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API reference

Grafana HTTP API reference

Folder HTTP API

Grafana Cloud

Folder API

If you are running Grafana Enterprise, for some endpoints you’ll need to have specific permissions. Refer to Role-based access control permissions for more information.

Identifier (id) vs unique identifier (uid)

The identifier (id) of a folder is an auto-incrementing numeric value and is only unique per Grafana install.

The unique identifier (uid) of a folder can be used for uniquely identify folders between multiple Grafana installs. It’s automatically generated if not provided when creating a folder. The uid allows having consistent URLs for accessing folders and when syncing folders between multiple Grafana installs. This means that changing the title of a folder will not break any bookmarked links to that folder.

The uid can have a maximum length of 40 characters.

Get all folders

GET /api/folders

Returns all folders that the authenticated user has permission to view. You can control the maximum number of folders returned through the limit query parameter, the default is 1000. You can also pass the page query parameter for fetching folders from a page other than the first one.

If nested folders are enabled, the operation expects an additional optional query parameter parentUid with the parent folder UID, and returns the immediate subfolders that the authenticated user has permission to view. If the parameter is not supplied, then the operation returns immediate subfolders under the root that the authenticated user has permission to view.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

Action	Scope
`folders:read`	`folders:*`

Example Request:

GET /api/folders?limit=10 HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

[
  {
    "id":1,
    "uid": "nErXDvCkzz",
    "title": "Department ABC"
  },
  {
    "id":2,
    "uid": "k3S1cklGk",
    "title": "Department RND"
  }
]

Get folder by uid

GET /api/folders/:uid

Will return the folder given the folder uid.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

Action	Scope
`folders:read`	`folders:*`

Example Request:

GET /api/folders/nErXDvCkzzh HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "id":1,
  "uid": "nErXDvCkzz",
  "title": "Department ABC",
  "url": "/dashboards/f/nErXDvCkzz/department-abc",
  "hasAcl": false,
  "canSave": true,
  "canEdit": true,
  "canAdmin": true,
  "createdBy": "admin",
  "created": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "updatedBy": "admin",
  "updated": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "version": 1
}

If nested folders are enabled, and the folder is nested (lives under another folder), then the response additionally contains:

parentUid - The parent folder UID.
parents - An array with the whole tree hierarchy, starting from the root going down up to the parent folder.

Status Codes:

200 – Found
401 – Unauthorized
403 – Access Denied
404 – Folder not found

Create folder

POST /api/folders

Creates a new folder.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

folders:create allows creating folders and subfolders. If granted with scope folders:uid:general, allows creating root level folders. Otherwise, allows creating subfolders under the specified folders.

Action	Scope
`folders:create`	`folders:*`
`folders:write`	`folders:*`

Example Request:

POST /api/folders HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

{
  "uid": "nErXDvCkzz",
  "title": "Department ABC",
  "parentUid": "fgnj5e52gel76g"
}

JSON Body schema:

uid – Optional unique identifier.
title – The title of the folder.
parentUid - Optional field, the unique identifier of the parent folder under which the folder should be created. Requires nested folders to be enabled.

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "id":1,
  "uid": "nErXDvCkzz",
  "title": "Department ABC",
  "url": "/dashboards/f/nErXDvCkzz/department-abc",
  "hasAcl": false,
  "canSave": true,
  "canEdit": true,
  "canAdmin": true,
  "createdBy": "admin",
  "created": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "updatedBy": "admin",
  "updated": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "version": 1
}

If nested folders are enabled, and the folder is nested (lives under another folder) then the response additionally contains:

parentUid - the parent folder UID.
parents - an array with the whole tree hierarchy starting from the root going down up to the parent folder.

Status Codes:

200 – Created
400 – Errors (invalid json, missing or invalid fields, etc)
401 – Unauthorized
403 – Access Denied
409 - Folder already exists

Update folder

PUT /api/folders/:uid

Updates an existing folder identified by uid.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

Action	Scope
`folders:write`	`folders:*`

Example Request:

PUT /api/folders/nErXDvCkzz HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

{
  "title":"Department DEF",
  "version": 1
}

JSON Body schema:

title – The title of the folder.
version – Provide the current version to be able to update the folder. Not needed if overwrite=true.
overwrite – Set to true if you want to overwrite existing folder with newer version.

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "id":1,
  "uid": "nErXDvCkzz",
  "title": "Department DEF",
  "url": "/dashboards/f/nErXDvCkzz/department-def",
  "hasAcl": false,
  "canSave": true,
  "canEdit": true,
  "canAdmin": true,
  "createdBy": "admin",
  "created": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "updatedBy": "admin",
  "updated": "2018-01-31T17:43:12+01:00",
  "version": 1
}

If nested folders are enabled, and the folder is nested (lives under another folder) then the response additionally contains:

parentUid - the parent folder UID.
parents - an array with the whole tree hierarchy starting from the root going down up to the parent folder.

Status Codes:

200 – Updated
400 – Errors (invalid json, missing or invalid fields, etc)
401 – Unauthorized
403 – Access Denied
404 – Folder not found
412 – Precondition failed

The 412 status code is used for explaining that you cannot update the folder and why. There can be different reasons for this:

The folder has been changed by someone else, status=version-mismatch

The response body will have the following properties:

HTTP/1.1 412 Precondition Failed
Content-Type: application/json; charset=UTF-8
Content-Length: 97

{
  "message": "The folder has been changed by someone else",
  "status": "version-mismatch"
}

Delete folder

DELETE /api/folders/:uid

Deletes an existing folder identified by UID along with all dashboards (and their alerts) stored in the folder. This operation cannot be reverted.

If Grafana Alerting is enabled, you can set an optional query parameter forceDeleteRules=false so that requests will fail with 400 (Bad Request) error if the folder contains any Grafana alerts. However, if this parameter is set to true then it will delete any Grafana alerts under this folder.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

Action	Scope
`folders:delete`	`folders:*`

Example Request:

DELETE /api/folders/nErXDvCkzz HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "message":"Folder deleted",
  "id": 2
}

Status Codes:

200 – Deleted
401 – Unauthorized
400 – Bad Request
403 – Access Denied
404 – Folder not found

Move folder

POST /api/folders/:uid/move

Moves the folder.

This is relevant only if nested folders are enabled.

Required permissions

See note in the introduction for an explanation.

If moving the folder under another folder:

Action	Scope
`folders:create`	`folders:uid:<destination folder UID>` `folders:*`

If moving the folder under root:

Action	Scope
`folders:create`	`folders:uid:general` `folders:*`

JSON body schema:

parentUid – Optional unique identifier of the new parent folder. If this is empty, then the folder is moved under the root.

Example Request:

POST /api/folders/a5393ec3-5568-4e88-8809-b866968ae8a6/move HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer eyJrIjoiT0tTcG1pUlY2RnVKZTFVaDFsNFZXdE9ZWmNrMkZYbk

{
  "parentUid": "d80b18c0-266a-4aa4-ad5d-5537a00cb8e8",
}

Example Response:

HTTP/1.1 200
Content-Type: application/json

{
	"id": 4,
	"uid": "a5393ec3-5568-4e88-8809-b866968ae8a6",
	"title": "just-testing",
	"url": "/dashboards/f/a5393ec3-5568-4e88-8809-b866968ae8a6/just-testing",
	"hasAcl": false,
	"canSave": true,
	"canEdit": true,
	"canAdmin": true,
	"canDelete": true,
	"createdBy": "Anonymous",
	"created": "2023-04-27T21:55:01.593741+03:00",
	"updatedBy": "Anonymous",
	"updated": "2023-04-27T21:55:15.747444+03:00",
	"parentUid": "d80b18c0-266a-4aa4-ad5d-5537a00cb8e8",
	"parents": [
		{
			"id": 2,
			"uid": "d80b18c0-266a-4aa4-ad5d-5537a00cb8e8",
			"title": "f0",
			"url": "",
			"hasAcl": false,
			"canSave": true,
			"canEdit": true,
			"canAdmin": true,
			"canDelete": true,
			"createdBy": "Anonymous",
			"created": "2023-04-27T21:53:46.070672+03:00",
			"updatedBy": "Anonymous",
			"updated": "2023-04-27T21:53:46.070673+03:00"
		}
	]
}

Status Codes: