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httr

Status

httr is superseded: only changes necessary to keep it on CRAN will be made. We recommend using httr2 instead.


The aim of httr is to provide a wrapper for the curl package, customised to the demands of modern web APIs.

Key features:

  • Functions for the most important http verbs: GET(), HEAD(), PATCH(), PUT(), DELETE() and POST().

  • Automatic connection sharing across requests to the same website (by default, curl handles are managed automatically), cookies are maintained across requests, and a up-to-date root-level SSL certificate store is used.

  • Requests return a standard reponse object that captures the http status line, headers and body, along with other useful information.

    • Response content is available with content() as a raw vector (as = "raw"), a character vector (as = "text"), or parsed into an R object (as = "parsed"), currently for html, xml, json, png and jpeg.

    • You can convert http errors into R errors with stop_for_status().

  • Config functions make it easier to modify the request in common ways: set_cookies(), add_headers(), authenticate(), use_proxy(), verbose(), timeout(), content_type(), accept(), progress().

  • Support for OAuth 1.0 and 2.0 with oauth1.0_token() and oauth2.0_token(). The demo directory has eight OAuth demos: four for 1.0 (twitter, vimeo, withings and yahoo) and four for 2.0 (facebook, github, google, linkedin). OAuth credentials are automatically cached within a project.

httr wouldn't be possible without the hard work of the authors of curl and libcurl. Thanks! httr is inspired by http libraries in other languages, such as Resty, Requests and httparty.

Installation

To get the current released version from CRAN:

install.packages("httr")

To get the current development version from github:

# install.packages("pak")
pak::pak("r-lib/httr")

Code of Conduct

Please note that the httr project is released with a Contributor Code of Conduct. By contributing to this project, you agree to abide by its terms.

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Version

Install

install.packages('httr')

Monthly Downloads

945,958

Version

1.4.8

License

MIT + file LICENSE

Issues

Pull Requests

Stars

Forks

Maintainer

Hadley Wickham

Last Published

February 13th, 2026

Functions in httr (1.4.8)

handle_pool

Maintain a pool of handles.
headers

Extract the headers from a response
content_type

Set content-type and accept headers.
content

Extract content from a request.
hmac_sha1

HMAC SHA1
has_content

Does the request have content associated with it?
cache_info

Compute caching information for a response.
config

Set curl options.
insensitive

Create a vector with case insensitive name matching.
init_oauth2.0

Retrieve OAuth 2.0 access token.
parse_url

Parse and build urls according to RFC3986.
progress

Add a progress bar.
modify_url

Modify a url.
jwt_signature

Generate a JWT signature given credentials.
parse_http_date

Parse and print http dates.
httr_options

List available options.
init_oauth1.0

Retrieve OAuth 1.0 access token.
parse_media

Parse a media type.
sha1_hash

SHA1 hash
oauth_endpoints

Popular oauth endpoints.
oauth_endpoint

Describe an OAuth endpoint.
verbose

Give verbose output.
get_callback

Install or uninstall a callback function
with_config

Execute code with configuration set.
http_type

Extract the content type of a response
cookies

Access cookies in a response.
http_status

Give information on the status of a request.
write_stream

Process output in a streaming manner.
sign_oauth

Sign an OAuth request
add_headers

Add additional headers to a request.
revoke_all

Revoke all OAuth tokens in the cache.
response

The response object.
http_condition

Generate a classed http condition.
oauth1.0_token

Generate an oauth1.0 token.
oauth2.0_token

Generate an oauth2.0 token.
http_error

Check for an http error.
stop_for_status

Take action on http error.
set_cookies

Set cookies.
authenticate

Use http authentication.
set_config

Set (and reset) global httr configuration.
oauth_listener

Create a webserver to listen for OAuth callback.
status_code

Extract status code from response.
httr_dr

Diagnose common configuration problems
write_disk

Control where the response body is written.
write_function

S3 object to define response writer.
httr-package

httr makes http easy.
oauth_exchanger

Walk the user through the OAuth2 dance without a local webserver.
oauth_service_token

Generate OAuth token for service accounts.
oauth_app

Create an OAuth application.
oauth_callback

The oauth callback url.
oauth_signature

Generate oauth signature.
use_proxy

Use a proxy to connect to the internet.
upload_file

Upload a file with POST() or PUT().
timeout

Set maximum request time.
user_agent

Set user agent.
PUT

Send PUT request to server.
BROWSE

Open specified url in browser.
Token-class

OAuth token objects.
GET

GET a url.
PATCH

Send PATCH request to a server.
DELETE

Send a DELETE request.
VERB

VERB a url.
HEAD

Get url HEADers.
POST

POST file to a server.
RETRY

Retry a request until it succeeds.
guess_media

Guess the media type of a path from its extension.
handle

Create a handle tied to a particular host.