HTTP Method (HTTP Verb)

Table of Contents

About

HTTP method defines a set of request methods to indicate the purpose of the request and what is expected if the request is successful1. Often referred to as an HTTP verb (even though they can be nouns), and it indicates the action that the HTTP request expects from the queried server2.

Two of the most common HTTP methods are ‘GET’ request, which expects information back in return, and ‘POST’ request, which typically indicates the client is submitting information to the web server e.g. information such as submitted password and username.

Types of HTTP methods/ requests

  1. GET method
  2. HEAD
  3. POST method
  4. PUT method
  5. DELETE method
  6. CONNECT
  7. OPTIONS
  8. TRACE
  9. PATCH method

HTTP method semantics

Each request method has its own semantics, but some characteristics are shared across multiple methods, specifically request methods can be safe , idempotent , or cacheable.

MethodSafeIdempotentCacheable
GETYesYesYes
HEADYesYesYes
OPTIONSYesYesNo
TRACEYesYesNo
PUTNoYesNo
DELETENoYesNo
POSTNoNoConditional^
PATCHNoNoConditional^
CONNECTNoNoNo

^ POST and PATCH are cacheable when responses explicitly include freshness information and a matching Content-Location header.

Anki

References

  1. Mozilla Developer Network. “HTTP method”. Available at: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Methods . (Accessed: [2025-05-06 Tue 17:47]). ↩︎

  2. Cloud Flare. “Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)”. Available at: https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/ddos/glossary/hypertext-transfer-protocol-http/ . (Accessed: [2025-05-06 Tue 04:42]). ↩︎

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