Http 415 Unsupported Media type error with JSON

Question

I am calling a REST service with a JSON request and it responds with a HTTP 415 "Unsupported Media Type" error.

The request content type is set to ("Content-Type", "application/json; charset=utf8").

It works fine if I don't include a JSON object in the request. I am using the google-gson-2.2.4 library for JSON.

I tried using a couple of different libraries but it made no difference.

Can anybody please help me to resolve this?

Here is my code:

public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception
{

    JsonObject requestJson = new JsonObject();
    String url = "xxx";

    //method call for generating json

    requestJson = generateJSON();
    URL myurl = new URL(url);
    HttpURLConnection con = (HttpURLConnection)myurl.openConnection();
    con.setDoOutput(true);
    con.setDoInput(true);

    con.setRequestProperty("Content-Type", "application/json; charset=utf8");
    con.setRequestProperty("Accept", "application/json");
    con.setRequestProperty("Method", "POST");
    OutputStream os = con.getOutputStream();
    os.write(requestJson.toString().getBytes("UTF-8"));
    os.close();


    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();  
    int HttpResult =con.getResponseCode();
    if(HttpResult ==HttpURLConnection.HTTP_OK){
    BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new   InputStreamReader(con.getInputStream(),"utf-8"));  

        String line = null;
        while ((line = br.readLine()) != null) {  
        sb.append(line + "\n");  
        }
         br.close(); 
         System.out.println(""+sb.toString());  

    }else{
        System.out.println(con.getResponseCode());
        System.out.println(con.getResponseMessage());  
    }  

}
public static JsonObject generateJSON () throws MalformedURLException

{
   String s = "http://www.example.com";
        s.replaceAll("/", "\\/");
    JsonObject reqparam=new JsonObject();
    reqparam.addProperty("type", "arl");
    reqparam.addProperty("action", "remove");
    reqparam.addProperty("domain", "staging");
    reqparam.addProperty("objects", s);
    return reqparam;

}
}

The value of requestJson.toString() is :

{"type":"arl","action":"remove","domain":"staging","objects":"http://www.example.com"}

Please update your question with the value of `requestJson.toString()` — Sabuj Hassan, Mar 21 '14 at 18:22
Value of requestJson.toString is : {"type":"arl","action":"remove","domain":"staging","objects":"http://www.abc.com"} — user3443794, Mar 21 '14 at 18:30
Have you written the server part? If you do the same request with Postman (Chrome extensions, Google it), does it work? Perhaps the server does not accept the JSON content type for some reason? — joscarsson, Mar 21 '14 at 19:18
Yes I tested that using soapUI. I sent the exact same request including json and got successful response from the server. — user3443794, Mar 21 '14 at 19:23
@joscarsson, since 14 Mar 2017, Postman chrome extension is deprecated. They moved to the native app. Here is their blog post: [http://blog.getpostman.com/2017/03/14/going-native/](http://blog.getpostman.com/2017/03/14/going-native/) — Serge Kishiko, Jul 16 '18 at 10:11

score 129 · Accepted Answer · edited Aug 17 '15 at 13:28

129

Not sure about the reason but Removing lines charset=utf8 from con.setRequestProperty("Content-Type", "application/json; charset=utf8") resolved the issue.

edited Aug 17 '15 at 13:28

Gopal Singh Sirvi

4,539
5
33
55

answered Mar 25 '14 at 19:02

user3443794

3,411
3
13
9

It's probably a bug in the ReST service. They're probably not expected the `charset` to be set in the Content-Type. My guess is that they're checking if the string `"application/json; charset=utf-8" == "application/json"`. That being said, JSON must be utf-8 so it's perfectly valid to leave out the charset. – Tim Martin Mar 28 '16 at 03:39
37

Because `charset=utf8` is not a valid character set designation. The correct version would be `charset=utf-8`. The dash is important. The list of valid character set designations is managed by IANA RFC2879: http://www.iana.org/assignments/character-sets/character-sets.xhtml – Berin Loritsch Jul 06 '17 at 17:33
1

Wasted a whole lot of time trying different things and then tried removing the charset=utf8 and it worked. Thanks. – Salman May 07 '18 at 10:42
In some implementations, like Dart http, `charset=UTF-8` is the only way to use it. – VoidMain Nov 08 '20 at 17:09
Which file contains this so I can remove it? – Etch Sep 29 '21 at 16:13

Parth Solanki · Answer 2 · 2020-07-08T11:13:06.993

110

Add Content-Type: application/json and Accept: application/json

edited Jul 08 '20 at 11:13

answered Sep 15 '16 at 06:45

Parth Solanki

3,268
2
22
41

8

If you using **Postman** for testing, try to add this part to the **Headers**: Content-Type: application/json – Oliver Oct 04 '19 at 12:03

score 22 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 13 '16 at 16:49

22

If you are making jquery ajax request, dont forget to add

contentType:'application/json'

answered Sep 13 '16 at 16:49

karthik

7,041
1
13
12

score 16 · Answer 4 · edited Dec 07 '16 at 20:48

16

This is because charset=utf8 should be without a space after application/json. That will work fine. Use it like application/json;charset=utf-8

edited Dec 07 '16 at 20:48

Matthew Read

1,365
1
30
50

answered May 17 '16 at 15:34

Dhruv

185
1
2

2

This is incorrect; spaces are allowed and should be ignored; see https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2046 . – djb Jan 03 '18 at 15:20

score 12 · Answer 5 · answered Feb 10 '21 at 16:51

12

HttpVerb needs its headers as a dictionary of key-value pairs

headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/json', 'charset': 'utf-8'}

answered Feb 10 '21 at 16:51

Mahmoud Nasr

564
7
11

score 8 · Answer 6 · answered Apr 23 '19 at 02:19

8

If you get this in React RSAA middleware or similar, Add the headers:

  method: 'POST',
  headers: {
    'Content-Type': 'application/json',
  },
  body: JSON.stringify(model),

answered Apr 23 '19 at 02:19

Nalan Madheswaran

10,136
1
57
42

score 7 · Answer 7 · answered May 16 '18 at 12:26

7

If you are using AJAX jQuery Request this is a must to apply. If not it will throw you 415 Error.

dataType: "json",
contentType:'application/json'

answered May 16 '18 at 12:26

Du-Lacoste

11,530
2
71
51

anand krish · Answer 8 · 2021-10-08T15:15:07.443

7

Incase if you are giving a post request through Postman then make sure you have choosed these 2 options

1. JSON (application/json) should be choosed

2. Content-Type - application/json

edited Oct 08 '21 at 15:15

answered Jul 19 '21 at 18:30

anand krish

4,281
4
44
47

score 2 · Answer 9 · answered Nov 29 '17 at 05:27

2

Add the HTTP header manager and add in it your API's header names and values. e.g. Content-type, Accept, etc. That will resolve your issue.

answered Nov 29 '17 at 05:27

Arjun Duggal

31
2

score 2 · Answer 10 · answered Oct 07 '21 at 20:30

2

I had the same issue with Postman. Adding Content-Type: application/json to the headers solved the issue.

answered Oct 07 '21 at 20:30

Chamila Maddumage

3,304
2
32
43

score 2 · Answer 11 · answered May 25 '22 at 13:23

2

I was facing the same issue and the solution was to remove

'mode': 'no-cors'

and adding the hostname as an allowed origin at backend server. Setting mode to 'no-cors' will always take "Content-Type" as "text/plain". For more info, visit info

answered May 25 '22 at 13:23

Jyoti Duhan

988
1
16
26

but if I remove this line from `fetchBaseQuery` I will get `cors issue` – Azhar Uddin Sheikh Oct 18 '22 at 12:25

score 1 · Answer 12 · answered May 08 '17 at 17:01

1

Some times Charset Metada breaks the json while sending in the request. Better, not use charset=utf8 in the request type.

answered May 08 '17 at 17:01

Murali Gundappan

13
3

2

utf8 just isn't a valid character set. Look at the spec: http://www.iana.org/assignments/character-sets/character-sets.xhtml – Berin Loritsch Jul 06 '17 at 17:34

score 1 · Answer 13 · answered Jul 31 '19 at 15:18

I fixed this by updating the Request class that my Controller receives.

I removed the following class level annotation from my Request class on my server side. After that my client didn't get 415 error.

import javax.xml.bind.annotation.XmlRootElement;
@XmlRootElement

score 1 · Answer 14 · answered Oct 14 '22 at 06:35

1

In my case: on the body params I set the param to text type instead of JSON I thought its all the same .:)

answered Oct 14 '22 at 06:35

Khalid

343
3
16

score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Apr 14 '16 at 09:03

I was sending "delete" rest request and it failed with 415. I saw what content-type my server uses to hit the api. In my case, It was "application/json" instead of "application/json; charset=utf8".

So ask from your api developer And in the meantime try sending request with content-type= "application/json" only.

score 0 · Answer 16 · answered Jan 12 '17 at 22:12

0

I had the same issue. My problem was complicated object for serialization. One attribute of my object was Map<Object1, List<Object2>>. I changed this attribute like List<Object3> where Object3 contains Object1 and Object2 and everything works fine.

answered Jan 12 '17 at 22:12

spajdo

901
9
20

score 0 · Answer 17 · answered Aug 30 '17 at 07:17

0

I know this is way too late to help the OP with his problem, but to all of us who is just encountering this problem, I had solved this issue by removing the constructor with parameters of my Class which was meant to hold the json data.

answered Aug 30 '17 at 07:17

Jero Dungog

379
1
10

score 0 · Answer 18 · answered May 31 '18 at 11:44

Add MappingJackson2HttpMessageConverter manually in configuration solved the problem for me :

@EnableWebMvc
@Configuration
@ComponentScan
public class RestConfiguration extends WebMvcConfigurerAdapter {

    @Override
    public void configureMessageConverters(List<HttpMessageConverter<?>> messageConverters) {
        messageConverters.add(new MappingJackson2HttpMessageConverter());
        super.configureMessageConverters(messageConverters);
    }
}

score 0 · Answer 19 · answered Jul 20 '18 at 05:06

0

The reason can be not adding "annotation-driven" in your dispatcher servlet xml file. and also it may be due to not adding as application/json in the headers

answered Jul 20 '18 at 05:06

BHARATHWAJ

39
1
10

score 0 · Answer 20 · edited Oct 07 '21 at 12:12

0

The 415 (Unsupported Media Type) status code indicates that the origin server is refusing to service the request because the payload is in a format not supported by this method on the target resource. The format problem might be due to the request's indicated Content-Type or Content-Encoding, or as a result of inspecting the data directly. DOC

edited Oct 07 '21 at 12:12

Community

1
1

answered Oct 13 '19 at 19:54

TiyebM

2,684
3
40
66

score 0 · Answer 21 · answered Nov 01 '20 at 07:35

I have also faced this issue when working REST service with a JSON request and it responds with a HTTP 415 "Unsupported Media Type" error. These lines of codes will help you to resolve the issue.

headers: { "Content-Type": "application/json", "accept": "/" },

After that, you should write code to encode the JSON body. For an example,

body: jsonEncode({"username": username, "password": password})

score 0 · Answer 22 · answered Mar 08 '23 at 14:16

0

In the Postman, in the Headers, you might insert the folows Keys and values Key = Content_Type VALUE application/json Key = Accept VALUE application/json

It is must work!!!

answered Mar 08 '23 at 14:16

NELSON JOSE CORREA DA SILVA

1

score 0 · Answer 23 · answered Mar 29 '23 at 13:01

0

I was having same issue even after adding correct “Content-Type” & “content-type” headers. The issue resolved when I added “x-version” header with value as “4”.

answered Mar 29 '23 at 13:01

Sagar

13
6

score 0 · Answer 24 · answered Apr 27 '23 at 08:22

0

Adding 'Content-Type': '*/*' and 'accept': '*/*' in headers resolve this problem for me.

answered Apr 27 '23 at 08:22

elouassif

308
1
10

score 0 · Answer 25 · answered May 02 '23 at 16:06

0

Your request might need a empty body {} even if you have no body data.

body: {}

answered May 02 '23 at 16:06

Satbir Kira

792
6
21

Http 415 Unsupported Media type error with JSON

25 Answers25

Linked