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How to set up Mapbox or Google Maps for location services

This article describes how to enable location services in your marketplace.

Written by Juho Makkonen

Your marketplace may use geolocation services to help providers and customers connect. The most common use of geolocation services is to power search by location, where customers search by location to discover listings nearby. If you plan to use locations in your marketplace, you must integrate a geolocation service.

You don't need to configure a map provider to try out location services in your Test marketplace. Your Test environment already has Mapbox configured.

You can use Mapbox or Google Maps as your geolocation service provider. These must be configured when you are setting up your Live environment if you want to use location search.
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If you are not sure which one to choose, we recommend Mapbox due to its generous free tier. It also doesn't use cookies, which means it is more compatible with EU's GDPR regulation.

How to use Mapbox as your location provider

  1. Sign up to Mapbox

  2. Go the account page

  3. Locate the Default public token or, if you wish to create a new one, click + Create a token, give it a name, and make sure all Public scopes are selected. Create the token

  4. Copy the token value

    1. It should look something like pk.aRanDoMStringofLetterSaNDNumbERs

  5. In your Sharetribe Console Live environment, navigate to Integrations > Map

  6. Select "Mapbox"

  7. Paste the token into the field

  8. Press "Save changes"

You're done! Mapbox is now powering your location services.

Mapbox location services are broken up into various pieces. Your marketplace uses the following services from Mapbox:

  • Mapbox GL JS is used to render dynamic (interactive) maps, like on the search page.

  • Static Image API is used to a retrieve static image of the map on the listing page.

  • Geocoding (aka address to coordinates conversion) is used in the search bar or when inputting location during listing creation.

How to use Google Maps as your location provider

  1. Go to the Google Maps JavaScript API V3 Reference

  2. Click on the "Get started" button in the top bar, and follow the instructions to generate your key

  3. After generating your key, you need to enable certain Google Maps capabilities:

    1. Go to https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/dashboard

    2. Select the project you've created earlier in step 2

    3. At the top of the page, select "+ ENABLE APIS AND SERVICES" or select "Library" in the left side menu to to display the "API Library" tab

    4. Enable the following capabilities, or make sure they are already enabled:

      1. "Places API (New)" (Be careful not to select the legacy and now deprecated "Places API", even if still listed as available)

      2. "Maps Static API"

      3. "Maps JavaScript API"

  4. Add application restrictions to your Google Maps API keys

  5. Go back to your dashboard then navigate to "Credentials" in the left-side menu

  6. Restrict your API key to specific domains, to prevent unauthorized use that would impact your billing:

    1. Find your API key in the "API Keys" section and click on its name to open the details (or click the three-dots menu on the right and click "Edit API key")

    2. Find the "Application restrictions" section and:

      1. Select the "Websites" option

      2. In "Website restrictions", add the URL(s) at which your marketplace is available, for example https://xample.mysharetribe.com and/or https://www.example.com

      3. Save

  7. On the Credentials page, where your API is listed, on the right end side of the row of your API key, press "Show key" and copy the key (it should look something like aRanDoMStringofLetterSaNDNumbERs)

  8. In your Sharetribe Console Live environment, navigate to Integrations > Map

  9. Select "Google Maps"

  10. Paste the key into the field

  11. Press "Save changes"

You're done! Google Maps is now powering your location services.

Troubleshooting your Maps issues

If you've configured Google Maps before April 3rd, 2025, and it has stopped working, first make sure that you have enabled the new required API. You can find instructions in this article.

For a test marketplace, you don't need to change the map settings, unless you want to use your own test application. If you have issues, you can always contact the Sharetribe team to reset the settings to the default ones.

The first thing to check is to make sure that you have copied the Mapbox token or Google Maps API key correctly. If you have done that, then the issue is somewhere else. Most of the common issues are due to restriction settings in the corresponding application.

If you are using Google maps:

  • Make sure that all the needed API's are enabled:

    • "Places API (New)" (Be careful not to select the legacy and now deprecated "Places API", even if still listed as available)

    • "Maps Static API"

    • "Maps JavaScript API"

  • Make sure that your domain is included in the list of allowed domains.

If you are using your own Mapbox app:

  • Make sure all the public scopes are selected.

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