UK Postcode Lookup jQuery Plugin

Add UK address lookups with a simple postcode input field on any web form with the Ideal-Postcodes.co.uk API. Ideal Postcodes uses Royal Mail's addressing database, the Postcode Address File (PAF).

PAF is licensed from the Royal Mail and incurs a license fee per lookup. We make PAF available to the public at 2p per external lookup.

How it Works

This plugin creates an input field to lookup postcodes on the Ideal Postcodes API. If your user searches a valid postcode, a dropdown menu is displayed and the selected address is piped into appropriate fields.

The plugin provides addresses according to Royal Mail's Addressing Guidelines. This consists of 3 address lines, a Post Town and Postcode and is sufficient to uniquely identify a premise in the UK.

Getting Started

Download the plugin and add to your page

<script src="jquery.js"></script>
<script src="jquery.postcodes.min.js"></script>

Sign up to get an API key
Setup a Postcode Search Field by inserting an empty div tag and calling .setupPostcodeLookup(). Pass in a configuration object identifying specifying your API Key and address fields (using CSS selectors)

<div id="postcode_lookup_field"></div>
<script>
$('#postcode_lookup_field').setupPostcodeLookup({
	// Set your API key
	api_key: 'iddqd',
	// Pass in CSS selectors pointing to your input fields to pipe the results
	output_fields: {
		line_1: '#first_line',
		line_2: '#second_line',
		line_3: '#third_line',
		post_town: '#post_town',
		postcode: '#postcode'
	}
});
</script>

Documentation & Configuration

Latest documentation can be found at ideal-postcodes.co.uk

This plugin also allows you to draw additional addressing information. The complete list of available data fields can be found here.

There are a lot of ways to configure the plugin to create an address lookup feature that suits most use cases. The documentation will guide you through how to use additional configuration options like customised styling, customised inputs & triggers, useful callbacks, key checking, etc.

For examples of the more advanced ways you can configure the plugin take a look at ideal-postcodes.co.uk/jquery.

Testing

Run automated tests with

grunt test

Please use jQuery 1.9.x or higher. This plugin has been tested against jQuery 1.9.x, 1.10.x, 1.11.x, 2.0.x and 2.1.x.

Our test postcodes are:

ID1 1QD Returns a successful postcode lookup response (2000)
ID1 KFA Returns "postcode not found" error (4040)
ID1 CLIP Returns "no lookups remaining" error (4020)
ID1 CHOP Returns "daily (or individual) lookup limit breached" error (4021)

License

MIT

Changelog

v3.0.0

Significant API backwards incompatible API changes
Simplified $.idealPostcodes.lookupPostcode and $.idealPostcodes.lookupAddress APIs
Added request tagging read more here
Added new callbacks and renamed existing callbacks
onLookupSuccess is now onSearchCompleted
Added callbacks onAddressesReceived, onDropdownCreated, onLookupTriggered, onSearchError
Added ability to insert error messages into custom containers

v2.2.4

Configuration object now accepts dropdown_container to specify a custom container to display the results dropdown

v2.2.2

onLookupSuccess is now also triggered when pre-flight postcode validation fails

v2.2.1

Added optional max_results for address searches

v2.2.0

Added fallback to address search if address_search: true. Any postcode search which does not validate as a postcode will be passed through to the address search API.

v2.1.2

Key checks are only performed against the API if the plugin is invoked in the DOM and not upon initialisation
Results from a key check are now cached and multiple calls to the same key are merged into the same request

v2.1.1

Changed lookup behaviour. Looking up a new postcode no longer clears existing results

v2.1.0

Added option to strip organisation name from address lines

v2.0.0

Deprecated old configuration method of .setup() followed by $.fn.setupPostcodeLookup
Added pre-initialisation checks
Added callbacks: onLoaded, onCheckFailed

v1.3.1

Bug fix for IE7

v1.3.0

Added custom input and lookup button configuration parameters

v1.2.2

Avoids use of object.class. For Safari 4.0 and 5.0
Avoid setting type. Fixes for earlier jQuery version in older browsers

v1.2.1

Fixed removal of elements from DOM

v1.2.0

Significant rewrite to allow for multiple lookups per page

v1.1.2

Minor fix for when label is selected in address dropdown