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Connect to Vertex AI

This page covers initializing the Vertex AI SDK and authenticating with your service account.

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Initialize the SDK

Use the following code to connect to Vertex AI APIs:

from google.auth.transport.requests import Request
from google.oauth2.service_account import Credentials
import vertexai

api_key_path = "path/to/your/jsonkey.json"
credentials = Credentials.from_service_account_file(
    api_key_path,
    scopes=["https://www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-platform"],
)
PROJECT_ID = "my-gcp-course-project"
REGION = "us-central1"
vertexai.init(project=PROJECT_ID, location=REGION, credentials=credentials)

Configuration Details

Parameter Description Example
api_key_path Path to your service account JSON file "./vertex-ai-sa-key.json"
PROJECT_ID Your Google Cloud project ID "my-gcp-course-project"
REGION Google Cloud region for Vertex AI "us-central1"

Available Regions

Common Vertex AI regions include:

  • us-central1 (Iowa)
  • us-east1 (South Carolina)
  • us-west1 (Oregon)
  • europe-west1 (Belgium)
  • asia-east1 (Taiwan)

See the full region list for all options.

Next Step

Continue to Explore Models to learn about available generative AI models.