diff --git a/doc/source/whatsnew/v1.0.0.rst b/doc/source/whatsnew/v1.0.0.rst
index db23bfdc8a5bd..6e1cf9ab66201 100644
--- a/doc/source/whatsnew/v1.0.0.rst
+++ b/doc/source/whatsnew/v1.0.0.rst
@@ -600,6 +600,7 @@ I/O
 - Bug in :meth:`DataFrame.to_clipboard` which did not work reliably in ipython (:issue:`22707`)
 - Bug in :func:`read_json` where default encoding was not set to ``utf-8`` (:issue:`29565`)
 - Bug in :class:`PythonParser` where str and bytes were being mixed when dealing with the decimal field (:issue:`29650`)
+- :meth:`read_gbq` now accepts ``progress_bar_type`` to display progress bar while the data downloads. (:issue:`29857`)
 -
 
 Plotting
diff --git a/pandas/io/gbq.py b/pandas/io/gbq.py
index b120de1b3011a..9fac7a52b370d 100644
--- a/pandas/io/gbq.py
+++ b/pandas/io/gbq.py
@@ -27,6 +27,7 @@ def read_gbq(
     use_bqstorage_api=None,
     private_key=None,
     verbose=None,
+    progress_bar_type=None,
 ):
     """
     Load data from Google BigQuery.
@@ -134,6 +135,30 @@ def read_gbq(
         Deprecated in pandas-gbq version 0.4.0. Use the `logging module to
         adjust verbosity instead
         <https://pandas-gbq.readthedocs.io/en/latest/intro.html#logging>`__.
+    progress_bar_type : Optional, str
+        If set, use the `tqdm <https://tqdm.github.io/>`__ library to
+        display a progress bar while the data downloads. Install the
+        ``tqdm`` package to use this feature.
+
+        Possible values of ``progress_bar_type`` include:
+
+        ``None``
+            No progress bar.
+        ``'tqdm'``
+            Use the :func:`tqdm.tqdm` function to print a progress bar
+            to :data:`sys.stderr`.
+        ``'tqdm_notebook'``
+            Use the :func:`tqdm.tqdm_notebook` function to display a
+            progress bar as a Jupyter notebook widget.
+        ``'tqdm_gui'``
+            Use the :func:`tqdm.tqdm_gui` function to display a
+            progress bar as a graphical dialog box.
+
+        Note that his feature requires version 0.12.0 or later of the
+        ``pandas-gbq`` package. And it requires the ``tqdm`` package. Slightly
+        different than ``pandas-gbq``, here the default is ``None``.
+
+        .. versionadded:: 1.0.0
 
     Returns
     -------
@@ -152,6 +177,9 @@ def read_gbq(
     # START: new kwargs.  Don't populate unless explicitly set.
     if use_bqstorage_api is not None:
         kwargs["use_bqstorage_api"] = use_bqstorage_api
+
+    if progress_bar_type is not None:
+        kwargs["progress_bar_type"] = progress_bar_type
     # END: new kwargs
 
     # START: deprecated kwargs.  Don't populate unless explicitly set.
diff --git a/pandas/tests/io/test_gbq.py b/pandas/tests/io/test_gbq.py
index 52147f4e1afc7..75c80bb0b8025 100644
--- a/pandas/tests/io/test_gbq.py
+++ b/pandas/tests/io/test_gbq.py
@@ -144,6 +144,24 @@ def mock_read_gbq(sql, **kwargs):
     assert "use_bqstorage_api" not in captured_kwargs
 
 
+@pytest.mark.parametrize("progress_bar", [None, "foo"])
+def test_read_gbq_progress_bar_type_kwarg(monkeypatch, progress_bar):
+    # GH 29857
+    captured_kwargs = {}
+
+    def mock_read_gbq(sql, **kwargs):
+        captured_kwargs.update(kwargs)
+        return DataFrame([[1.0]])
+
+    monkeypatch.setattr("pandas_gbq.read_gbq", mock_read_gbq)
+    pd.read_gbq("SELECT 1", progress_bar_type=progress_bar)
+
+    if progress_bar:
+        assert "progress_bar_type" in captured_kwargs
+    else:
+        assert "progress_bar_type" not in captured_kwargs
+
+
 @pytest.mark.single
 class TestToGBQIntegrationWithServiceAccountKeyPath:
     @classmethod