ee.Geometry.Polygon.distance

Returns the minimum distance between two geometries.

Usage	Returns
`Polygon.distance(right, maxError, proj, spherical)`	Float

Argument	Type	Details
this: `left`	Geometry	The geometry used as the left operand of the operation.
`right`	Geometry	The geometry used as the right operand of the operation.
`maxError`	ErrorMargin, default: null	The maximum amount of error tolerated when performing any necessary reprojection.
`proj`	Projection, default: null	The projection in which to perform the operation. If not specified, the operation will be performed in a spherical coordinate system, and linear distances will be in meters on the sphere.
`spherical`	Boolean, default: false	When proj is not specified, if true the calculation will be done on the unit sphere. If false the calculation will be elliptical, taking earth flattening into account. Ignored if proj is specified. Default is false.

Examples

Code Editor (JavaScript)

// Define a Polygon object.
var polygon = ee.Geometry.Polygon(
    [[[-122.092, 37.424],
      [-122.086, 37.418],
      [-122.079, 37.425],
      [-122.085, 37.423]]]);

// Define other inputs.
var inputGeom = ee.Geometry.Point(-122.090, 37.423);

// Apply the distance method to the Polygon object.
var polygonDistance = polygon.distance({'right': inputGeom, 'maxError': 1});

// Print the result to the console.
print('polygon.distance(...) =', polygonDistance);

// Display relevant geometries on the map.
Map.setCenter(-122.085, 37.422, 15);
Map.addLayer(polygon,
             {'color': 'black'},
             'Geometry [black]: polygon');
Map.addLayer(inputGeom,
             {'color': 'blue'},
             'Parameter [blue]: inputGeom');

Python setup

See the Python Environment page for information on the Python API and using geemap for interactive development.

import ee
import geemap.core as geemap

Colab (Python)

# Define a Polygon object.
polygon = ee.Geometry.Polygon([[
    [-122.092, 37.424],
    [-122.086, 37.418],
    [-122.079, 37.425],
    [-122.085, 37.423],
]])

# Define other inputs.
input_geom = ee.Geometry.Point(-122.090, 37.423)

# Apply the distance method to the Polygon object.
polygon_distance = polygon.distance(right=input_geom, maxError=1)

# Print the result.
display('polygon.distance(...) =', polygon_distance)

# Display relevant geometries on the map.
m = geemap.Map()
m.set_center(-122.085, 37.422, 15)
m.add_layer(polygon, {'color': 'black'}, 'Geometry [black]: polygon')
m.add_layer(input_geom, {'color': 'blue'}, 'Parameter [blue]: input_geom')
m