How do I parse JSON in JavaScript?

In JavaScript you parse JSON with the built-in JSON.parse(), which turns a JSON string into a JavaScript object. To go the other way, JSON.stringify() converts an object back into a JSON string. No library is needed.

// String -> object
const obj = JSON.parse('{ "name": "Ada", "age": 36 }');
console.log(obj.name); // "Ada"

// Object -> string
const text = JSON.stringify(obj);

// Pretty-printed with 2-space indent
const pretty = JSON.stringify(obj, null, 2);

Handle invalid JSON safely

JSON.parse throws a SyntaxError on malformed input, so wrap it in a try/catch:

try {
  const data = JSON.parse(input);
} catch (err) {
  console.error("Invalid JSON:", err.message);
}

Fetching JSON from an API

const res = await fetch("/api/users");
const data = await res.json(); // parses automatically

Before parsing, make sure the JSON is valid by pasting it into the validator. Reading data in another language? See JSON in Python.