Google Places Autocomplete Force Selection

The following solution did the trick for me (with jQuery). The idea is to use the blur() event to force the last selected address once the input loses focus.

We add a timeout to prevent a conflict between the blur and the place_changed events.

Consider the following html:

<input type="text" placeholder="Your address" id="autocomplete">

And the following javascript :

var autocomplete = new google.maps.places.Autocomplete(
    (document.getElementById('autocomplete')),
    {types: ['geocode']});
autocomplete.addListener('place_changed', fillInAddress);

var currentAddress = {
    line_1: "",
    line_2: "",
    zipcode: "",
    city: "",
    country: "",
    lat: "",
    lng: "",
    one_liner: ""
};

function fillInAddress() {
    var place = this.autocomplete.getPlace();
    // reset the address
    currentAddress = {
        line_1: "",
        line_2: "",
        zipcode: "",
        city: "",
        country: "",
        lat: "",
        lng: "",
        one_liner: place.formatted_address
    };
    // store relevant info in currentAddress
    var results = place.address_components.reduce(function(prev, current) {
        prev[current.types[0]] = current['long_name'];
        return prev;
    }, {})
    if (results.hasOwnProperty('route')) {
        currentAddress.line_1 = results.route;
    }
    if (results.hasOwnProperty('street_number')) {
        currentAddress.line_1 = results.street_number + " " + currentAddress.line_1;
    }
    if (results.hasOwnProperty('postal_code')) {
        currentAddress.zipcode = results.postal_code;
    }
    if (results.hasOwnProperty('locality')) {
        currentAddress.city = results.locality;
    }
    if (results.hasOwnProperty('country')) {
        currentAddress.country = results.country;
    }
    currentAddress.lat = Number(place.geometry.location.lat()).toFixed(6);
    currentAddress.lng = Number(place.geometry.location.lng()).toFixed(6);
}

$('#autocomplete').blur(function() {
    var address = $('#autocomplete').val();
    // we set a timeout to prevent conflicts between blur and place_changed events
    var timeout = setTimeout(function() {
        // release timeout
        clearTimeout(timeout);
        if (address !== currentAddress.one_liner) {
            $('#autocomplete').val(currentAddress.one_liner);
        }
    }, 500);
});

I hope this helps.

Actually, what we did was the following:
- Every time a location is picked from the Auto complete list, we populate some hidden fields with some fields coming from the JSON response (city name, country name, longitude and latitude)
- When the form is submitted, we check if these fields have values, if they don't, it means that the user instead of selecting a location from the list, he just entered a value himself.

It is not solving the problem in a JS way, but still, it does the trick just fine!

The Google Places API does not currently support this feature. If you believe this would be a useful feature please submit a Places API - Feature Request.

 <script src="http://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false&amp;libraries=places"
    type="text/javascript"></script>
<script>
    var IsplaceChange = false;
    $(document).ready(function () {            
        var input = document.getElementById('txtlocation');
        var autocomplete = new google.maps.places.Autocomplete(input, { types: ['(cities)'] });

        google.maps.event.addListener(autocomplete, 'place_changed', function () {
            var place = autocomplete.getPlace();

            IsplaceChange = true;
        });

        $("#txtlocation").keydown(function () {
            IsplaceChange = false;
        });

        $("#btnsubmit").click(function () {

            if (IsplaceChange == false) {
                $("#txtlocation").val('');
                alert("please Enter valid location");
            }
            else {
                alert($("#txtlocation").val());
            }

        });
    });
</script>