binary.md

owner	handrews
name	Binary
description	Non-text-based media types
media_types	name iana specifications application/octet-stream https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/application/octet-stream name url RFC2045 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2045 name url RFC2046 §4.5.1 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2046#section-4.5.1 name iana specifications audio/* https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml#audio name url RFC2045 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2045 name url RFC2046 §4.2 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2046#section-4.3 name iana specifications image/* https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml#image name url RFC2045 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2045 name url RFC2046 §4.2 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2046#section-4.2 name iana specifications video/* https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml#video name url RFC2045 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2045 name url RFC2046 §4.4 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2046#section-4.4
default_for	binary
references	section anchor parentObject parentAnchor Working with Binary Data working-with-binary-data Schema Object schema-object section anchor parentObject parentAnchor Binary Streams binary-streams Media Type Object media-type-object section anchor parentObject parentAnchor `Content-Transfer-Encoding` and `contentEncoding` content-transfer-encoding-and-contentencoding Encoding Object encoding-object
layout	default

{% capture summary %} As of OAS v3.1, binary data is modeled using an empty Schema Object, in accordance with JSON Schema's guidance regarding non-JSON instances. {% endcapture %}

{% capture remarks %} As specified in Working with Binary Data, modeling binary data that has been encoded into a string is handled differently from raw binary data, with two variations: with the Schema Object's contentMediaType and contentEncoding, or with a Content-Transfer-Encoding header in the Encoding Object (for media types that use Encoding Objects). Consult the specification for how these two mechanisms interact when they both apply.

In OAS v3.0, raw binary content was modeled as type: string, format: binary, while type: string, format: byte was used for base64-encoded binary. This was dropped in favor of JSON Schema draft 2020-12's support because it did not allow specifying the media type along with the binary encoding. {% endcapture %}

{% include media-type-entry.md summary=summary remarks=remarks %}