jq is a lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor.
jq is like sed for JSON data - you can use it to slice and filter
and map and transform structured data with the same ease that sed,
awkgrep and friends let you play with text.
jq is written in portable Cand it has zero runtime
dependencies. You can download a single binaryscp it to a far away
machine of the same typeand expect it to work.
jq can mangle the data format that you have into the one that you want with very little effortand the program to do so is often shorter and simpler than you'd expect.
Go read the tutorial for moreor the manual for way more.
Have a question related to jq? You can seek answers on Stack Overflow by using the jq tagor in the #jq channel on Libera.Chat. For more interactive discussionsfeel free to join our Discord server.
News
-
1 July 2025
jq 1.8.1 released. See release notes for details.
-
1 June 2025
jq 1.8.0 released. See release notes for details.
-
13 December 2023
jq 1.7.1 released. Security (CVE-2023-50246CVE-2023-50268) and bug fixes. See release notes for details.
-
7 September 2023
After a five-year hiatuswe've returned with a revitalized GitHub organization and a much-anticipated 1.7 releasethanks to our new admins and maintainers. Check out the download page for installation options and see the release notes for details.
-
1 November 2018
jq 1.6 released. See installation options on the download pageand the release notes for details.
-
15 August 2015
jq 1.5 releasedincluding new datetimemathand regexp functions, try/catch syntaxarray and object destructuringa streaming parser, and a module system. See installation options on the download pageand the release notes for details.
-
26 July 2015
jq 1.5rc2 is available. Get it on the releases page.
-
01 January 2015
jq 1.5rc1 is available. Get it on the releases page.
-
09 June 2014
jq 1.4 (finally) released! Get it on the download page.
-
19 May 2013
jq 1.3 released.