How can I pretty-print JSON using JavaScript?

Question

How can I display JSON in an easy-to-read (for human readers) format? I'm looking primarily for indentation and whitespace, with perhaps even colors / font-styles / etc.

Answer 1

Here is a simple JSON format/color component written in React:

const HighlightedJSON = ({ json }: Object) => {
  const highlightedJSON = jsonObj =>
    Object.keys(jsonObj).map(key => {
      const value = jsonObj[key];
      let valueType = typeof value;
      const isSimpleValue =
        ["string", "number", "boolean"].includes(valueType) || !value;
      if (isSimpleValue && valueType === "object") {
        valueType = "null";
      }
      return (
        <div key={key} className="line">
          <span className="key">{key}:</span>
          {isSimpleValue ? (
            <span className={valueType}>{`${value}`}</span>
          ) : (
            highlightedJSON(value)
          )}
        </div>
      );
    });
  return <div className="json">{highlightedJSON(json)}</div>;
};

See it working in this CodePen: https://codepen.io/benshope/pen/BxVpjo

Hope that helps!

Answer 2

If you need this to work in a textarea the accepted solution will not work.

<textarea id='textarea'></textarea>

$("#textarea").append(formatJSON(JSON.stringify(jsonobject),true));

function formatJSON(json,textarea) {
    var nl;
    if(textarea) {
        nl = "
";
    } else {
        nl = "<br>";
    }
    var tab = "&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;";
    var ret = "";
    var numquotes = 0;
    var betweenquotes = false;
    var firstquote = false;
    for (var i = 0; i < json.length; i++) {
        var c = json[i];
        if(c == '"') {
            numquotes ++;
            if((numquotes + 2) % 2 == 1) {
                betweenquotes = true;
            } else {
                betweenquotes = false;
            }
            if((numquotes + 3) % 4 == 0) {
                firstquote = true;
            } else {
                firstquote = false;
            }
        }

        if(c == '[' && !betweenquotes) {
            ret += c;
            ret += nl;
            continue;
        }
        if(c == '{' && !betweenquotes) {
            ret += tab;
            ret += c;
            ret += nl;
            continue;
        }
        if(c == '"' && firstquote) {
            ret += tab + tab;
            ret += c;
            continue;
        } else if (c == '"' && !firstquote) {
            ret += c;
            continue;
        }
        if(c == ',' && !betweenquotes) {
            ret += c;
            ret += nl;
            continue;
        }
        if(c == '}' && !betweenquotes) {
            ret += nl;
            ret += tab;
            ret += c;
            continue;
        }
        if(c == ']' && !betweenquotes) {
            ret += nl;
            ret += c;
            continue;
        }
        ret += c;
    } // i loop
    return ret;
}

Answer 3

I ran into an issue today with @Pumbaa80's code. I'm trying to apply JSON syntax highlighting to data that I'm rendering in a Mithril view, so I need to create DOM nodes for everything in the JSON.stringify output.

I split the really long regex into its component parts as well.

render_json = (data) ->
  # wraps JSON data in span elements so that syntax highlighting may be
  # applied. Should be placed in a `whitespace: pre` context
  if typeof(data) isnt 'string'
    data = JSON.stringify(data, undefined, 2)
  unicode =     /"(\\u[a-zA-Z0-9]{4}|\\[^u]|[^\\"])*"(\s*:)?/
  keyword =     /\b(true|false|null)\b/
  whitespace =  /\s+/
  punctuation = /[,.}{\[\]]/
  number =      /-?\d+(?:\.\d*)?(?:[eE][+\-]?\d+)?/

  syntax = '(' + [unicode, keyword, whitespace,
            punctuation, number].map((r) -> r.source).join('|') + ')'
  parser = new RegExp(syntax, 'g')

  nodes = data.match(parser) ? []
  select_class = (node) ->
    if punctuation.test(node)
      return 'punctuation'
    if /^\s+$/.test(node)
      return 'whitespace'
    if /^\"/.test(node)
      if /:$/.test(node)
        return 'key'
      return 'string'

    if /true|false/.test(node)
      return 'boolean'

     if /null/.test(node)
       return 'null'
     return 'number'
  return nodes.map (node) ->
    cls = select_class(node)
    return Mithril('span', {class: cls}, node)

Code in context on Github here

Answer 4

If you use net.sf.json, you can pretty print as follows (using a 4 space indentation):

JSONObject work = JSONObject.fromObject("{\"hi\":\"there\",\"more\":\"stuff\"}");
log.info("WORK="+work.toString(4));

Answer 5

var jsonObj = {"streetLabel": "Avenue Anatole France", "city": "Paris 07",  "postalCode": "75007", "countryCode": "FRA",  "countryLabel": "France" };

document.getElementById("result-before").innerHTML = JSON.stringify(jsonObj);

In case of displaying in HTML, you should to add a balise <pre></pre>

document.getElementById("result-after").innerHTML = "<pre>"+JSON.stringify(jsonObj,undefined, 2) +"</pre>"

Example:

var jsonObj = {"streetLabel": "Avenue Anatole France", "city": "Paris 07",  "postalCode": "75007", "countryCode": "FRA",  "countryLabel": "France" };

document.getElementById("result-before").innerHTML = JSON.stringify(jsonObj);

document.getElementById("result-after").innerHTML = "<pre>"+JSON.stringify(jsonObj,undefined, 2) +"</pre>"

div { float:left; clear:both; margin: 1em 0; }

<div id="result-before"></div>
<div id="result-after"></div>

Answer 6

It works well:

console.table()

Read more here: https://developer.mozilla.org/pt-BR/docs/Web/API/Console/table