A Leap Forward in Location Intelligence
We’re thrilled to unveil the public preview of Azure Maps Geocode Autocomplete API, a powerful REST service designed to modernize and elevate autocomplete capabilities across Microsoft’s mapping platforms.
If you’ve ever started typing an address into a search bar and immediately seen a list of relevant suggestions—whether it’s for a landmark, or your own home—you’ve already experienced the convenience of autocomplete. What’s less obvious is just how complex it is to deliver those suggestions quickly, accurately, and in a format that modern applications can use. That’s exactly the challenge this new API is designed to solve.
Why Autocomplete Matters More Than Ever
The Azure Maps Geocode Autocomplete API is the natural successor to the Bing Maps Autosuggest REST API, designed to meet the growing demand for intelligent, real-time location suggestions across a wide range of applications. It’s an ideal solution for developers who need reliable and scalable autocomplete functionality—whether for small business websites or large-scale enterprise systems. Key use cases include:
- Store locators: When a customer starts typing “New Yo…” into store locator, autocomplete instantly suggests “New York, N.Y.” With just a click, the map centers on the right location—making it fast and effortless to find the nearest branch.
- Rideshare or dispatching platforms: A rideshare driver needs to pick up a passenger at “One Microsoft Way.” Instead of typing out the full address, the driver starts entering “One Micro…” and the app instantly offers the correct road segment in Redmond, Washington.
- Delivery services: A delivery app can limit suggestions to postal codes within a specific region, ensuring the addresses customers choose are deliverable and reducing the risk of failed shipments
- Any Web UIs requiring location input: From real estate search to form autofill, autocomplete enhances the user experience wherever accurate location entry is needed.
What the API Can Do
The Geocode Autocomplete API is designed to deliver fast, relevant, and structured suggestions as users type. Key capabilities include:
- Entity Suggestions: Supports both Place (e.g., administrative districts, populated places, landmarks, postal codes) and Address (e.g., roads, point addresses) entities.
- Ranking: Results can be ranked based on entity popularity, user location (coordinates), and bounding box (bbox).
- Structured Output: Returns suggestions with structured address formats, making integration seamless.
- Multilingual Support: Set up query language preferences via the Accept-Language parameter.
- Flexible Filtering: You can filter suggestions by specifying a country or region using countryRegion, or by targeting a specific entity subtype using resultType. This allows you to extract entities with precise categorization—for example, you can filter results to return only postal codes to match the needs of a location-based selection input in your web application.
How It Works
The Geocode Autocomplete API is accessed via the following endpoint:
https://atlas.microsoft.com/search/geocode:autocomplete?api-version=2025-06-01-preview
This endpoint provides autocomplete-style suggestions for addresses and places. With just a few parameters, like your Azure Maps subscription key, a query string, and optionally user coordinates or a bounding box, you can start returning structured suggestions instantly. Developers can further issue geocode service with the selected/ideal entity as query to locate the entity on map, which is a common scenario for producing interactive mapping experiences.
Let’s look at below examples:
Example 1: Place Entity Autocomplete
GET https://atlas.microsoft.com/search/geocode:autocomplete?api-version=2025-06-01-preview
&subscription-key={YourAzureMapsKey}
&coordinates={coordinates}
&query=new yo
&top=3A user starts typing “new yo.” The API quickly returns results like “New York City” and “New York State,” each complete with structured metadata you can plug directly into your app.
{
"type": "FeatureCollection",
"features": [
{
"type": "Feature",
"properties": {
"typeGroup": "Place",
"type": "PopulatedPlace",
"geometry": null,
"address": {
"locality": "New York",
"adminDistricts": [
{
"name": "New York",
"shortName": "N.Y."
}
],
"countryRegions": {
"ISO": "US",
"name": "United States"
},
"formattedAddress": "New York, N.Y."
}
}
},
{
"type": "Feature",
"properties": {
"typeGroup": "Place",
"type": "AdminDivision1",
"geometry": null,
"address": {
"locality": "",
"adminDistricts": [
{
"name": "New York",
"shortName": "N.Y."
}
],
"countryRegions": {
"ISO": "US",
"name": "United States"
},
"formattedAddress": "New York"
}
}
},
{
"type": "Feature",
"properties": {
"typeGroup": "Place",
"type": "AdminDivision2",
"geometry": null,
"address": {
"locality": "",
"adminDistricts": [
{
"name": "New York",
"shortName": "N.Y."
},
{
"name": "New York County"
}
],
"countryRegions": {
"ISO": "US",
"name": "United States"
},
"formattedAddress": "New York County"
}
}
}
]
}Example 2: Address Entity Autocomplete
GET https://atlas.microsoft.com/search/geocode:autocomplete?api-version=2025-06-01-preview
&subscription-key={YourAzureMapsKey}
&bbox={bbox}
&query=One Micro
&top=3
&countryRegion=USA query for “One Micro” scoped to the U.S. yields “NE One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052, United States.” That’s a complete, structured address ready to be mapped, dispatched, or stored.
{
"type": "FeatureCollection",
"features": [
{
"type": "Feature",
"properties": {
"typeGroup": "Address",
"type": "RoadBlock",
"geometry": null,
"address": {
"locality": "Redmond",
"adminDistricts": [
{
"name": "Washington",
"shortName": "WA"
},
{
"name": "King County"
}
],
"countryRegions": {
"ISO": "US",
"name": "United States"
},
"postalCode": "98052",
"streetName": "NE One Microsoft Way",
"addressLine": "",
"formattedAddress": "NE One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052, United States"
}
}
}
]
}Example 3: Integration with Web Application
Below sample shows user enter query and autocomplete service provide a series of suggestions based on user query and location.
Web UI sample shows user enter query and autocomplete service provide a series of suggestions based on user query and user location.Pricing and Billing
The Geocode Autocomplete API uses the same metering model as the Azure Maps Search service. For billing purposes, every 10 Geocode Autocomplete API requests are counted as one billable transaction. This approach keeps usage and costs consistent with what developers are already familiar with in Azure Maps.
Ready to Build Smarter Location Experiences?
Whether you're powering a store locator, enhancing address entry, or building a dynamic dispatch system, the new Geocode Autocomplete API gives you the precision, flexibility, and performance needed to deliver seamless location intelligence. With real-world use cases already proving its value, now is the perfect time to integrate this service into your applications and unlock richer, more interactive mapping experiences.
Let’s build what’s next—faster, smarter, and more intuitive.
Resources to Get Started
Geocode Autocomplete REST API Documentation
Microsoft