Technology & Units
What Is JSON (JavaScript Object Notation)?
JSON is a lightweight text format for structured data, built on key-value pairs and arrays — the standard language of web APIs.
JSON is a human-readable text format for exchanging structured data, built from two structures: objects (collections of key-value pairs in braces) and arrays (ordered lists in brackets). Values can be strings, numbers, booleans, null, or nested objects and arrays.
Despite the name, JSON is language-independent and has become the default format for web APIs, configuration files and data storage. Strict syntax rules — double quotes only, no trailing commas, no comments — make validation tools essential when editing by hand.