Media types

Custom media types are used in the API to let consumers choose the format of the data they wish to receive. This is done by adding one or more of the following types to the Accept header when you make a request. Media types are specific to resources, allowing them to change independently and support formats that other resources don't.

All GitHub Enterprise Server media types look like this:

application/vnd.github.param[+json]

The most basic media types the API supports are:

application/vnd.github+json
application/json

If you're specifying a property (such as full/raw/etc defined below), put it after github:

application/vnd.github.raw+json

Comment body properties

The body of a comment can be written in GitHub Flavored Markdown. The APIs to manage issues, issue comments, pull request comments, and gist comments all accept these same media types:

Raw media type for comment body properties

application/vnd.github.raw+json

Return the raw markdown body. Response will include body. This is the default if you do not pass any specific media type.

Text media type for comment body properties

application/vnd.github.text+json

Return a text only representation of the markdown body. Response will include body_text.

HTML media type for comment body properties

application/vnd.github.html+json

Return HTML rendered from the body's markdown. Response will include body_html.

Full media type for comment body properties

application/vnd.github.full+json

Return raw, text and HTML representations. Response will include body, body_text, and body_html:

Git blob properties

The following media types are allowed when getting a blob:

JSON media type for Git blob properties

application/vnd.github+json
application/json

Return JSON representation of the blob with content as a base64 encoded string. This is the default if nothing is passed.

Raw media type for Git blob properties

application/vnd.github.raw

Return the raw blob data.

Commits, commit comparison, and pull requests

The REST API to manage commits and pull requests support diff and patch formats:

diff media type for commits, commit comparison, and pull requests

application/vnd.github.diff

patch media type for commits, commit comparison, and pull requests

application/vnd.github.patch

sha media type for commits, commit comparison, and pull requests

application/vnd.github.sha

Repository contents

Raw media type for repository contents

application/vnd.github.raw

Return the raw contents of a file. This is the default if you do not pass any specific media type.

HTML media type for repository contents

application/vnd.github.html

For markup files such as Markdown or AsciiDoc, you can retrieve the rendered HTML using the .html media type. Markup languages are rendered to HTML using our open-source Markup library.

Gists

Raw media type for gists

application/vnd.github.raw

Return the raw contents of a gist. This is the default if you do not pass any specific media type.

base64 media type for gists

application/vnd.github.base64

The gist contents are base64-encoded before being sent out. This can be useful if your gist contains any invalid UTF-8 sequences.