Common patterns for building store locators, restaurant finders, and location-based search applications with Mapbox. Covers marker display, filtering, distance calculation, and interactive lists.
npx skills add https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-agent-skills --skill mapbox-store-locator-patterns
Comprehensive patterns for building store locators, restaurant finders, and location-based search applications with Mapbox GL JS. Covers marker display, filtering, distance calculation, interactive lists, and directions integration.
Use this skill when building applications that:
Required:
Installation:
npm install mapbox-gl @turf/turf
A typical store locator consists of:
mapboxgl.GeolocateControl — simpler than custom markers.GeoJSON format for locations:
{
"type": "FeatureCollection",
"features": [
{
"type": "Feature",
"geometry": {
"type": "Point",
"coordinates": [-77.034084, 38.909671]
},
"properties": {
"id": "store-001",
"name": "Downtown Store",
"address": "123 Main St, Washington, DC 20001",
"phone": "(202) 555-0123",
"hours": "Mon-Sat: 9am-9pm, Sun: 10am-6pm",
"category": "retail",
"website": "https://example.com/downtown"
}
}
]
}
Key properties:
id - Unique identifier for each locationname - Display nameaddress - Full address for display and geocodingcoordinates - [longitude, latitude] formatcategory - For filtering (retail, restaurant, office, etc.)import mapboxgl from 'mapbox-gl';
import 'mapbox-gl/dist/mapbox-gl.css';
mapboxgl.accessToken = 'YOUR_MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN';
// Store locations data
const stores = {
type: 'FeatureCollection',
features: [
{
type: 'Feature',
geometry: {
type: 'Point',
coordinates: [-77.034084, 38.909671]
},
properties: {
id: 'store-001',
name: 'Downtown Store',
address: '123 Main St, Washington, DC 20001',
phone: '(202) 555-0123',
category: 'retail'
}
}
// ... more stores
]
};
const map = new mapboxgl.Map({
container: 'map',
style: 'mapbox://styles/mapbox/standard',
center: [-77.034084, 38.909671],
zoom: 11
});
Marker strategy by location count:
| Count | Strategy | Reason |
| ------------------- | -------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| Fewer than 100 | HTML Markers | Full DOM/CSS control; DOM node count is manageable |
| 100–1,000 | Symbol Layer (default) | Renders on the GPU via WebGL — one <canvas>, zero per-point DOM elements |
| More than 1,000 | Clustering | Reduces visual clutter at large scale |
> HTML Markers create one DOM element per point. Beyond ~100 locations the browser spends too much time on layout/paint. Symbol layers bypass the DOM entirely — the GPU draws all points in a single WebGL draw call.
Symbol Layer implementation (best for 100–1,000 locations). For HTML Markers (fewer than 100) or Clustering (more than 1,000), see references/markers.md.
map.on('load', () => {
// Add store data as source
map.addSource('stores', {
type: 'geojson',
data: stores
});
// Add custom marker image
map.loadImage('/marker-icon.png', (error, image) => {
if (error) throw error;
map.addImage('custom-marker', image);
// Add symbol layer
map.addLayer({
id: 'stores-layer',
type: 'symbol',
source: 'stores',
layout: {
'icon-image': 'custom-marker',
'icon-size': 0.8,
'icon-allow-overlap': true,
'text-field': ['get', 'name'],
'text-font': ['Open Sans Bold', 'Arial Unicode MS Bold'],
'text-offset': [0, 1.5],
'text-anchor': 'top',
'text-size': 12
}
});
});
// Handle marker clicks using Interactions API (recommended)
map.addInteraction('store-click', {
type: 'click',
target: { layerId: 'stores-layer' },
handler: (e) => {
const store = e.feature;
flyToStore(store);
createPopup(store);
}
});
// Or using traditional event listener:
// map.on('click', 'stores-layer', (e) => {
// const store = e.features[0];
// flyToStore(store);
// createPopup(store);
// });
// Change cursor on hover
map.on('mouseenter', 'stores-layer', () => {
map.getCanvas().style.cursor = 'pointer';
});
map.on('mouseleave', 'stores-layer', () => {
map.getCanvas().style.cursor = '';
});
});
function buildLocationList(stores) {
const listingContainer = document.getElementById('listings');
stores.features.forEach((store, index) => {
const listing = listingContainer.appendChild(document.createElement('div'));
listing.id = `listing-${store.properties.id}`;
listing.className = 'listing';
const link = listing.appendChild(document.createElement('a'));
link.href = '#';
link.className = 'title';
link.id = `link-${store.properties.id}`;
link.innerHTML = store.properties.name;
const details = listing.appendChild(document.createElement('div'));
details.innerHTML = `
<p>${store.properties.address}</p>
<p>${store.properties.phone || ''}</p>
`;
// Handle listing click
link.addEventListener('click', (e) => {
e.preventDefault();
flyToStore(store);
createPopup(store);
highlightListing(store.properties.id);
});
});
}
function flyToStore(store) {
map.flyTo({
center: store.geometry.coordinates,
zoom: 15,
duration: 1000
});
}
function createPopup(store) {
const popups = document.getElementsByClassName('mapboxgl-popup');
// Remove existing popups
if (popups[0]) popups[0].remove();
new mapboxgl.Popup({ closeOnClick: true })
.setLngLat(store.geometry.coordinates)
.setHTML(
`<h3>${store.properties.name}</h3>
<p>${store.properties.address}</p>
<p>${store.properties.phone}</p>
${store.properties.website ? `<a href="${store.properties.website}" target="_blank">Visit Website</a>` : ''}`
)
.addTo(map);
}
// IMPORTANT: highlightListing MUST include scrollIntoView — without it,
// selecting a marker on the map won't scroll the sidebar to the listing.
function highlightListing(id) {
// Remove existing highlights
const activeItem = document.getElementsByClassName('active');
if (activeItem[0]) {
activeItem[0].classList.remove('active');
}
// Add highlight to selected listing
const listing = document.getElementById(`listing-${id}`);
listing.classList.add('active');
// Scroll the selected listing into view (critical UX requirement)
listing.scrollIntoView({ behavior: 'smooth', block: 'nearest' });
}
// Build the list on load
map.on('load', () => {
buildLocationList(stores);
});
Load these references for additional patterns as needed:
| Reference | File | Contents |
| ------------------------- | -------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------- |
| HTML Markers & Clustering | references/markers.md | HTML Markers (< 100 locations), Clustering (> 1000 locations) |
| Search & Filter | references/search-filter.md | Text search, category filter |
| Geolocation & Directions | references/geolocation-directions.md | User location, distance calculation, route directions |
| Styling & Layout | references/styling-layout.md | Full HTML/CSS layout, custom marker CSS |
| Performance & A11y | references/optimization-a11y.md | Debounced search, data management, error handling, accessibility |
| Variations & React | references/variations-react.md | Mobile-first, fullscreen, map-only, React implementation |
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Take mapbox/mapbox-store-locator-patterns from the repository into ~/.claude/skills for personal
use, or into .claude/skills inside a project.
The agent identifies a skill by the name field in its header. Two skills with the
same name cannot sit side by side — one of them will be ignored.
The instructions reference npm.
Without those the skill loads but fails at the first command.