Cannot GET 🔌 API

API Error: Cannot GET /api/... / No route matches / The route could not be found

The server has no route for this URL and HTTP method combination — the endpoint path, API version prefix or method is wrong.

Seen on: REST API

Meaning

Unlike a “resource not found” (the endpoint exists, the record doesn’t), here the framework never matched a handler. Express answers “Cannot GET /path”, Rails “No route matches [GET]”, Laravel “The route api/x could not be found”, Django “Page not found (404)”, and API gateways “no Route matched with those values”.

Usually the path is slightly off — missing /api or /v1 prefix, trailing slash, wrong base URL for the environment — or the route exists only for another method.

Common causes

  • Typo or missing prefix in the path (/api, /v1)
  • Base URL points at the wrong service or environment
  • Route defined for POST but called with GET (or vice versa)
  • Router mounted at a different path, or the route file isn’t loaded
  • Deployed build doesn’t include the new route yet

⚡ Quick fix

  1. Compare the full URL and method with the API docs character by character
  2. List the server’s registered routes
  3. Check the base URL / environment variable the client uses

Detailed fix by platform

Express

  1. bash
    // print every registered route
app._router.stack.filter(l => l.route).forEach(l => console.log(Object.keys(l.route.methods), l.route.path));

Laravel

  1. php artisan route:list --path=api

Rails

  1. bin/rails routes | grep users

How to diagnose

  1. Method — Same method the route is defined for?
  2. Prefix — /api, /v1, trailing slash?
  3. Environment — Which base URL is the client using?
  4. Deploy — Is the route in the running build?

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