How to Set up a Custom Google Maps API Key on Your WordPress Site in 2022
Short on time? Click down to the Recap of this post for the essential bullet points of this important announcement.
As you may know, Google Maps no longer supports keyless access to their maps. Users will need to have a valid API key and enter their credit card information for all projects.
With this change in effect, according to Google, “…keyless calls to the Maps JavaScript API and Street View API will return low-resolution maps watermarked with ‘for development purposes only’.”
These changes will affect embedded map views in a number of our products, such as The Events Calendar‘s single event and venue pages and Events Calendar Pro‘s Map View. It also affects geo-lookups, which includes getting the latitude and longitude information for a venue address in Events Calendar Pro.
The Good News
The good news is that acquiring an API key is easy and that while entering a credit card is required if an API key is just used for our products, no charges will actually be made for it—the card info is just used as a way to verify your identity and prevent wanton API key generation.
You can visit the Google Maps Platform to get started on adding an API Key to your site. You can also follow along with our guide on how to set up your Google Maps API Key.
If you already have an API key, you’ll just need to update it with your billing information, which you can do over on the Google Maps Platform’s Guide for Existing Users.
🔔 Reminder: Although you’ll have to enter in your credit card information in order to obtain and/or continue using your Google Maps API key, there is a great free pricing tier so that you will not incur any additional costs.
Please also note that you can set limits on your API key usage so that you can doubly ensure you don’t get charged unexpectedly. You can check out the pricing table for more information.
We’re committed to making this a seamless transition for all of our customers who rely on this functionality. If you have any questions, feel free to hit us up!
Recap
- As of June 11, 2018, you need to add a Google Maps API Key to your events calendar for its various embedded maps to work.
- Google Maps API Keys are free and easy to set up—add yours today!
- You’ll have to enter your credit card info to obtain or continue using a Google Maps API key, but if that key is just being used for The Events Calendar and its add-ons, the free tier totally covers all the functionality you need and you will not be charged anything! You can even setup a budget with notifications.