This page shows you how to get started with the Document AI API in your favorite programming language.

Before you begin

  1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.

  2. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

    Roles required to select or create a project

    • Select a project: Selecting a project doesn't require a specific IAM role—you can select any project that you've been granted a role on.
    • Create a project: To create a project, you need the Project Creator role (roles/resourcemanager.projectCreator), which contains the resourcemanager.projects.create permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    Go to project selector

  3. Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  4. Enable the Document AI API.

    Roles required to enable APIs

    To enable APIs, you need the Service Usage Admin IAM role (roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin), which contains the serviceusage.services.enable permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    Enable the API

  5. Create a service account:

    1. Ensure that you have the Create Service Accounts IAM role (roles/iam.serviceAccountCreator) and the Project IAM Admin role (roles/resourcemanager.projectIamAdmin). Learn how to grant roles.

    2. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Create service account page.

      Go to Create service account
    3. Select your project.

    4. In the Service account name field, enter a name. The Google Cloud console fills in the Service account ID field based on this name.

      In the Service account description field, enter a description. For example, Service account for quickstart.

    5. Click Create and continue.

    6. Grant the Document AI > Document AI Administrator role to the service account.

      To grant the role, find the Select a role list, then select Document AI > Document AI Administrator.

    7. Click Continue.

    8. Click Done to finish creating the service account.

      Do not close your browser window. You will use it in the next step.

  6. Create a service account key:

    1. In the Google Cloud console, click the email address for the service account that you created.
    2. Click Keys.
    3. Click Add key, and then click Create new key.
    4. Click Create. A JSON key file is downloaded to your computer.
    5. Click Close.

  7. Set the environment variable GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS to the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials. This variable applies only to your current shell session, so if you open a new session, set the variable again.

    Example: Linux or macOS

    export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

    For example:

    export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="/home/user/Downloads/service-account-file.json"

    Example: Windows

    For PowerShell:

    $env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

    For example:

    $env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="C:\Users\username\Downloads\service-account-file.json"

    For command prompt:

    set GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS=KEY_PATH

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

  8. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

    Roles required to select or create a project

    • Select a project: Selecting a project doesn't require a specific IAM role—you can select any project that you've been granted a role on.
    • Create a project: To create a project, you need the Project Creator role (roles/resourcemanager.projectCreator), which contains the resourcemanager.projects.create permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    Go to project selector

  9. Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  10. Enable the Document AI API.

    Roles required to enable APIs

    To enable APIs, you need the Service Usage Admin IAM role (roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin), which contains the serviceusage.services.enable permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    Enable the API

  11. Create a service account:

    1. Ensure that you have the Create Service Accounts IAM role (roles/iam.serviceAccountCreator) and the Project IAM Admin role (roles/resourcemanager.projectIamAdmin). Learn how to grant roles.

    2. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Create service account page.

      Go to Create service account
    3. Select your project.

    4. In the Service account name field, enter a name. The Google Cloud console fills in the Service account ID field based on this name.

      In the Service account description field, enter a description. For example, Service account for quickstart.

    5. Click Create and continue.

    6. Grant the Document AI > Document AI Administrator role to the service account.

      To grant the role, find the Select a role list, then select Document AI > Document AI Administrator.

    7. Click Continue.

    8. Click Done to finish creating the service account.

      Do not close your browser window. You will use it in the next step.

  12. Create a service account key:

    1. In the Google Cloud console, click the email address for the service account that you created.
    2. Click Keys.
    3. Click Add key, and then click Create new key.
    4. Click Create. A JSON key file is downloaded to your computer.
    5. Click Close.

  13. Set the environment variable GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS to the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials. This variable applies only to your current shell session, so if you open a new session, set the variable again.

    Example: Linux or macOS

    export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

    For example:

    export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="/home/user/Downloads/service-account-file.json"

    Example: Windows

    For PowerShell:

    $env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="KEY_PATH"

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

    For example:

    $env:GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="C:\Users\username\Downloads\service-account-file.json"

    For command prompt:

    set GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS=KEY_PATH

    Replace KEY_PATH with the path of the JSON file that contains your credentials.

Install the client library

C#

For more on setting up your C# development environment, refer to the C# Development Environment Setup Guide. 

Install-Package Google.Cloud.DocumentAI.V1 -Pre

Go

go get cloud.google.com/go/documentai

Java

For more on setting up your Java development environment, refer to the Java Development Environment Setup Guide.

If you are using Maven, add the following to your pom.xml file. For more information about BOMs, see The Google Cloud Platform Libraries BOM.

If you are using Gradle, add the following to your dependencies:

If you are using sbt, add the following to your dependencies:

If you're using Visual Studio Code or IntelliJ, you can add client libraries to your project using the following IDE plugins:

The plugins provide additional functionality, such as key management for service accounts. Refer to each plugin's documentation for details.

Node.js

For more on setting up your Node.js development environment, refer to the Node.js Development Environment Setup Guide. 

npm install @google-cloud/documentai

PHP

composer require google/cloud-document-ai

Python

For more on setting up your Python development environment, refer to the Python Development Environment Setup Guide. 

pip install --upgrade google-cloud-documentai

Ruby

For more on setting up your Ruby development environment, refer to the Ruby Development Environment Setup Guide. 

gem install google-cloud-document_ai

Document processing

Use Document AI API to request information from a local PDF document. To run the following samples you must first create a processor in the UI.

Console

  1. In the Google Cloud console, in the Document AI section, go to the Processors page.

    Go to the Processors page

  2. Select Create processor.

  3. Click on the processor type from the list you want to create.

  4. In the side Create processor window specify a processor name.

  5. Select your Region from the list.

  6. Click Create to create your processor.

After you have created a processor and have the processor ID, run the following code to request individual document processing:

C#

For more information, see the Document AI C# API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

C++

For more information, see the Document AI C++ API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Go

For more information, see the Document AI Go API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Java

For more information, see the Document AI Java API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Node.js

For more information, see the Document AI Node.js API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

PHP

For more information, see the Document AI PHP API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Python

For more information, see the Document AI Python API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Ruby

For more information, see the Document AI Ruby API reference documentation.

To authenticate to Document AI, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, see Set up authentication for a local development environment.

Congratulations! You've sent your first request to Document AI.

How did it go?

Clean up

To avoid incurring charges to your Google Account for the resources used in this quickstart:

What's next

Find out more about our Document AI API Client Libraries.

Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License. For details, see the Google Developers Site Policies. Java is a registered trademark of Oracle and/or its affiliates.