For Agents
Search Google's place database by text query, location, or autocomplete prefix and retrieve place details including address, hours, rating, and photos.
Install Jentic One Beta
Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the Places API (New), or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.
Two steps, two machines. Install the instance in a safe environment, then register your agent from wherever it runs.
Step 1: Jentic One Host machine
# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | shStep 2: Agent machine
# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh
jentic register # connects your agent to your Jentic One instanceJentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.
What an agent can do with Places API (New) API.
Search places by free-text query with optional location bias and category filtering
Find places within a radius of a latitude and longitude with type filters such as restaurant or cafe
Autocomplete place queries character-by-character for typeahead UIs
GET STARTED
Use for: Find restaurants near a given latitude and longitude, Search for coffee shops in San Francisco by text query, Autocomplete place names as a user types in a search box, Get the opening hours and rating for a specific Google Place
Not supported: Does not handle routing, geocoding-only address conversion, or static map rendering — use for searching and retrieving Google place data only.
The Google Places API (New) lets applications search for businesses and points of interest, autocomplete place queries as the user types, find nearby places by category, and fetch detailed information for a specific place by resourceName. The four endpoints in v1 cover text search, nearby search, autocomplete, and place details, with field masks that let callers control billing-relevant response size. Each Place response can include addresses, opening hours, ratings, photos, and Plus Codes drawn from Google Maps' global place database.
Retrieve a single Place resource by name with selectable fields like opening hours, ratings, and photos
Apply field masks to limit response size and avoid charges for unused fields
Bias search results to a circular or rectangular geographic region
Patterns agents use Places API (New) API for, with concrete tasks.
★ Place Search Autocomplete
Build a typeahead search experience that suggests places as the user types, similar to the Google Maps search bar. The places:autocomplete endpoint returns suggested place predictions for a partial query in milliseconds and accepts a sessionToken so each user typing session is billed as a single autocomplete-plus-details transaction. Implementations typically debounce keystrokes and forward the final selection to places:searchText or a place details lookup.
POST /v1/places:autocomplete with {input: 'mountain v', locationBias: {circle: {center: {latitude: 37.4, longitude: -122.1}, radius: 5000}}, sessionToken: '...'} and return the top 5 predictions.
Nearby Restaurant Discovery
Power a 'restaurants near me' or 'open now' feature inside a travel or delivery app. The places:searchNearby endpoint takes a circular location restriction, an array of included place types such as restaurant or cafe, and returns up to 20 ranked results per call. Field masks ensure the response includes only the fields the UI renders (for example displayName, rating, currentOpeningHours), keeping billing predictable.
POST /v1/places:searchNearby with includedTypes=['restaurant'], locationRestriction.circle.center=current GPS, radius=1500, and X-Goog-FieldMask='places.displayName,places.rating,places.currentOpeningHours'.
Travel Itinerary Enrichment
Enrich a travel itinerary by attaching ratings, opening hours, photos, and addresses to each named destination. Use places:searchText to resolve a free-form name like 'Sushi Saito Tokyo' to a Place resource, then GET the place details with a field mask for the data the itinerary card displays. A 20-stop itinerary can be enriched in a single batch of API calls in under a second.
POST /v1/places:searchText with textQuery='Sushi Saito Tokyo', then GET /v1/{place.name} with X-Goog-FieldMask='id,displayName,formattedAddress,rating,regularOpeningHours,photos'.
AI Agent Location Lookup via Jentic
Travel and concierge agents that need to ground a user's request ('book me a quiet cafe near the office') in real-world places can call the Places API through Jentic without managing API keys or field masks directly. Jentic stores the Google Cloud key in its vault and exposes one search query per intent so the agent picks the right operation in a single step.
Search Jentic for 'find places near a location', load the places.searchNearby schema, and execute it with the user's coordinates and includedTypes=['cafe'].
4 endpoints — the google places api (new) lets applications search for businesses and points of interest, autocomplete place queries as the user types, find nearby places by category, and fetch detailed information for a specific place by resourcename.
METHOD
PATH
DESCRIPTION
/v1/places:autocomplete
Autocomplete place predictions for a partial query
/v1/places:searchNearby
Find places within a radius of a coordinate
/v1/places:searchText
Search places by free-text query
/v1/{name}
Get detailed information for a specific place
/v1/places:autocomplete
Autocomplete place predictions for a partial query
/v1/places:searchNearby
Find places within a radius of a coordinate
/v1/places:searchText
Search places by free-text query
/v1/{name}
Get detailed information for a specific place
Three things that make agents converge on Jentic-routed access.
Credential isolation
Google Cloud API keys for the Places API are stored encrypted in the Jentic vault. Agents receive scoped tokens at call time so the raw API key never enters agent context or logs.
Intent-based discovery
Agents search Jentic with intents like 'find a restaurant nearby' or 'autocomplete a place name' and receive the correct Places operation with its full input schema, including field-mask hints.
Time to first call
Direct integration: 1-2 days for API key provisioning, field-mask tuning, and billing setup. Through Jentic: under 1 hour.
Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.
Specific to using Places API (New) API through Jentic.
What authentication does the Google Places API use?
The Places API (New) accepts an API key passed via the X-Goog-Api-Key header or OAuth 2.0 access tokens for server-side calls. Through Jentic the API key or OAuth credential is held in the Jentic vault and injected at call time so agents never see the raw key.
Can I get opening hours and photos with the Places API?
Yes. The Place resource includes regularOpeningHours, currentOpeningHours, photos, rating, and userRatingCount fields. Request them by adding the field names to the X-Goog-FieldMask header on the GET /v1/{name} or search calls — fields not listed in the mask are not returned and are not billed.
What are the rate limits for the Google Places API?
The Places API uses Google Cloud quotas measured in queries per minute per project. Per-call billing is based on which fields are requested via the field mask, so large field masks can hit the per-day spend cap faster. Quotas can be raised through the Google Cloud Console.
How do I autocomplete place queries through Jentic?
Run jentic search 'autocomplete a Google place query', load the schema for POST /v1/places:autocomplete, and execute it with input set to the partial text and a sessionToken to bundle the autocomplete and a follow-up details call into one billable session.
Is the Google Places API free?
The Places API is paid, billed per request with field-mask-aware pricing. Google Cloud offers a recurring monthly credit that covers a baseline volume of calls. Pricing per SKU is published at developers.google.com/maps/billing-and-pricing.
Can I search for places only within a specific country or region?
Yes. Both places:searchText and places:autocomplete accept a locationRestriction (rectangle or circle) and includedRegionCodes to constrain results to specific countries. places:searchNearby requires a circular locationRestriction with a center coordinate and radius.