Formatting your spreadsheet

Step by step guide to formatting your spreadsheet for geocoding

1. DO upload only spreadsheets in a supported file format

   The file needs to be a format we support.

   Good: addresses.xlsx

   Not Good: addresses.pdf

   Not Good: addresses.doc

   We support the following file types: .csv, .ods, .tsv, .txt, .xls, .xlsx

2. DO add a header row

   Use the first row of the file to tell us what the columns mean so we don't have to guess.

   Good:

   id, latitude, longitude
   1, 52.3877830, 9.7334394
   2, 51.522664, -0.102534
   

   Not Good:

   1, 52.3877830, 9.7334394
   2, 51.522664, -0.102534
   

   Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   2, "82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom"
   

   Not Good:

   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   2, "82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom"
   

3. DO ensure your file obeys the row limits

   Free trial accounts can geocode spreadsheets of up to 100 rows.

   Subscription customers can geocode spreadsheets up to 10,000 rows.

   One-time customers can geocode spreadsheets up to the number of requests the have remaining or 10,000 rows.

4. DO ensure your file obeys the file size limits

   Files can be at most 10 MB.

5. DO put the address in a single column

   When forward geocoding, ideally you should put the entire address into a single column to reduce the chance we make a mistake when assembling the address pieces.

   Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   2, "82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom"
   

   Less Good:

   id, street, postcode, city, country
   1, Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165, Hanover, Germany
   2, 82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom
   

6. DO follow our advice for formatting the address

   We do much better if you can follow our query formatting guidelines, for example things like telling us which country the address is in.

   Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   2, "82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom"
   

   Not Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165"
   2, "123 Main Street, 81003"
   

7. DO put coordinates in separate columns

   When reverse geocoding, you should have one column for latitude, and one column for longitude. The values should be in decimal format.

   Good:

   id, latitude, longitude
   1, 52.3877830, 9.7334394
   2, 51.5226742, -0.1025238
   

   Not Good:

   id, coordinates
   1, "52.3877830, 9.7334394"
   2, "51.5226742, -0.1025238"
   

   Not Good:

   id, latitude, longitude
   1, 52° 23' 16.01880'' N, 9° 44' 0.38184'' E
   2, 51° 31' 21.62712'' N, 0° 6' 9.08568'' E
   

8. DO remove duplicate lines

   Each line counts as an API request.

   Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   2, "82 Clerkenwell Road, London, EC1M 5RF, United Kingdom"
   

   Not Good:

   id, address
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"
   1, "Philipsbornstraße 2, 30165 Hanover, Germany"