TypeError: 'Response' object is not subscriptable in Python

# TypeError: 'Response' object is not subscriptable in Python

The Python "TypeError: 'Response' object is not subscriptable" occurs when we try to access a key in a Response object without parsing it first.

To solve the error, use the json() method to parse the JSON response to native Python object, e.g. res.json().

Here is an example of how the error occurs.

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import requests


def make_request():
    res = requests.post(
        'https://reqres.in/api/users',
        data={'name': 'Bobby Hadz', 'job': 'manager'},
        timeout=10,
    )

    # ⛔️ TypeError: 'Response' object is not subscriptable
    print(res['name'])


make_request()

The issue in the code sample is that the Response object does not just store the response data.

# Parse the JSON response by calling the json() method

To solve the error, call the json() method on the Response to parse the JSON response object into a native Python object.

Copied!
import requests


def make_request():
    res = requests.post(
        'https://reqres.in/api/users',
        data={'name': 'Bobby Hadz', 'job': 'manager'},
        timeout=10
    )

    # ✅ Parse JSON response to native Python object
    data = res.json()

    # 👇️ {'name': 'Bobby Hadz', 'job': 'manager', 'id': '649', 'createdAt': '2022-05-20T10:11:23.939Z'}
    print(data)

    print(data['name']) # 👉️ "Bobby Hadz"
    print(data['job']) # 👉️ "manager"
    print(data['id']) # 649


make_request()

We called the json() method on the Response object to parse it into a native Python object before accessing any of its keys.

You should use the json() method to parse the data from all requests, not just HTTP POST.

To solve the error, convert the object to a dictionary (or list) or another data structure that is subscriptable.

You should only use square brackets to access subscriptable objects.

The subscriptable objects in Python are:

• list
• tuple
• dictionary
• string

All other objects have to be converted to a subscriptable object by using the list(), tuple(), dict() or str() classes to be able to use bracket notation.

Subscriptable objects implement the __getitem__ method whereas non-subscriptable objects do not.

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a_list = [2, 4, 6, 8]

# 👇️ <built-in method __getitem__ of list object at 0x7f71f3252640>
print(a_list.__getitem__)