v. Multiple Errors

Multiple Errors

When multiple errors occur in response to a single request, the server can simply add each error to the errors array:

HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request
Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json

{
  "errors": [
    {
      "status": "403",
      "source": { "pointer": "/data/attributes/secret-powers" },
      "detail": "Editing secret powers is not authorized on Sundays."
    },
    {
      "status": "422",
      "source": { "pointer": "/data/attributes/volume" },
      "detail": "Volume does not, in fact, go to 11."
    },
    {
      "status": "500",
      "source": { "pointer": "/data/attributes/reputation" },
      "title": "The backend responded with an error",
      "detail": "Reputation service not responding after three requests."
    }
  ]
}

The only uniqueness constraint on error objects is the id field. Thus, multiple errors on the same attribute can each be given their own error object. The example below shows multiple errors on the "first-name" attribute:

HTTP/1.1 422 Unprocessable Entity
Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json

{
  "errors": [
    {
      "source": { "pointer": "/data/attributes/first-name" },
      "title": "Invalid Attribute",
      "detail": "First name must contain at least three characters."
    },
    {
      "source": { "pointer": "/data/attributes/first-name" },
      "title": "Invalid Attribute",
      "detail": "First name must contain an emoji."
    }
  ]
}

Note: in the responses above with a 422 status code, 400 Bad Request would also be acceptable. (More details.) JSON API doesn’t take a position on 400 vs. 422.

---

Source(s):

• http://jsonapi.org/examples/#error-objects-multiple-errors