[javascript] Get city name using geolocation

I managed to get the user's latitude and longitude using HTML-based geolocation.

//Check if browser supports W3C Geolocation API
if (navigator.geolocation) {
    navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(successFunction, errorFunction);
} 
//Get latitude and longitude;
function successFunction(position) {
    var lat = position.coords.latitude;
    var long = position.coords.longitude;
}

I want to display the city name, it seems the only way to get it is to use a reverse geolocation API. I read Google's documentation for reverse geolocation but I don't know how to get the output on my site.

I don't know how to go use this: "http://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?latlng='+lat+','+long+'&sensor=true" to display the city name on the page.

How can I achieve this?

This question is related to javascript html geolocation

The answer is


You can get the name of the city, country, street name and other geodata using the Google Maps Geocoding API

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <title></title>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-2.2.3.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
    <script type="text/javascript">
        navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(success, error);

        function success(position) {
            console.log(position.coords.latitude)
            console.log(position.coords.longitude)

            var GEOCODING = 'https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?latlng=' + position.coords.latitude + '%2C' + position.coords.longitude + '&language=en';

            $.getJSON(GEOCODING).done(function(location) {
                console.log(location)
            })

        }

        function error(err) {
            console.log(err)
        }
    </script>
</body>
</html>

and to display this data on the page using jQuery

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <title></title>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-2.2.3.js"></script>
</head>
<body>

    <p>Country: <span id="country"></span></p>
    <p>State: <span id="state"></span></p>
    <p>City: <span id="city"></span></p>
    <p>Address: <span id="address"></span></p>

    <p>Latitude: <span id="latitude"></span></p>
    <p>Longitude: <span id="longitude"></span></p>

    <script type="text/javascript">
        navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(success, error);

        function success(position) {

            var GEOCODING = 'https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?latlng=' + position.coords.latitude + '%2C' + position.coords.longitude + '&language=en';

            $.getJSON(GEOCODING).done(function(location) {
                $('#country').html(location.results[0].address_components[5].long_name);
                $('#state').html(location.results[0].address_components[4].long_name);
                $('#city').html(location.results[0].address_components[2].long_name);
                $('#address').html(location.results[0].formatted_address);
                $('#latitude').html(position.coords.latitude);
                $('#longitude').html(position.coords.longitude);
            })

        }

        function error(err) {
            console.log(err)
        }
    </script>
</body>
</html>

Another approach to this is to use my service, http://ipinfo.io, which returns the city, region and country name based on the user's current IP address. Here's a simple example:

$.get("http://ipinfo.io", function(response) {
    console.log(response.city, response.country);
}, "jsonp");

Here's a more detailed JSFiddle example that also prints out the full response information, so you can see all of the available details: http://jsfiddle.net/zK5FN/2/


After some searching and piecing together a couple of different solutions along with my own stuff, I came up with this function:

function parse_place(place)
{
    var location = [];

    for (var ac = 0; ac < place.address_components.length; ac++)
    {
        var component = place.address_components[ac];

        switch(component.types[0])
        {
            case 'locality':
                location['city'] = component.long_name;
                break;
            case 'administrative_area_level_1':
                location['state'] = component.long_name;
                break;
            case 'country':
                location['country'] = component.long_name;
                break;
        }
    };

    return location;
}

You can use https://ip-api.io/ to get city Name. It supports IPv6.

As a bonus it allows to check whether ip address is a tor node, public proxy or spammer.

Javascript Code:

$(document).ready(function () {
        $('#btnGetIpDetail').click(function () {
            if ($('#txtIP').val() == '') {
                alert('IP address is reqired');
                return false;
            }
            $.getJSON("http://ip-api.io/json/" + $('#txtIP').val(),
                 function (result) {
                     alert('City Name: ' + result.city)
                     console.log(result);
                 });
        });
    });

HTML Code

<script src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.12.4.js"></script>
<div>
    <input type="text" id="txtIP" />
    <button id="btnGetIpDetail">Get Location of IP</button>
</div>

JSON Output

{
    "ip": "64.30.228.118",
    "country_code": "US",
    "country_name": "United States",
    "region_code": "FL",
    "region_name": "Florida",
    "city": "Fort Lauderdale",
    "zip_code": "33309",
    "time_zone": "America/New_York",
    "latitude": 26.1882,
    "longitude": -80.1711,
    "metro_code": 528,
    "suspicious_factors": {
        "is_proxy": false,
        "is_tor_node": false,
        "is_spam": false,
        "is_suspicious": false
    }
}

Here is updated working version for me which will get City/Town, It looks like some fields are modified in the json response. Referring previous answers for this questions. ( Thanks to Michal & one more reference : Link

var geocoder;

if (navigator.geolocation) {
  navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(successFunction, errorFunction);
}
// Get the latitude and the longitude;
function successFunction(position) {
  var lat = position.coords.latitude;
  var lng = position.coords.longitude;
  codeLatLng(lat, lng);
}

function errorFunction() {
  alert("Geocoder failed");
}

function initialize() {
  geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();

}

function codeLatLng(lat, lng) {
  var latlng = new google.maps.LatLng(lat, lng);
  geocoder.geocode({latLng: latlng}, function(results, status) {
    if (status == google.maps.GeocoderStatus.OK) {
      if (results[1]) {
        var arrAddress = results;
        console.log(results);
        $.each(arrAddress, function(i, address_component) {
          if (address_component.types[0] == "locality") {
            console.log("City: " + address_component.address_components[0].long_name);
            itemLocality = address_component.address_components[0].long_name;
          }
        });
      } else {
        alert("No results found");
      }
    } else {
      alert("Geocoder failed due to: " + status);
    }
  });
}

As @PirateApp mentioned in his comment, it's explicitly against Google's Maps API Licensing to use the Maps API as you intend.

You have a number of alternatives, including downloading a Geoip database and querying it locally or using a third party API service, such as my service ipdata.co.

ipdata gives you the geolocation, organisation, currency, timezone, calling code, flag and Tor Exit Node status data from any IPv4 or IPv6 address.

And is scalable with 10 global endpoints each able to handle >10,000 requests per second!

This answer uses a 'test' API Key that is very limited and only meant for testing a few calls. Signup for your own Free API Key and get up to 1500 requests daily for development.

_x000D_
_x000D_
$.get("https://api.ipdata.co?api-key=test", function(response) {_x000D_
  $("#ip").html("IP: " + response.ip);_x000D_
  $("#city").html(response.city + ", " + response.region);_x000D_
  $("#response").html(JSON.stringify(response, null, 4));_x000D_
}, "jsonp");
_x000D_
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>_x000D_
<h1><a href="https://ipdata.co">ipdata.co</a> - IP geolocation API</h1>_x000D_
_x000D_
<div id="ip"></div>_x000D_
<div id="city"></div>_x000D_
<pre id="response"></pre>
_x000D_
_x000D_
_x000D_

The fiddle; https://jsfiddle.net/ipdata/6wtf0q4g/922/


Alternatively you could use my service, https://astroip.co, it is a new Geolocation API:

$.get("https://api.astroip.co/?api_key=1725e47c-1486-4369-aaff-463cc9764026", function(response) {
    console.log(response.geo.city, response.geo.country);
});

AstroIP provides geolocation data together with security datapoints like proxy, TOR nodes and crawlers detection. The API also returns currency, timezones, ASN and company data.

It is a pretty new api with an average response time of 40ms from multiple regions around the world, which positions it in the handful list of super fast Geolocation APIs available.

Big free plan of up to 30,000 requests per month for free is available.


geolocator.js can do that. (I'm the author).

Getting City Name (Limited Address)

geolocator.locateByIP(options, function (err, location) {
    console.log(location.address.city);
});

Getting Full Address Information

Example below will first try HTML5 Geolocation API to obtain the exact coordinates. If fails or rejected, it will fallback to Geo-IP look-up. Once it gets the coordinates, it will reverse-geocode the coordinates into an address.

var options = {
    enableHighAccuracy: true,
    fallbackToIP: true, // fallback to IP if Geolocation fails or rejected
    addressLookup: true
};
geolocator.locate(options, function (err, location) {
    console.log(location.address.city);
});

This uses Google APIs internally (for address lookup). So before this call, you should configure geolocator with your Google API key.

geolocator.config({
    language: "en",
    google: {
        version: "3",
        key: "YOUR-GOOGLE-API-KEY"
    }
});

Geolocator supports geo-location (via HTML5 or IP lookups), geocoding, address look-ups (reverse geocoding), distance & durations, timezone information and a lot more features...


Here's an easy function you can use to get it. I used axios to make the API request, but you can use anything else.

async function getCountry(lat, long) {
  const { data: { results } } = await axios.get(`https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?latlng=${lat},${long}&key=${GOOGLE_API_KEY}`);
  const { address_components } = results[0];

  for (let i = 0; i < address_components.length; i++) {
    const { types, long_name } = address_components[i];

    if (types.indexOf("country") !== -1) return long_name;
  }
}

Here is another go at it .. Adding more to the accepted answer possibly more comprehensive .. of course switch -case will make it look for elegant.

function parseGeoLocationResults(result) {
    const parsedResult = {}
    const {address_components} = result;

    for (var i = 0; i < address_components.length; i++) {
        for (var b = 0; b < address_components[i].types.length; b++) {
            if (address_components[i].types[b] == "street_number") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.street_number = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "route") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.street_name = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "sublocality_level_1") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.sublocality_level_1 = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "sublocality_level_2") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.sublocality_level_2 = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "sublocality_level_3") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.sublocality_level_3 = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "neighborhood") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.neighborhood = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "locality") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.city = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "administrative_area_level_1") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.state = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }

            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "postal_code") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.zip = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
            else if (address_components[i].types[b] == "country") {
                //this is the object you are looking for
                parsedResult.country = address_components[i].long_name;
                break;
            }
        }
    }
    return parsedResult;
}

_x000D_
_x000D_
$.ajax({_x000D_
  url: "https://geolocation-db.com/jsonp",_x000D_
  jsonpCallback: "callback",_x000D_
  dataType: "jsonp",_x000D_
  success: function(location) {_x000D_
    $('#country').html(location.country_name);_x000D_
    $('#state').html(location.state);_x000D_
    $('#city').html(location.city);_x000D_
    $('#latitude').html(location.latitude);_x000D_
    $('#longitude').html(location.longitude);_x000D_
    $('#ip').html(location.IPv4);_x000D_
  }_x000D_
});
_x000D_
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/3.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>_x000D_
_x000D_
<div>Country: <span id="country"></span></div>_x000D_
  <div>State: <span id="state"></span></div>_x000D_
    <div>City: <span id="city"></span></div>_x000D_
      <div>Latitude: <span id="latitude"></span></div>_x000D_
        <div>Longitude: <span id="longitude"></span></div>_x000D_
          <div>IP: <span id="ip"></span></div>
_x000D_
_x000D_
_x000D_

Using html5 geolocation requires user permission. In case you don't want this, go for an external locator like https://geolocation-db.com IPv6 is supported. No restrictions and unlimited requests allowed.

Example

For a pure javascript example, without using jQuery, check out this answer.


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