5/4/2020 HTTP Methods GET vs POST

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HTTP Request Methods

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The two most common HTTP methods are: GET and POST.

What is HTTP?
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is designed to enable communications between
clients and servers.

HTTP works as a request-response protocol between a client and server.

A web browser may be the client, and an application on a computer that hosts a web
site may be the server.

Example: A client (browser) submits an HTTP request to the server; then the server
returns a response to the client. The response contains status information about the
request and may also contain the requested content.

HTTP Methods
GET
POST
PUT
HEAD
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DELETE
PATCH
OPTIONS

The GET Method

GET is used to request data from a specified resource.

GET is one of the most common HTTP methods.

Note that the query string (name/value pairs) is sent in the URL of a GET request:

/test/demo_form.php?name1=value1&name2=value2

Some other notes on GET requests:

GET requests can be cached

GET requests remain in the browser history
GET requests can be bookmarked
GET requests should never be used when dealing with sensitive data
GET requests have length restrictions
GET requests are only used to request data (not modify)

The POST Method

POST is used to send data to a server to create/update a resource.

The data sent to the server with POST is stored in the request body of the HTTP request:

POST /test/demo_form.php HTTP/1.1

Host: w3schools.com
name1=value1&name2=value2

POST is one of the most common HTTP methods.

Some other notes on POST requests:

POST requests are never cached

POST requests do not remain in the browser history
POST requests cannot be bookmarked

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POST requests have no restrictions on data length

The PUT Method

PUT is used to send data to a server to create/update a resource.

The difference between POST and PUT is that PUT requests are idempotent. That is,
calling the same PUT request multiple times will always produce the same result. In
contrast, calling a POST request repeatedly have side effects of creating the same
resource multiple times.

The HEAD Method

HEAD is almost identical to GET, but without the response body.

In other words, if GET /users returns a list of users, then HEAD /users will make the
same request but will not return the list of users.

HEAD requests are useful for checking what a GET request will return before actually
making a GET request - like before downloading a large file or response body.

The DELETE Method

The DELETE method deletes the specified resource.

The OPTIONS Method

The OPTIONS method describes the communication options for the target
resource.

Compare GET vs. POST

The following table compares the two HTTP methods: GET and POST.

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GET POST

BACK button/Reload Harmless Data will be re-submitted

(the browser should alert the
user that the data are about
to be re-submitted)

Bookmarked Can be bookmarked Cannot be bookmarked

Cached Can be cached Not cached

Encoding type application/x-www-form- application/x-www-form-

urlencoded urlencoded or
multipart/form-data. Use
multipart encoding for binary
data

History Parameters remain in Parameters are not saved in

browser history browser history

Restrictions on data Yes, when sending data, the No restrictions

length GET method adds the data
to the URL; and the length
of a URL is limited
(maximum URL length is
2048 characters)

Restrictions on data Only ASCII characters No restrictions. Binary data

type allowed is also allowed

Security GET is less secure compared POST is a little safer than

to POST because data sent GET because the parameters
is part of the URL are not stored in browser
history or in web server logs
Never use GET when
sending passwords or other
sensitive information!

Visibility Data is visible to everyone in Data is not displayed in the

the URL URL

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