JSON Viewer
Paste JSON to explore it as a collapsible tree. Runs locally in your browser.
Need to select values from nested data? Use the JSONPath Tester.
What is a JSON viewer?
A JSON viewer presents a JSON document as a structured tree instead of a wall of text.
How to use this viewer
- Paste JSON in the input panel.
- Click View JSON - or press ⌘/Ctrl + Enter.
- Click any object or array to expand or collapse it.
- Copy a value or JSON path using the copy icons.
Exploring API responses and config files
Paste a raw API response here when you need to find one field inside a payload you don't fully know the shape of - collapse the tree down to its top-level keys, then drill into just the branch you care about, such as data or meta, without scrolling past everything else. The same approach works for a large config file: expand only the section you're editing and leave the rest collapsed so it doesn't distract from the part that matters right now.
Reading nested objects and arrays
Each object and array in the tree can be expanded or collapsed independently, so you can open a deeply nested value - say, the third item in an array, three levels inside an object - without also expanding every sibling at each level along the way. This makes it easy to compare two similarly-shaped entries in an array side by side, one expanded and one still collapsed, or to confirm exactly how many items an array contains just by glancing at its collapsed summary.
Working with large or deeply nested JSON
Because the tree only renders the branches you've expanded, pasting a very large document doesn't mean rendering it all at once - a response with thousands of array items stays responsive as long as most of it is left collapsed. Extremely deep nesting (many dozens of levels) is rarer in practice but still navigable one level at a time; if you only need to confirm a document's overall shape rather than inspect specific values, keep everything collapsed and read just the top-level key names and array lengths.
Viewer vs. formatter
A formatter is for producing text - indented JSON you'll copy, save, or hand to something else. A viewer is for reading: it never changes or outputs the JSON, it just gives you a collapsible way to explore data that's already there. Use the formatter when you need a clean text version of the JSON; use the viewer when you're trying to understand or navigate its structure.
Frequently asked questions
- How is this different from just formatting the JSON?
- A formatter still gives you a flat block of indented text you have to scroll and scan. A viewer turns the same data into a tree you can collapse - so a response with hundreds of fields can be shrunk down to just the top-level keys, then expanded only where you need to look.
- What's the best way to explore a large API response?
- Collapse everything first, then expand one branch at a time toward the field you're looking for. Scanning a collapsed tree top-down is much faster than scrolling through thousands of lines of formatted text looking for one nested value.
- What is a JSON path, and why would I copy one?
- A JSON path is a compact string, like data.users[2].email, that pinpoints one exact value inside the document. Copying it is useful for telling a teammate exactly where a value lives, or for writing a test assertion or a script that reads that same field.
- Does deep nesting slow the viewer down?
- Not meaningfully for typical API responses or config files. Deeply nested or very large documents (tens of thousands of keys) can take longer to parse initially, but the tree only renders what's currently expanded, so browsing stays responsive even when the full document is large.
- Can I use this to double-check a config file before deploying it?
- Yes - collapsing a large config down to its top-level sections makes it easy to confirm a specific setting is nested where you expect, or to spot a section that's missing entirely, before you trust it in production.
Related tools
Query nested JSON values with JSONPath.
Format, beautify, and validate JSON.
Check whether JSON is syntactically valid.
Produce compact single-line JSON.
Compare two JSON documents.
Convert an array of JSON objects into CSV.
Convert CSV back into JSON.
Convert JSON into readable YAML.
Convert YAML back to JSON.
Escape text into a JSON string literal.