This is old but in case it helps anyone else I can still get to the following URLs without having to enter billing info
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/dashboard?project=your-project-name
If you don't know your project name try variations of the above link (shorten it a section at a time) until you see the blue banner along the top with the pull-down name of projects. If you click the pull-down you'll see a popup with all your project names which you can use to put into the above URL.
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/library?project=your-project-name (you can get to that URL from the 'Library' menu on the left)
From here you can find and enable the API you want, e.g. https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/library/maps-backend.googleapis.com?project=your-project-name (you should see a blue 'Enable' button)
You'll probably get redirected to the billing page after enabling it but ignore that - your selected API should now be enabled and if you go back to the first URL you should see it listed at the bottom of the page (but if you click on it here you'll likely get booted to the billing page again).
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/credentials?project=your-project-name (you can get here from the 'Credentials' menu on left)
This is where you can set up and manage your API key - there's a link at the top to 'Add credentials'. When done they will appear listed on the page and can be edited by clicking on the name of the API key in the list or the 'Actions' > 'Edit API key' triple dot on the right of the list, plus other actions you might need.
So it's possible to enable an API and create a key for it, but I don't know if it still needs billing info as I can't get it working... but that might be my limited coding skills ;)
Answer from kiden on Stack OverflowVideos
This is old but in case it helps anyone else I can still get to the following URLs without having to enter billing info
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/dashboard?project=your-project-name
If you don't know your project name try variations of the above link (shorten it a section at a time) until you see the blue banner along the top with the pull-down name of projects. If you click the pull-down you'll see a popup with all your project names which you can use to put into the above URL.
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/library?project=your-project-name (you can get to that URL from the 'Library' menu on the left)
From here you can find and enable the API you want, e.g. https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/library/maps-backend.googleapis.com?project=your-project-name (you should see a blue 'Enable' button)
You'll probably get redirected to the billing page after enabling it but ignore that - your selected API should now be enabled and if you go back to the first URL you should see it listed at the bottom of the page (but if you click on it here you'll likely get booted to the billing page again).
https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/credentials?project=your-project-name (you can get here from the 'Credentials' menu on left)
This is where you can set up and manage your API key - there's a link at the top to 'Add credentials'. When done they will appear listed on the page and can be edited by clicking on the name of the API key in the list or the 'Actions' > 'Edit API key' triple dot on the right of the list, plus other actions you might need.
So it's possible to enable an API and create a key for it, but I don't know if it still needs billing info as I can't get it working... but that might be my limited coding skills ;)
Yes you need to setup a billing account, there is no way around it these days. As long as you keep under the free tier it doesn't really matter.
Also their pricing examples are counted monthly so the things that have 5 000 hits in their pricing is per month not per year.
There seems no way to have google maps api key free without credit card. To test the functionality of google map you can use it while leaving the api key field "EMPTY". It will show a message saying "For Development Purpose Only". And that way you can test google map functionality without putting billing information for google map api key.
<script src="https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/js?key=&callback=initMap" async defer></script>
Updated Answer
As of June11, 2018 it is now mandatory to have a billing account to get API key. You can still make keyless calls to the Maps JavaScript API and Street View Static API which will return low-resolution maps that can be used for development. Enabling billing still gives you $200 free credit monthly for your projects.
This answer is no longer valid
As long as you're using a testing API key it is free to register and use. But when you move your app to commercial level you have to pay for it. When you enable billing, google gives you $200 credit free each month that means if your app's map usage is low you can still use it for free even after the billing enabled, if it exceeds the credit limit now you have to pay for it.
In order to use the Places API you do need a developer key, at least if you want to go over 1000 queries a day. You registered for it in the Google API Console, and you can find it again there.
This appears to work for me - I 'lost' my API Key ages ago
https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/tutorial#api_key
Google Maps APIs are free for a wide variety of use cases, with predictable overage pricing and usage limits for APIs and annual contracts for enterprise deployments.
Your issue is probably related to how you are enabling restrictions inside Google Developers Console. Assuming you are doing this for Android, it requires you to add package name (that you can get from AndroidManifest.xml file) and SHA-1 certificate fingerprint that you can generate using following command.
keytool -list -v -keystore mystore.keystore
Once you add these two to the console, it should be in-effect within 5 minutes of the update.
HOW TO REGISTER A FREE GOOGLE MAPS API KEY
if you want to use Google Maps as basemaps, you need to register a free API key that can be obtained from the Google API Console and enable the “Google Maps Javascript API” within Maps Marker Pro respectively Leaflet Maps Marker