HTTP MIME Types Reference — Complete List by Category

Complete reference of common HTTP MIME types (also called media types or Content-Type values). The full IANA registry has thousands; this is the practical subset web developers actually use.

Application

MIME type	Used for	Extensions
application/json	JSON data, REST APIs	.json
application/ld+json	JSON-LD structured data	.jsonld
application/xml	XML data	.xml
application/xhtml+xml	XHTML pages	.xhtml
application/javascript	JavaScript (deprecated; use text/javascript)	.js
application/ecmascript	ECMAScript (rare)	.es
application/pdf	PDF documents	.pdf
application/zip	ZIP archives	.zip
application/gzip	Gzip-compressed files	.gz
application/x-tar	Tar archives	.tar
application/x-7z-compressed	7-Zip archives	.7z
application/x-rar-compressed	RAR archives	.rar
application/octet-stream	Generic binary; "download as file"	(any)
application/msword	Microsoft Word (.doc)	.doc
application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document	Word .docx	.docx
application/vnd.ms-excel	Excel .xls	.xls
application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet	Excel .xlsx	.xlsx
application/vnd.ms-powerpoint	PowerPoint .ppt	.ppt
application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.presentationml.presentation	PowerPoint .pptx	.pptx
application/vnd.ms-fontobject	EOT fonts	.eot
application/wasm	WebAssembly modules	.wasm
application/manifest+json	PWA manifest	.webmanifest
application/x-www-form-urlencoded	HTML form data (default)	—

Text

MIME type	Used for	Extensions
text/plain	Unformatted text	.txt
text/html	HTML pages	.html, .htm
text/css	CSS stylesheets	.css
text/javascript	JavaScript (preferred over application/javascript)	.js, .mjs
text/csv	CSV data	.csv
text/markdown	Markdown	.md
text/xml	XML as text (use application/xml for data)	.xml
text/calendar	iCalendar events	.ics
text/vcard	vCard contact data	.vcf

Image

MIME type	Extensions	Notes
image/jpeg	.jpg, .jpeg	Lossy; photos
image/png	.png	Lossless; transparency
image/gif	.gif	Animated; 256 colors
image/webp	.webp	Modern; lossy + lossless; ~30% smaller than JPEG
image/avif	.avif	Newer; ~20% smaller than WebP
image/svg+xml	.svg	Vector; XML-based
image/x-icon	.ico	Favicons
image/heic	.heic	Apple's modern format
image/tiff	.tiff, .tif	Print/archival
image/bmp	.bmp	Uncompressed bitmap

Audio & video

MIME type	Extensions
audio/mpeg	.mp3
audio/wav	.wav
audio/ogg	.ogg, .oga
audio/webm	.weba
audio/aac	.aac
audio/flac	.flac
video/mp4	.mp4, .m4v
video/webm	.webm
video/ogg	.ogv
video/mpeg	.mpeg, .mpg
video/quicktime	.mov

Font

MIME type	Extensions
font/woff	.woff
font/woff2	.woff2 (preferred for web)
font/ttf	.ttf
font/otf	.otf

Multipart

MIME type	Used for
multipart/form-data	HTML forms with file uploads
multipart/byteranges	Partial-content responses
multipart/mixed	Multiple unrelated parts (email)
multipart/alternative	Same content in multiple formats (email)

Charset and parameters

Most text MIME types support a charset parameter:

Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
Content-Type: text/csv; charset=utf-8

For modern web, always use charset=utf-8. Skip the parameter on binary types (images, video) — it's meaningless there.

Related tools

HTTP status codes: status code lookup + cheat sheet. Encode/decode binary content for transmission: Base64. Pretty-print API responses: JSON formatter.