Yes there are a couple of standards (albeit some liberties on the definition of standard) that have emerged:

  1. JSON API - JSON API covers creating and updating resources as well, not just responses.
  2. JSend - Simple and probably what you are already doing.
  3. OData JSON Protocol - Very complicated.
  4. HAL - Like OData but aiming to be HATEOAS like.

There are also JSON API description formats:

  • Swagger
    • JSON Schema (used by swagger but you could use it stand alone)
  • WADL in JSON
  • RAML
  • HAL because HATEOAS in theory is self describing.
Answer from Adam Gent on Stack Overflow
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JSON:API
jsonapi.org › examples
JSON:API — Examples
Note: The above example URI shows unencoded [ and ] characters simply for readability. In practice, these characters should be percent-encoded, as noted in the base specification. See “Square Brackets in Parameter Names”. Here we want articles objects to have fields title, body and author only and people objects to have name field only. HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json { "data": [{ "type": "articles", "id": "1", "attributes": { "title": "JSON:API paints my bikeshed!", "body": "The shortest article.
Discussions

[HOW TO] Get and parse JSON data in Tasker
Nice share and usage of the how to tag. Taskerlinks Mitch Joke More on reddit.com
🌐 r/tasker
27
37
August 4, 2014
Invoke-RestMethod output to file is trimming my response, nothing I do will give me the full response. Any ideas?

Per Ansgar Wiechers at Stack Overflow I have to convert the result to Json. He answered as soon as I posted but I am copying his response here in case someone else runs into the same issue.

Invoke-RestMethod returns the result as a PowerShell object data structure. Convert it to JSON before writing it to a file:

Invoke-RestMethod ... | ConvertTo-Json -Depth 10 | Out-File ...
More on reddit.com
🌐 r/PowerShell
12
22
April 3, 2017
Testing REST API but not sure how to get nested JSON objects
I don't want to be a buzzkill, but as Logan Ninefingers always says, you have to be realistic. So please try to take this as constructive criticism. Even if you get our help solving this problem, the fact you spent two days on it yourself and couldn't find something as basic as using a JSON parsing library means you're really not ready for this job. The next round of interviews is going to tear you down. If by some miracle you pass the process then you're likely to underperform on the job and very quickly get fired, and have a very short job in your work history that you'll need to be able to explain. If you truly aren't ready for this job, then spend some time doing self study before continuing the interview process. That way you don't burn future interview bridges by having bad interviews with companies. At the very least, if this one crashes and burns, then don't interview elsewhere until you're more confident in your own skills and can handle these problems without asking others to help. That's the long term path to success in this field. You simply have to excel at figuring stuff out on your own. More on reddit.com
🌐 r/softwaretesting
13
7
March 20, 2020
Standardizing REST API response structure?
I don't find including a successful boolean in the response body very helpful since the status code already gives you that info. Laravel returns a consistent JSON response for validation exceptions that looks similar to your example. You can specify how other exceptions should be rendered in the exception handler or on the exception itself . Eloquent resources will wrap successful responses in a data key by default . If you need any other metadata it's easy to add that too . On the client side if you are using the Axios HTTP client interceptors make it straightforward to handle error responses in one place. More on reddit.com
🌐 r/laravel
7
5
March 20, 2020
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ReqBin
reqbin.com › req › chcn9woc › rest-api-get-example
How do I get JSON from a REST API endpoint?
To get data from the REST API server, you must send an HTTP GET request with an "Accept: application/json" request header. The server informs the client that it has returned JSON by sending "Content-Type: application/json" in response.
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Medium
medium.com › @sunitparekh › guidelines-on-json-responses-for-restful-services-1ba7c0c015d
Guidelines on JSON responses for RESTful services | by Sunit Parekh | Medium
April 3, 2018 - Use of response header is key in the above example. Next-Page response header tells client that I have more data (next page) available. And such headers can be really useful for loading next pages on scroll. However, when I look at API like elasticsearch I get convinced that Option 2 is also right. Choose one for the project and follow it. Now it’s time to get inside the JSON fields.
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JSON:API
jsonapi.org
JSON:API — A specification for building APIs in JSON
}, "relationships": { "author": { "data": { "type": "people", "id": "2" } } }, "links": { "self": "http://example.com/comments/5" } }, { "type": "comments", "id": "12", "attributes": { "body": "I like XML better" }, "relationships": { "author": { "data": { "type": "people", "id": "9" } } }, "links": { "self": "http://example.com/comments/12" } }] } The response above contains the first in a collection of “articles”, as well as links to subsequent members in that collection. It also contains resources linked to the article, including its author and comments. Last but not least, links are provided that can be used to fetch or update any of these resources. JSON:API covers creating and updating resources as well, not just responses.
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Atlassian
developer.atlassian.com › server › crowd › json-requests-and-responses
JSON requests and responses
As an example, the following command attempts to authenticate a user by password with a JSON request: 1 2 · curl -i -u application_name:application_password --data '{"value": "my_password"}' http://localhost:8095/crowd/rest/usermanagement/1/authentication?username=my_username --header ...
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Treblle
treblle.com › blog › create-simple-rest-api-json
How to Create a Simple REST API With JSON Responses - Treblle
Learn how to build a simple REST API that returns JSON responses using Node.js and Express. This step-by-step guide walks you through project setup, creating routes, handling different HTTP methods, and testing your endpoints—perfect for beginners diving into API development.
Find elsewhere
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CRAN
cran.r-project.org › web › packages › jsonlite › vignettes › json-apis.html
Fetching JSON data from REST APIs - CRAN
The code below includes some example keys for illustration purposes. #search for articles article_key <- "&api-key=b75da00e12d54774a2d362adddcc9bef" url <- "http://api.nytimes.com/svc/search/v2/articlesearch.json?q=obamacare+socialism" req <- fromJSON(paste0(url, article_key)) articles <- req$response$docs colnames(articles)
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MDN Web Docs
developer.mozilla.org › en-US › docs › Web › API › Response › json
Response: json() method - Web APIs | MDN
const myList = document.querySelector("ul"); const myRequest = new Request("products.json"); fetch(myRequest) .then((response) => response.json()) .then((data) => { for (const product of data.products) { const listItem = document.createElement("li"); listItem.appendChild(document.createElement("strong")).textContent = product.Name; listItem.append(` can be found in ${product.Location}. Cost: `); listItem.appendChild(document.createElement("strong")).textContent = `£${product.Price}`; myList.appendChild(listItem); } }) .catch(console.error);
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ReqBin
reqbin.com › req › v0crmky0 › rest-api-post-example
How do I post JSON to a REST API endpoint?
To post JSON to a REST API endpoint, ... application/json request header. In this REST API POST example, we also send the Accept: application/json request header to tell the REST API server that the API client expects JSON in response....
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GeeksforGeeks
geeksforgeeks.org › spring-rest-json-response
Spring - REST JSON Response - GeeksforGeeks
March 24, 2025 - The below image demonstrates the communication between a Spring Application (REST API) and a front-end framework, where requests are sent from the front-end and JSON responses are returned.
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GitHub
gist.github.com › igorjs › 407ffc3126f6ef2a6fe8f918a0673b59
REST API response format based on some of the best practices · GitHub
REST API response format based ... single item - HTTP Response Code: 200 · HTTP/1.1 200 Content-Type: application/json { "id": 10, "name": "shirt", "color": "red", "price": "$23" } 2- GET - Get item list - HTTP Response Code: ...
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Wyday
wyday.com › limelm › help › api › response.json
JSON Response Format • LimeLM
function jsonLimeLMApi(rsp){ if (rsp.stat !== "ok"){ // something broke! return; } for (var i=0; i < rsp.pkeys.pkey.length; i++){ var pkey = rsp.pkeys.pkey[i]; var div = document.createElement('div'); var txt = document.createTextNode(pkey.key); div.appendChild(txt); document.body.appendChild(div); } } Failure responses also call the jsonLimeLMApi() method, but with a different JSON object.
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Medium
medium.com › @bojanmajed › standard-json-api-response-format-c6c1aabcaa6d
Standard JSON API response format | by MaJeD BoJaN | Medium
March 31, 2020 - This is not global standard format for RESTful API’s but we follow it in most of our applications in our company if you liked feel free to design your API’s and i will encourage you to have a look at this repo it has rails api template with Dry base controller and all these responses built in it.
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HowToDoInJava
howtodoinjava.com › home › spring rest › json example
Spring REST JSON Response Example
December 19, 2021 - In this spring rest tutorial, we will learn to write RESTFul APIs capable of returning JSON representations of resources using MappingJackson2JsonView and @ResponseBody annotations.
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Stack Overflow
stackoverflow.blog › 2020 › 03 › 02 › best-practices-for-rest-api-design
Best practices for REST API design - Stack Overflow
For example, suppose you wanted to return the author of particular comments. You could use /articles/:articleId/comments/:commentId/author. But that's getting out of hand. Instead, return the URI for that particular user within the JSON response ...
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Apidog
apidog.com › blog › json-api-responses
Mastering API Responses: The Definitive Guide to JSON Formatting
July 21, 2025 - Status Code: Indicates the result of the API call, such as success or error. Headers: Provide metadata about the response, like content type and cache directives. Body: Contains the actual data payload, formatted as a JSON object or array. For example, a successful response from an API might look like this:
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Red Hat
docs.redhat.com › en › documentation › red_hat_satellite › 6.3 › html › api_guide › sect-api_guide-understanding_the_json_response_format
2.2. Understanding the JSON Response Format | API Guide | Red Hat Satellite | 6.3 | Red Hat Documentation
$ curl -X GET -k -u admin:password https://satellite6.example.com/api/domains | python -m json.tool { "total": 3, "subtotal": 3, "page": 1, "per_page": 20, "search": null, "sort": { "by": null, "order": null }, "results": [ { "id": 23, "name": "qa.lab.example.com", "fullname": "QA", "dns_id": 10, "created_at": "2013-08-13T09:02:31Z", "updated_at": "2013-08-13T09:02:31Z" }, { "id": 25, "name": "sat.lab.example.com", "fullname": "SATLAB", "dns_id": 8, "created_at": "2013-08-13T08:32:48Z", "updated_at": "2013-08-14T07:04:03Z" }, { "id": 32, "name": "hr.lab.example.com", "fullname": "HR", "dns_id": 8, "created_at": "2013-08-16T08:32:48Z", "updated_at": "2013-08-16T07:04:03Z" } ] }
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ReqBin
reqbin.com › req › 4gvqbdi1 › json-response-format-example
What is the correct JSON Response Format?
December 23, 2022 - As an example, if the server is capable of accepting both JSON and XML content types on one endpoint, a "Content-Type: application/json" will tell the server to interpret the body data as JSON, whereas a "Content-Type: application/xml" will ...