# GitLab API Automate GitLab via a simple and powerful API. All definitions can be found under [`/lib/api`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/tree/master/lib/api). ## Resources Documentation for various API resources can be found separately in the following locations: - [Users](users.md) - [Session](session.md) - [Projects](projects.md) including setting Webhooks - [Project Snippets](project_snippets.md) - [Services](services.md) - [Repositories](repositories.md) - [Repository Files](repository_files.md) - [Commits](commits.md) - [Tags](tags.md) - [Branches](branches.md) - [Merge Requests](merge_requests.md) - [Issues](issues.md) - [Labels](labels.md) - [Milestones](milestones.md) - [Notes](notes.md) (comments) - [Deploy Keys](deploy_keys.md) - [System Hooks](system_hooks.md) - [Groups](groups.md) - [Namespaces](namespaces.md) - [Settings](settings.md) - [Keys](keys.md) - [Builds](builds.md) - [Build triggers](build_triggers.md) - [Build Variables](build_variables.md) - [Runners](runners.md) ## Authentication All API requests require authentication. You need to pass a `private_token` parameter via query string or header. If passed as a header, the header name must be `PRIVATE-TOKEN` (uppercase and with a dash instead of an underscore). You can find or reset your private token in your account page (`/profile/account`). If `private_token` is invalid or omitted, then an error message will be returned with status code `401`: ```json { "message": "401 Unauthorized" } ``` API requests should be prefixed with `api` and the API version. The API version is defined in [`lib/api.rb`][lib-api-url]. Example of a valid API request: ```shell GET https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/projects?private_token=9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK ``` Example of a valid API request using cURL and authentication via header: ```shell curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: 9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK" "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/projects" ``` The API uses JSON to serialize data. You don't need to specify `.json` at the end of an API URL. ## Authentication with OAuth2 token Instead of the `private_token` you can transmit the OAuth2 access token as a header or as a parameter. Example of OAuth2 token as a parameter: ```shell curl https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/user?access_token=OAUTH-TOKEN ``` Example of OAuth2 token as a header: ```shell curl -H "Authorization: Bearer OAUTH-TOKEN" https://example.com/api/v3/user ``` Read more about [GitLab as an OAuth2 client](oauth2.md). ## Status codes The API is designed to return different status codes according to context and action. This way, if a request results in an error, the caller is able to get insight into what went wrong. The following table gives an overview of how the API functions generally behave. | Request type | Description | | ------------ | ----------- | | `GET` | Access one or more resources and return the result as JSON. | | `POST` | Return `201 Created` if the resource is successfully created and return the newly created resource as JSON. | | `GET` / `PUT` / `DELETE` | Return `200 OK` if the resource is accessed, modified or deleted successfully. The (modified) result is returned as JSON. | | `DELETE` | Designed to be idempotent, meaning a request to a resource still returns `200 OK` even it was deleted before or is not available. The reasoning behind this, is that the user is not really interested if the resource existed before or not. | The following table shows the possible return codes for API requests. | Return values | Description | | ------------- | ----------- | | `200 OK` | The `GET`, `PUT` or `DELETE` request was successful, the resource(s) itself is returned as JSON. | | `201 Created` | The `POST` request was successful and the resource is returned as JSON. | | `400 Bad Request` | A required attribute of the API request is missing, e.g., the title of an issue is not given. | | `401 Unauthorized` | The user is not authenticated, a valid [user token](#authentication) is necessary. | | `403 Forbidden` | The request is not allowed, e.g., the user is not allowed to delete a project. | | `404 Not Found` | A resource could not be accessed, e.g., an ID for a resource could not be found. | | `405 Method Not Allowed` | The request is not supported. | | `409 Conflict` | A conflicting resource already exists, e.g., creating a project with a name that already exists. | | `422 Unprocessable` | The entity could not be processed. | | `500 Server Error` | While handling the request something went wrong server-side. | ## Sudo All API requests support performing an API call as if you were another user, provided your private token is from an administrator account. You need to pass the `sudo` parameter either via query string or a header with an ID/username of the user you want to perform the operation as. If passed as a header, the header name must be `SUDO` (uppercase). If a non administrative `private_token` is provided, then an error message will be returned with status code `403`: ```json { "message": "403 Forbidden: Must be admin to use sudo" } ``` If the sudo user ID or username cannot be found, an error message will be returned with status code `404`: ```json { "message": "404 Not Found: No user id or username for: " } ``` --- Example of a valid API call and a request using cURL with sudo request, providing a username: ```shell GET /projects?private_token=9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK&sudo=username ``` ```shell curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: 9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK" --header "SUDO: username" "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/projects" ``` Example of a valid API call and a request using cURL with sudo request, providing an ID: ```shell GET /projects?private_token=9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK&sudo=23 ``` ```shell curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: 9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK" --header "SUDO: 23" "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/projects" ``` ## Pagination Sometimes the returned result will span across many pages. When listing resources you can pass the following parameters: | Parameter | Description | | --------- | ----------- | | `page` | Page number (default: `1`) | | `per_page`| Number of items to list per page (default: `20`, max: `100`) | In the example below, we list 50 [namespaces](namespaces.md) per page. ```bash curl -X PUT -H "PRIVATE-TOKEN: 9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK" "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/namespaces?per_page=50 ``` ### Pagination Link header [Link headers](http://www.w3.org/wiki/LinkHeader) are sent back with each response. They have `rel` set to prev/next/first/last and contain the relevant URL. Please use these links instead of generating your own URLs. In the cURL example below, we limit the output to 3 items per page (`per_page=3`) and we request the second page (`page=2`) of [comments](notes.md) of the issue with ID `8` which belongs to the project with ID `8`: ```bash curl -I -H "PRIVATE-TOKEN: 9koXpg98eAheJpvBs5tK" https://gitlab.example.com/api/v3/projects/8/issues/8/notes?per_page=3&page=2 ``` The response will then be: ``` HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control: no-cache Content-Length: 1103 Content-Type: application/json Date: Mon, 18 Jan 2016 09:43:18 GMT Link: ; rel="prev", ; rel="next", ; rel="first", ; rel="last" Status: 200 OK Vary: Origin X-Next-Page: 3 X-Page: 2 X-Per-Page: 3 X-Prev-Page: 1 X-Request-Id: 732ad4ee-9870-4866-a199-a9db0cde3c86 X-Runtime: 0.108688 X-Total: 8 X-Total-Pages: 3 ``` ### Other pagination headers Additional pagination headers are also sent back. | Header | Description | | ------ | ----------- | | `X-Total` | The total number of items | | `X-Total-Pages` | The total number of pages | | `X-Per-Page` | The number of items per page | | `X-Page` | The index of the current page (starting at 1) | | `X-Next-Page` | The index of the next page | | `X-Prev-Page` | The index of the previous page | ## `id` vs `iid` When you work with the API, you may notice two similar fields in API entities: `id` and `iid`. The main difference between them is scope. For example, an issue might have `id: 46` and `iid: 5`. | Parameter | Description | | --------- | ----------- | | `id` | Is unique across all issues and is used for any API call | | `iid` | Is unique only in scope of a single project. When you browse issues or merge requests with the Web UI, you see the `iid` | That means that if you want to get an issue via the API you should use the `id`: ```bash GET /projects/42/issues/:id ``` On the other hand, if you want to create a link to a web page you should use the `iid`: ```bash GET /projects/42/issues/:iid ``` ## Data validation and error reporting When working with the API you may encounter validation errors, in which case the API will answer with an HTTP `400` status. Such errors appear in two cases: - A required attribute of the API request is missing, e.g., the title of an issue is not given - An attribute did not pass the validation, e.g., user bio is too long When an attribute is missing, you will get something like: ``` HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request Content-Type: application/json { "message":"400 (Bad request) \"title\" not given" } ``` When a validation error occurs, error messages will be different. They will hold all details of validation errors: ``` HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request Content-Type: application/json { "message": { "bio": [ "is too long (maximum is 255 characters)" ] } } ``` This makes error messages more machine-readable. The format can be described as follows: ```json { "message": { "": [ "", "", ... ], "": { "": [ "", "", ... ], } } } ``` ## Clients There are many unofficial GitLab API Clients for most of the popular programming languages. Visit the [GitLab website] for a complete list. [GitLab website]: https://about.gitlab.com/applications/#api-clients "Clients using the GitLab API" [lib-api-url]: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/tree/master/lib/api/api.rb