What is the difference between a request payload and request body?

http request payload
Ankur Garg picture Ankur Garg · Feb 27, 2014 · Viewed 32.8k times · Source

I am learning HTTP. I enclose a request payload in XML or JSON format in my POST requests. What I wanted to know is whether a request payload and request body mean the same thing?

Answer

Satyam picture Satyam · Jan 5, 2016

Definition of: payload : The "actual data" in a packet or file minus all headers attached for transport and minus all descriptive meta-data. In a network packet, headers are appended to the payload for transport and then discarded at their destination.

Edit: In Http protocol, an http packet has http headers and http payload.So payload section of http packet may or may not have a body depending upon the type of request (e.g. POST vs GET). So payload and body are not the same thing.

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