Maximum length of HTTP GET request

Question

What's the maximum length of an HTTP GET request?

Is there a response error defined that the server can/should return if it receives a GET request that exceeds this length?

This is in the context of a web service API, although it's interesting to see the browser limits as well.

possible duplicate of [What is the maximum length of a URL?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/417142/what-is-the-maximum-length-of-a-url) — KillianDS, Dec 25 '12 at 10:09
@KillianDS It has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the maximum length of a URL. The question is about the maximum length of a *request* that is sent *to* a URL. — user207421, Mar 26 '15 at 09:15
@JimAho your comment is a duplicate of the first comment too..... — Jun711, May 28 '18 at 17:22

score 520 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 26 '21 at 12:19

520

The limit is dependent on both the server and the client used (and if applicable, also the proxy the server or the client is using).

Most web servers have a limit of 8192 bytes (8 KB), which is usually configurable somewhere in the server configuration. As to the client side matter, the HTTP 1.1 specification even warns about this. Here's an extract of chapter 3.2.1:

Note: Servers ought to be cautious about depending on URI lengths above 255 bytes, because some older client or proxy implementations might not properly support these lengths.

The limit in Internet Explorer and Safari is about 2 KB, in Opera about 4 KB and in Firefox about 8 KB. We may thus assume that 8 KB is the maximum possible length and that 2 KB is a more affordable length to rely on at the server side and that 255 bytes is the safest length to assume that the entire URL will come in.

If the limit is exceeded in either the browser or the server, most will just truncate the characters outside the limit without any warning. Some servers however may send an HTTP 414 error.

If you need to send large data, then better use POST instead of GET. Its limit is much higher, but more dependent on the server used than the client. Usually up to around 2 GB is allowed by the average web server.

This is also configurable somewhere in the server settings. The average server will display a server-specific error/exception when the POST limit is exceeded, usually as an HTTP 500 error.

edited Feb 26 '21 at 12:19

shareef

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answered Apr 17 '10 at 20:44

BalusC

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You answer the question in terms of browser limitations. Do you know if there are any differences between GET and POST (in terms of problematic request size) if, say, HttpClient is used to interact with a REST server? – aioobe Feb 12 '13 at 21:50
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Sure, POST use the body to send the data. The HTTP specification doesn't impose a specific size limit for posts. – Ignacio A. Poletti Jul 17 '13 at 13:45
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It's perfectly allowed by the Http specs to put a body in GET and DELETE requests. I've tested it in Java, and it works. Unfortunately here again some proxys could cut the full body. – Nicolas Zozol Apr 11 '14 at 21:06
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Get and Post method has a very specific meaning, so using a POST to perform a GET is the same as using as using a hammer to break an egg. – nohros May 08 '15 at 15:17
I've also received a 413 response for this (from Solr), even though it really *should* have been a 414 according to the spec. – devios1 Jul 29 '15 at 22:27
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@nohros That's idealistically true, but GET also has limitations that POST/PUT do not. For example, suppose you want to perform a very long query involving a bunch of ids; if you're selecting on hundreds of ids, that can breach the limit of the allowable URL size, whereas putting that query in a POST can avoid that, even if it doesn't make as much sense conceptually. Personally, I wish HTTP allowed GET requests to have bodies just like PUT and POST. – devios1 Jul 29 '15 at 22:37
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Why is PUT not suggested as an alternative solution? It is idempotent, just like GET, so is that not actually more suitable than using POST? – Web User Feb 03 '17 at 20:03
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Some REST API's like to stick to the standard correct method when interacting with data. using POST on a route where you recieve ( GET ) something can be misleading. However, i do see the need for using the `body` to send lengthy data, where in GET the URL can only hold so much as explained in this answer. – Zac May 23 '19 at 01:35
Some REST APIs do not allow you to request data at all with anything other than GET (which is how it should be). There is no choice of a POST request in these cases. – BadHorsie Feb 19 '20 at 17:14
whats the usual max in 2022? – tgkprog May 28 '22 at 06:35

score 156 · Answer 2 · edited Jan 22 '20 at 23:56

You are asking two separate questions here:

What's the maximum length of an HTTP GET request?

As already mentioned, HTTP itself doesn't impose any hard-coded limit on request length; but browsers have limits ranging on the 2 KB - 8 KB (255 bytes if we count very old browsers).

Is there a response error defined that the server can/should return if it receives a GET request exceeds this length?

That's the one nobody has answered.

HTTP 1.1 defines status code 414 Request-URI Too Long for the cases where a server-defined limit is reached. You can see further details on RFC 2616.

For the case of client-defined limits, there isn't any sense on the server returning something, because the server won't receive the request at all.

score 40 · Answer 3 · edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:28

Browser limits are:

Browser           Address bar    document.location
                                 or anchor tag
---------------------------------------------------
Chrome                32779           >64k
Android                8192           >64k
Firefox                >64k           >64k
Safari                 >64k           >64k
Internet Explorer 11   2047           5120
Edge 16                2047          10240

Want more? See this question on Stack Overflow.

score 5 · Answer 4 · edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:06

5

Technically, I have seen HTTP GET will have issues if the URL length goes beyond 2000 characters. In that case, it's better to use HTTP POST or split the URL.

edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:06

Peter Mortensen

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answered Jun 25 '13 at 19:39

MSIslam

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score 5 · Answer 5 · edited Jan 22 '20 at 23:53

5

A similar question is here: Is there a limit to the length of a GET request?

I've hit the limit and on my shared hosting account, but the browser returned a blank page before it got to the server I think.

edited Jan 22 '20 at 23:53

Peter Mortensen

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answered Apr 17 '10 at 20:33

jay

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score 2 · Answer 6 · edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:17

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As already mentioned, HTTP itself doesn't impose any hard-coded limit on request length; but browsers have limits ranging on the 2048 character allowed in the GET method.

edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:17

Peter Mortensen

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answered Jul 08 '16 at 13:41

Sandeep Kumar

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score -6 · Answer 7 · edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:26

-6

Yes. There isn't any limit on a GET request.

I am able to send ~4000 characters as part of the query string using both the Chrome browser and curl command.

I am using Tomcat 8.x server which has returned the expected 200 OK response.

Here is the screenshot of a Google Chrome HTTP request (hiding the endpoint I tried due to security reasons):

RESPONSE

edited Jan 23 '20 at 00:26

Peter Mortensen

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answered Sep 03 '17 at 16:11

Lokendra Chauhan

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Maximum length of HTTP GET request

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