HTTP 206 Partial Content

What HTTP 206 means

When a client sends a Range header, the server can return just that part of the file with 206 and a Content-Range header. This is how video seeking, resumable downloads (curl -C -, wget -c) and parallel download managers work. Servers advertise support with Accept-Ranges: bytes.

Using 206 correctly

• If a range is impossible, like starting past the end of the file, the server returns 416 instead.

Retrying

Not applicable: this isn’t an error.

Example response

HTTP/1.1 206 Partial Content
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2026 10:30:00 GMT
Content-Range: bytes 0-1023/146515
Content-Length: 1024
Accept-Ranges: bytes

How to return 206

res.status(206).json(result);

@app.post("/items", status_code=206)
def create_item(item: Item):
    return item

w.Header().Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
w.WriteHeader(http.StatusPartialContent)
json.NewEncoder(w).Encode(result)

Related status codes

• 416 Range Not Satisfiable : The byte range in the Range header can’t be served.
• 200 OK : The request succeeded and the response contains the result.
• 304 Not Modified : Tells the client its cached copy is still valid, so no body is sent.

Other 2xx status codes

200 OK · 201 Created · 202 Accepted · 203 Non-Authoritative Information · 204 No Content · 205 Reset Content · 207 Multi-Status

See the full list of HTTP status codes.

Sources

• RFC 9110, section 206
• IANA HTTP Status Code Registry
• MDN: 206 Partial Content

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Frequently asked questions