Sending HTTP Requests in Python with the requests Library

The Python requests library is the most popular way to make HTTP requests in Python. Whether you’re consuming a third-party API, scraping a webpage, or talking to your own backend, requests makes it clean and intuitive. Let’s cover everything you need to get started.

Installing and Making Your First Request

pip install requests

import requests

response = requests.get("https://api.github.com/users/kaikobud")

print(response.status_code)  # 200
print(response.json())       # Python dict of the response body

response.status_code tells you if the request succeeded (200 = OK, 404 = Not Found, etc.). response.json() parses the JSON response body automatically.

GET Requests with Query Parameters

params = {
    "q": "python flask",
    "sort": "stars",
    "per_page": 5
}

response = requests.get("https://api.github.com/search/repositories", params=params)
data = response.json()

for repo in data["items"]:
    print(repo["full_name"], repo["stargazers_count"])

Pass query parameters as a dictionary — requests handles URL encoding for you.

POST Requests with JSON

payload = {
    "title": "New Post",
    "body": "This is the content.",
    "userId": 1
}

response = requests.post(
    "https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts",
    json=payload  # automatically sets Content-Type: application/json
)

print(response.status_code)  # 201
print(response.json())

Adding Headers and Authentication

headers = {
    "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_API_TOKEN",
    "Accept": "application/json"
}

response = requests.get("https://api.example.com/me", headers=headers)

Error Handling

try:
    response = requests.get("https://api.example.com/data", timeout=5)
    response.raise_for_status()  # Raises an exception for 4xx/5xx responses
    data = response.json()
except requests.exceptions.Timeout:
    print("Request timed out")
except requests.exceptions.HTTPError as e:
    print(f"HTTP error: {e}")

Always set a timeout — without it, your code can hang indefinitely if the server doesn’t respond.

Conclusion

The Python requests library is essential for any developer working with APIs. GET, POST, headers, auth, error handling — you now have all the basics. Practice by hitting a free public API like JSONPlaceholder or GitHub’s API and building something small with the data.

Read next: Building a REST API with Python and Flask

External resource: Requests Library Documentation