
      map.fitBounds(place.viewport);
    } else {
      map.setCenter(place.location);
      map.setZoom(17);
    }

    let content =
      '<div id="infowindow-content">' +
      '<span id="place-displayname" class="title">' +
      place.displayName +
      "</span><br />" +
      '<span id="place-address">' +
      place.formattedAddress +
      "</span>" +
      "</div>";

    updateInfoWindow(content, place.location);
    marker.position = place.location;
  });
}

// Helper function to create an info window.
function updateInfoWindow(content, center) {
  infoWindow.setContent(content);
  infoWindow.setPosition(center);
  infoWindow.open({
    map,
    anchor: marker,
    shouldFocus: false,
  });
}

initMap();

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;
}

#map_canvas {
  flex: 1;
}

#pac-card {
  background-color: #fff;
  border-radius: 5px;
  box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.35) 0px 5px 15px;
  margin: 10px;
  padding: 5px;
  font-family: Roboto, sans-serif;
  font-size: large;
  font-weight: bold;
}

#pac-input {
  width: 250px;
}

#infowindow-content .title {
  font-weight: bold;
}

#map #infowindow-content {
  display: inline;
}

[class$=api-load-alpha-banner] {
  display: none;
}

HTML

<html>
  <head>
    <title>Place Autocomplete map</title>
    <script src="https://polyfill.io/v3/polyfill.min.js?features=default"></script>

    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="./style.css" />
    <script type="module" src="./index.js"></script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <div class="pac-card" id="pac-card">
      <p>Search for a place here:</p>
    </div>
    <div id="map"></div>

    <!-- prettier-ignore -->
    <script>(g=>{var h,a,k,p="The Google Maps JavaScript API",c="google",l="importLibrary",q="__ib__",m=document,b=window;b=b[c]||(b[c]={});var d=b.maps||(b.maps={}),r=new Set,e=new URLSearchParams,u=()=>h||(h=new Promise(async(f,n)=>{await (a=m.createElement("script"));e.set("libraries",[...r]+"");for(k in g)e.set(k.replace(/[A-Z]/g,t=>"_"+t[0].toLowerCase()),g[k]);e.set("callback",c+".maps."+q);a.src=`https://maps.${c}apis.com/maps/api/js?`+e;d[q]=f;a.onerror=()=>h=n(Error(p+" could not load."));a.nonce=m.querySelector("script[nonce]")?.nonce||"";m.head.append(a)}));d[l]?console.warn(p+" only loads once. Ignoring:",g):d[l]=(f,...n)=>r.add(f)&&u().then(()=>d[l](f,...n))})
        ({key: "AIzaSyB41DRUbKWJHPxaFjMAwdrzWzbVKartNGg", v: "alpha"});</script>
  </body>
</html>

Try Sample