Cloud-based maps styling

Google Maps Platform offers cloud-based maps styling features that make it easy to style, customize, and manage your maps using the Google Cloud Console, letting you create a customized map experience for your users without having to update your apps' code each time you make a style change.

Styles created before September 15, 2020 don't display Google Maps enhanced natural features. To use Google Maps enhanced natural features support for your map styling, you must create a map Style.

cloud-based maps styling lets you create and edit map styles for any of your apps that use Google Maps, without requiring any changes to your code once the map ID is in place. All style changes can be done in the Cloud Console, with no coding skills required. Change the appearance and color of many map elements such as roads, buildings, bodies of water, points of interest, and transit routes.

These features include:

• Cloud-based map styling: Rather than styling your map in code using JSON, manage and style your dynamic or static maps in the Cloud Console using map IDs and map styles.
• Business POI filtering: Five categories of business points of interest can be optionally removed from the map display.
• POI Density Control: The density of points of interest shown on the basemap can be adjusted to show greater or fewer points of interest by default.

While cloud-based maps styling is available on Maps SDK for Android¹, Maps SDK for iOS, JavaScript, and Maps Static API, not all features are visible on all platforms.

Before you begin

• Create a map ID
  To use Cloud-based maps styling, your map must be loaded using a map ID.
• Update from hard-coded styling Before adding a map ID to use cloud-based maps styling on an existing map that is customized with hard-coded styling, such as JSON or URL query parameters, remove the hard-coded styling to avoid a potential conflict with future features. You can import your JSON styling into a new map style.
  • On Android, update the MapStyleOptions
  • On iOS, update the GMSMapStyle class
  • On JavaScript, remove the MapTypeStyle styling
  • On Maps Static, remove the style parameter

Billing

Using cloud-based maps styling requires a map ID. On Maps SDK for Android, Maps SDK for iOS, and JavaScript, using a map ID incurs a charge against the Dynamic Maps SKU. On the Maps Static API, using a map ID incurs a charge against the Static Maps SKU.

Examples

A map ID is an identifier that's associated with a specific map style or feature. Configure a map style and associate it with a map ID in the Google Cloud Console. Then, when you reference a map ID in your code, its associated map style is displayed in your app. Any subsequent style updates you make appear in your app automatically, without the need for any updates by your customers.

1. If you are using cloud-based maps styling with an existing map that is customized with the style parameter, make sure to remove them to avoid potential conflict with future functionality.

2. To add a map ID to a new or existing map that uses one of our web APIs, append the map_id URL parameter and set it to your map ID. This example shows adding a map ID to a map using Maps Static API.

   <img src="https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?center=Brooklyn+Bridge,New+York,NY&zoom=13&size=600x300&maptype=roadmap&markers=color:blue%7Clabel:S%7C40.702147,-74.015794&markers=color:green%7Clabel:G%7C40.711614,-74.012318&markers=color:red%7Clabel:C%7C40.718217,-73.998284&key=YOUR_API_KEY&map_id=YOUR_MAP_ID&signature=YOUR_SIGNATURE" />