Announcing general availability (GA) for the OptimizeToursLongRunning and OptimizeToursUri endpoints in the Route Optimization API.

These non-blocking endpoints use the standard Long-Running Operation (LRO) pattern to provide higher reliability for long-running optimizations and support for large request and response payloads.

For guidance on choosing between blocking and non-blocking endpoints, see Choose an endpoint.

Feature

The OptimizeToursLongRunning endpoint is generally available (GA).

OptimizeToursLongRunning is a non-blocking endpoint designed for single optimization requests with longer solve times. Instead of maintaining an open connection while routes are being calculated, the endpoint immediately returns a Long-Running Operation (LRO) ID. You can poll this ID using the GetOperation method to monitor progress and retrieve the final optimized route (OptimizeToursResponse) directly in the operation response.

This endpoint supports medium-sized inline payloads—providing increased payload headroom over blocking OptimizeTours requests without connection timeouts—and is accessible through REST, gRPC, and Google Maps Platform client libraries. For more information, see Choose an endpoint and the OptimizeToursLongRunning reference.

Feature

The OptimizeToursUri endpoint is generally available (GA).

OptimizeToursUri is a non-blocking endpoint designed for single, large optimization requests and responses with long solve times. Input OptimizeToursRequest messages are read directly from Cloud Storage URIs (gs://...), and output OptimizeToursResponse messages are written directly to a client-specified Cloud Storage destination. The endpoint returns a Long-Running Operation (LRO) ID that you can poll using GetOperation to track status and confirm completion before reading the response from your Cloud Storage destination.

This endpoint is accessible through REST, gRPC, and Google Maps Platform client libraries. For more information, see Choose an endpoint and the OptimizeToursUri reference.

Four new experimental features are now available.

See U-turn Avoidance, Objectives, Single Non-Blocking Optimizations and Load Costs.

You can access these features through our REST and gRPC endpoints. Client libraries are not yet available.

Mitigate an issue where routes occasionally suggest a different arrival and departure location for a visit, even when the user has specified only one location for the visit request. When this issue happens, if the distance between arrival and departure locations is large, it can result in a fragmented route.

This mitigation results in smoother routes and can be visible in the API as reduced gaps in ShipmentRoute and Transition route polylines at Visit locations.

Previously, route polylines could have large gaps at Visit locations even when the VisitRequest arrival and departure locations or waypoints were set to be equal. This would generally happen when the VisitRequest location had multiple nearby roads or entrances as sometimes different navigation points would be chosen for arrival to and departure from the same location. This would result in a gap between the endpoints of incoming and outgoing route polylines for the Visit.

Now, suitable navigation points are chosen for VisitRequest locations before generating route polylines so the endpoints of incoming and outgoing route polylines for Visits (with equal arrival and departure locations) are likely to be closer together.

You can now generate route tokens using the Route Optimization API. Pass a route token to the Navigation SDK to guide how it routes your vehicle. For details, see Transition Polylines and Route Tokens.

Fixed an issue where duplicate GcsDestination uris (which represent output files for the optimization responses) were accepted in BatchOptimizeToursRequest AsyncModelConfigs for the BatchOptimizeTours API. Now GcsDestination uris must be unique across all BatchOptimizeToursRequest AsyncModelConfigs in a single BatchOptimizeTours API call. This is desirable behavior to fail the BatchOptimizeTours call earlier as the call will not be able to complete successfully if enough output files are not provided.

Fixed

Fixed an issue where duplicate GcsSource uris (which represent input files for the optimization requests) were accepted in BatchOptimizeToursRequest AsyncModelConfigs for the BatchOptimizeTours API. Now GcsSource uris must be unique across all BatchOptimizeToursRequest AsyncModelConfigs in a single BatchOptimizeTours API call. This is desirable behavior to avoid processing the same request twice in case of accidental input duplication.

Route Optimization API

Announcing the General Availability (GA) release of the Route Optimization API.

The Route Optimization API assigns tasks and routes to a vehicle fleet, optimizing against the objectives and constraints that you supply for your transportation goals.

If you are a new user, see Set up your Google Cloud project to start the development process.