Upload an object with HTML forms Stay organized with collections Save and categorize content based on your preferences.
This page describes how to use HTML forms, which allow yourusers to upload files to your bucket. When you create an HTML form, it'srecommended that you create apolicy document, which defines conditionsthat upload requests must meet. HTML forms utilize the XML objectPOST API.
The uploaded object replaces any existing object with the same name. Fortips on uploading to Cloud Storage, seebest practices. For informationaboutPOST object requests using the legacy signingprocess, seePOST Object with the V2 signing process.
Query string parameters
This request does not include query string parameters.
Form fields
You can create an HTML form by defining the form fields described below.
| Field | Description | Required |
|---|---|---|
acl | The predefined ACL that you want to apply to the object that is being uploaded. If you do not specify this field the bucket'sdefault ACL is applied. | No |
bucket | The name of the bucket that you want to upload to. If you include this field, it must match the bucket name you specify in theaction attribute. | No |
Cache-Control | The cache control for the object. You can only set cache control for an object that is accessible to all users. For instance, an object's ACL must bepublic-read orpublic-read-write to be able to set the cache-control. | No |
Content-Disposition | Specifies how the object data should be transmitted. For example, aContent-Disposition value ofinline means that the object should be displayed immediately. | No |
Content-Encoding | The compression algorithm for the object, such asgzip. | No |
Content-Length | The size of the uploaded file, in bytes. | No |
Content-Type | The MIME type of the file you are uploading via the form. If you do not specify a content type, the Cloud Storage system defaults toapplication/octet-stream when it serves the content. | No |
Expires | AnISO8601 timestamp that specifies the date and time before an object is considered stale by the browser. | No |
file | The file you are uploading. Must be the last field in the form. You can upload only one object per request. | Yes |
key | Thename of the object that you are uploading. You can also use the ${filename} variable if a user is providing a file name. | Yes |
policy | The security policy that describes what can and cannot be uploaded in the form. The policy document must be Base64 encoded. Seepolicy documents for more information. If you do not provide a security policy, requests are considered to be anonymous and will only work with buckets that have granted | No |
success_action_redirect | A URL that users are redirected to when an upload is successful. If you do not provide a URL, Cloud Storage responds with the status code that you specified insuccess_action_status. | No |
success_action_status | The status code that you want Cloud Storage to respond with when an upload is successful. The default is 204, but you can change this to 200 or 201. If you choose 200 or 204, Cloud Storage returns an empty document with those status codes. If you choose 201, Cloud Storage returns an XML document with the elements that are described in Response Body Elements. | No |
x-goog-algorithm | The signing algorithm used to create thesignature associated with your policy document. Possible values areGOOG4-HMAC-SHA256 andGOOG4-RSA-SHA256 | Only if you specify apolicy |
x-goog-credential | The credentials used to create thesignature associated with your policy document.x-goog-credential has the formAccessKeyId/CredentialScope, where:
| Only if you specify apolicy |
x-goog-custom-time | A user-specified date and time in theRFC 3339 formatYYYY-MM-DD'T'HH:MM:SS.SS'Z'. | No |
x-goog-date | The current date, in theISO 8601 basic formatYYYYMMDD'T'HHMMSS'Z'. | Only if you specify apolicy |
x-goog-signature | Thesignature associated with your policy document. | Only if you specify apolicy |
x-goog-meta-* | A field for custom metadata. You can use this to specify any additional metadata that is not provided by the other form fields. For example,x-goog-meta-reviewer: jane orx-goog-meta-project-manager: john is custom metadata. | No |
Response body elements
The following response body elements are returned in an XML document only ifyou setsuccess_action_status to 201.
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
Bucket | Bucket in which the object was stored. |
ETag | HTTP 1.1 entity tag for the object. |
Key | The object's name. |
Location | The URI for the object. |
Example of how to create an HTML form
The following example shows you how to create an HTML form to upload an object,using a signature that's created with the V4 policy signing process.
The form must be UTF-8 encoded. You can specify form encoding in the form's HTMLhead tag or by using theContent-Type request header.
Yourform tag must specify the following three items:
An action.
The
actionattribute specifies an XML APIrequest endpoint.Valid endpoints include
https://BUCKET_NAME.storage.googleapis.com,https://storage.googleapis.com/BUCKET_NAME, andCNAMEredirects.A method.
The
methodattribute specifies the method that you are using to submitthe form. It must bepost.An enclosure type.
The
enctypeattribute specifies the enclosure type you are using and mustalways bemultipart/form-data.
The following is an example HTML form, which uses apolicy document that'sspecified by thepolicy form field.
HTML
<form action="https://storage.googleapis.com/travel-maps" method="post" enctype="multipart/form-data"> <input type="text" name="key" value="test-object"> <input type="hidden" name="Content-Type" value="image/jpeg"> <input type="hidden" name="success_action_redirect" value="https://www.example.com/success_notification.html"> <input type="hidden" name="policy" value="eyJjb25kaXRpb25zIjpbey..."> <input type="hidden" name="x-goog-algorithm" value="GOOG4-RSA-SHA256"> <input type="hidden" name="x-goog-credential" value="example_account@example_project.iam.gserviceaccount.com/20191102/us-central1/storage/goog4_request"> <input type="hidden" name="x-goog-date" value="20191102T043530Z"> <input type="hidden" name="x-goog-signature" value="58bc39b8f604ee1f18171f..."> <input name="file" type="file"> <input type="submit" value="Upload"></form>
Client libraries
For more information, see theCloud StorageC++ API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StorageC# API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StorageJava API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StorageGo API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StorageNode.js API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StoragePHP API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StoragePython API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries. For more information, see theCloud StorageRuby API reference documentation. To authenticate to Cloud Storage, set up Application Default Credentials. For more information, seeSet up authentication for client libraries.C++
namespacegcs=::google::cloud::storage;using::google::cloud::StatusOr;[](gcs::Clientclient,std::stringconst&bucket_name,std::stringconst&object_name,std::stringconst&signing_account){autodocument=client.GenerateSignedPostPolicyV4(gcs::PolicyDocumentV4{bucket_name,object_name,/*expiration=*/std::chrono::minutes(10),},gcs::AddExtensionFieldOption("x-goog-meta-test","data"),gcs::SigningAccount(signing_account));if(!document)throwstd::move(document).status();// Create the HTML form for the computed policy.std::ostringstreamos;os <<"<form action='" <<document->url <<"' method='POST'" <<" enctype='multipart/form-data'>\n";for(autoconst&field:document->required_form_fields){os <<" <input name='" <<field.first <<"' value='" <<field.second <<"' type='hidden' />\n";}os <<" <input type='submit' value='Upload File' /><br />\n" <<" <input type='file' name='file' /><br />\n" <<"</form>";std::cout <<"A sample HTML form:\n" <<os.str() <<"\n";}C#
// Create a signed post policy which can be used to upload a specific object and// expires in 1 hour after creation.UrlSignerurlSigner=UrlSigner.FromCredential(credential);UrlSigner.Optionsoptions=UrlSigner.Options.FromDuration(TimeSpan.FromHours(1)).WithSigningVersion(SigningVersion.V4).WithScheme("https");UrlSigner.PostPolicypostPolicy=UrlSigner.PostPolicy.ForBucketAndKey(bucketName,objectName);postPolicy.SetCustomField(UrlSigner.PostPolicyCustomElement.GoogleMetadata,"x-goog-meta-test","data");UrlSigner.SignedPostPolicysignedPostPolicy=awaiturlSigner.SignAsync(postPolicy,options);// Create an HTML form including all the fields in the signed post policy.StringBuilderform=newStringBuilder();form.AppendLine($"<form action=\"{signedPostPolicy.PostUrl}\" method=\"post\" enctype=\"multipart/form-data\">");foreach(varfieldinsignedPostPolicy.Fields){form.AppendLine($"<input type=\"hidden\" name=\"{field.Key}\" value=\"{field.Value}\">");}// Include the file element. It should always be the last element in the form.form.AppendLine("<input name=\"file\" type=\"file\">");form.AppendLine("<input type=\"submit\" value=\"Upload\">");form.AppendLine("</form>");// You can now save the form to file and serve it as static content// or send it as the response to a request made to your application.File.WriteAllText("PostPolicySimple.html",form.ToString());Java
importcom.google.cloud.storage.BlobInfo;importcom.google.cloud.storage.PostPolicyV4;importcom.google.cloud.storage.Storage;importcom.google.cloud.storage.StorageOptions;importjava.util.Map;importjava.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;publicclassGenerateSignedPostPolicyV4{/** * Generating a signed POST policy requires Credentials which implement ServiceAccountSigner. * These can be set explicitly using the Storage.PostPolicyV4Option.signWith(ServiceAccountSigner) * option. If you don't, you could also pass a service account signer to StorageOptions, i.e. * StorageOptions().newBuilder().setCredentials(ServiceAccountSignerCredentials). In this example, * neither of these options are used, which means the following code only works when the * credentials are defined via the environment variable GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS, and those * credentials are authorized to sign a policy. See the documentation for * Storage.generateSignedPostPolicyV4 for more details. */publicstaticvoidgenerateSignedPostPolicyV4(StringprojectId,StringbucketName,StringblobName){// The ID of your GCP project// String projectId = "your-project-id";// The ID of the GCS bucket to upload to// String bucketName = "your-bucket-name"// The name to give the object uploaded to GCS// String blobName = "your-object-name"Storagestorage=StorageOptions.newBuilder().setProjectId(projectId).build().getService();PostPolicyV4.PostFieldsV4fields=PostPolicyV4.PostFieldsV4.newBuilder().setCustomMetadataField("test","data").build();PostPolicyV4policy=storage.generateSignedPostPolicyV4(BlobInfo.newBuilder(bucketName,blobName).build(),10,TimeUnit.MINUTES,fields);StringBuilderhtmlForm=newStringBuilder("<form action='"+policy.getUrl()+"' method='POST' enctype='multipart/form-data'>\n");for(Map.Entry<String,String>entry:policy.getFields().entrySet()){htmlForm.append(" <input name='"+entry.getKey()+"' value='"+entry.getValue()+"' type='hidden' />\n");}htmlForm.append(" <input type='file' name='file'/><br />\n");htmlForm.append(" <input type='submit' value='Upload File'/><br />\n");htmlForm.append("</form>\n");System.out.println("You can use the following HTML form to upload an object to bucket "+bucketName+" for the next ten minutes:");System.out.println(htmlForm.toString());}}Go
import("context""fmt""html/template""io""time""cloud.google.com/go/storage")// form is a template for an HTML form that will use the data from the signed// post policy.varform=`<form action="{{ .URL }}" method="POST" enctype="multipart/form-data">{{- range $name, $value := .Fields }}<input name="{{ $name }}" value="{{ $value }}" type="hidden"/>{{- end }}<input type="file" name="file"/><br /><input type="submit" value="Upload File" name="submit"/><br /></form>`vartmpl=template.Must(template.New("policyV4").Parse(form))// generateSignedPostPolicyV4 generates a signed post policy.funcgenerateSignedPostPolicyV4(wio.Writer,bucket,objectstring)(*storage.PostPolicyV4,error){// bucket := "bucket-name"// object := "object-name"ctx:=context.Background()client,err:=storage.NewClient(ctx)iferr!=nil{returnnil,fmt.Errorf("storage.NewClient: %w",err)}deferclient.Close()metadata:=map[string]string{"x-goog-meta-test":"data",}// Generating a signed POST policy requires credentials authorized to sign a URL.// You can pass these in through PostPolicyV4Options with one of the following options:// a. a Google service account private key, obtainable from the Google Developers Console// b. a Google Access ID with iam.serviceAccounts.signBlob permissions// c. a SignBytes function implementing custom signing// In this example, none of these options are used, which means the// GenerateSignedPostPolicyV4 function attempts to use the same authentication// that was used to instantiatethe Storage client. This authentication must// include a private key or have iam.serviceAccounts.signBlob permissions.opts:=&storage.PostPolicyV4Options{Expires:time.Now().Add(10*time.Minute),Fields:&storage.PolicyV4Fields{Metadata:metadata,},}policy,err:=client.Bucket(bucket).GenerateSignedPostPolicyV4(object,opts)iferr!=nil{returnnil,fmt.Errorf("storage.GenerateSignedPostPolicyV4: %w",err)}// Generate the form, using the data from the policy.iferr=tmpl.Execute(w,policy);err!=nil{returnpolicy,fmt.Errorf("executing template: %w",err)}returnpolicy,nil}Node.js
/** * TODO(developer): Uncomment the following lines before running the sample. */// The ID of your GCS bucket// const bucketName = 'your-unique-bucket-name';// The ID of your GCS file// const fileName = 'your-file-name';// Imports the Google Cloud client libraryconst{Storage}=require('@google-cloud/storage');// Creates a clientconststorage=newStorage();asyncfunctiongenerateV4SignedPolicy(){constbucket=storage.bucket(bucketName);constfile=bucket.file(fileName);// These options will allow temporary uploading of a file// through an HTML form.constexpires=Date.now()+10*60*1000;// 10 minutesconstoptions={expires,fields:{'x-goog-meta-test':'data'},};// Get a v4 signed policy for uploading fileconst[response]=awaitfile.generateSignedPostPolicyV4(options);// Create an HTML form with the provided policyletoutput=`<form action="${response.url}" method="POST" enctype="multipart/form-data">\n`;// Include all fields returned in the HTML form as they're requiredfor(constnameofObject.keys(response.fields)){constvalue=response.fields[name];output+=` <input name="${name}" value="${value}" type="hidden"/>\n`;}output+=' <input type="file" name="file"/><br />\n';output+=' <input type="submit" value="Upload File"/><br />\n';output+='</form>';console.log(output);}generateV4SignedPolicy().catch(console.error);PHP
use Google\Cloud\Storage\StorageClient;/** * Generates a v4 POST Policy to be used in an HTML form and echo's form. * * @param string $bucketName The name of your Cloud Storage bucket. * (e.g. 'my-bucket') * @param string $objectName The name of your Cloud Storage object. * (e.g. 'my-object') */function generate_v4_post_policy(string $bucketName, string $objectName): void{ $storage = new StorageClient(); $bucket = $storage->bucket($bucketName); $response = $bucket->generateSignedPostPolicyV4( $objectName, new \DateTime('10 min'), [ 'fields' => [ 'x-goog-meta-test' => 'data' ] ] ); $url = $response['url']; $output = "<form action='$url' method='POST' enctype='multipart/form-data'>" . PHP_EOL; foreach ($response['fields'] as $name => $value) { $output .= " <input name='$name' value='$value' type='hidden'/>" . PHP_EOL; } $output .= " <input type='file' name='file'/><br />" . PHP_EOL; $output .= " <input type='submit' value='Upload File' name='submit'/><br />" . PHP_EOL; $output .= '</form>' . PHP_EOL; echo $output;}Python
importdatetimefromgoogle.cloudimportstoragedefgenerate_signed_post_policy_v4(bucket_name,blob_name):"""Generates a v4 POST Policy and prints an HTML form."""# bucket_name = 'your-bucket-name'# blob_name = 'your-object-name'storage_client=storage.Client()policy=storage_client.generate_signed_post_policy_v4(bucket_name,blob_name,expiration=datetime.timedelta(minutes=10),fields={'x-goog-meta-test':'data'})# Create an HTML form with the provided policyheader="<form action='{}' method='POST' enctype='multipart/form-data'>\n"form=header.format(policy["url"])# Include all fields returned in the HTML form as they're requiredforkey,valueinpolicy["fields"].items():form+=f" <input name='{key}' value='{value}' type='hidden'/>\n"form+=" <input type='file' name='file'/><br />\n"form+=" <input type='submit' value='Upload File' /><br />\n"form+="</form>"print(form)returnformRuby
defgenerate_signed_post_policy_v4bucket_name:,file_name:# The ID of the GCS bucket to upload to# bucket_name = "your-unique-bucket-name"# The name to give the object uploaded to GCS# file_name = "your-file-name"require"google/cloud/storage"storage=Google::Cloud::Storage.newbucket=storage.bucketbucket_namepost_object=bucket.generate_signed_post_policy_v4file_name,expires:600,fields:{"x-goog-meta-test"=>"data"}html_form="<form action='#{post_object.url}' method='POST' enctype='multipart/form-data'>\n"post_object.fields.eachdo|name,value|html_form+=" <input name='#{name}' value='#{value}' type='hidden'/>\n"endhtml_form+=" <input type='file' name='file'/><br />\n"html_form+=" <input type='submit' value='Upload File'/><br />\n"html_form+="</form>\n"puts"You can use the following form to upload an object to bucket#{bucket_name} for the next 10 minutes:\n"putshtml_formpost_objectend
As a best practice you should use theExpect: 100-continue headerwithPOST requests. This lets you verify that the server will handle therequest before you send the object. If you receive a status code100 Continueyou should proceed with the request. If you receive a status code417 Expectation Failed then you shouldn't send the object.
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Last updated 2026-02-19 UTC.