Compare JSON

Compare two JSON files and list every difference by path

A text diff of two JSON files is noisy: reordered keys, changed indentation and a reformatted number all show up as changes even when the data is the same. Compare JSON reads both files as data and reports what actually differs: which values were added, which were removed, which changed, and which changed type.

Upload the two files. The report is a table with one row per difference and the path to it in a compact notation, such as the city inside the address of the fourth customer, followed by the value in each file. Changing 1 to 1.0 is not reported, because the values are equal; changing 1 to "1" is reported as a type change, because a program would treat them differently. Keys in a different order are never reported. If the files are lists whose order is not meaningful, you can ignore array order, in which case a reordered list with the same items counts as identical. Both files are validated first, and an invalid file is reported with the line and column of the problem.

The comparison is exact and covers nested data of any depth. Typical uses are checking a configuration before deployment, verifying a data migration, or reviewing what a web service returned before and after a change. To normalise formatting before you compare, run each file through the JSON Formatter with sorted keys.