Get Blob

The Get Blob operation reads or downloads a blob from the system, including its metadata and properties. You can also call Get Blob to read a snapshot.

Request

You can construct the Get Blob request as follows. We recommend that you use HTTPS. Replace myaccount with the name of your storage account:

GET method request URI HTTP version
https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/mycontainer/myblob

https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/mycontainer/myblob?snapshot=<DateTime>

https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/mycontainer/myblob?versionid=<DateTime>

 HTTP/1.0

HTTP/1.1

Emulated storage service URI

When you're making a request against the emulated storage service, specify the emulator hostname and Azure Blob Storage port as 127.0.0.1:10000, followed by the emulated storage account name:

GET method request URI HTTP version
http://127.0.0.1:10000/devstoreaccount1/mycontainer/myblob HTTP/1.0

HTTP/1.1

For more information, see Use the Azure Storage Emulator for development and testing.

URI parameters

The following additional parameters may be specified on the request URI:

Parameter Description
snapshot Optional. The snapshot parameter is an opaque DateTime value that, when it's present, specifies the blob snapshot to be retrieved. For more information about working with blob snapshots, see Create a snapshot of a blob.
versionid Optional, version 2019-12-12 and later. The versionid parameter is an opaque DateTime value that, when present, specifies the version of the blob to be retrieved.
timeout Optional. The timeout parameter is expressed in seconds. For more information, see Set timeouts for Blob Storage operations.

Request headers

The following table describes required and optional request headers.

Request header Description
Authorization Required. Specifies the authorization scheme, account name, and signature. For more information, see Authorize requests to Azure Storage.
Date or x-ms-date Required. Specifies the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) for the request. For more information, see Authorize requests to Azure Storage.
x-ms-version Required for all authorized requests. Optional for anonymous requests. Specifies the version of the operation to use for this request. If this header is omitted for an anonymous request, then the service executes the request with version 2009-09-19. For more information, see Versioning for the Azure Storage services.
Range Optional. Return the bytes of the blob only in the specified range.
x-ms-range Optional. Return the bytes of the blob only in the specified range. If both Range and x-ms-range are specified, the service uses the value of x-ms-range. If neither range is specified, the entire blob contents are returned. For more information, see Specify the range header for Blob Storage operations.
x-ms-lease-id: <ID> Optional. If this header is specified, the operation is performed only if both of the following conditions are met:

- The blob's lease is currently active.
- The lease ID that's specified in the request matches the lease ID of the blob.

If this header is specified but either of these conditions isn't met, the request fails and the Get Blob operation fails with status code 412 (Precondition Failed).
x-ms-range-get-content-md5: true Optional. When this header is set to true and specified together with the Range header, the service returns the MD5 hash for the range, as long as the range is less than or equal to 4 mebibytes (MiB) in size.

If the header is specified without the Range header, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).

If the header is set to true when the range exceeds 4 MiB, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).
x-ms-range-get-content-crc64: true Optional. When this header is set to true and specified together with the Range header, the service returns the CRC64 hash for the range, as long as the range is less than or equal to 4 MiB in size.

If the header is specified without the Range header, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).

If the header is set to true when the range exceeds 4 MiB, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).

If both the x-ms-range-get-content-md5 and x-ms-range-get-content-crc64 headers are present, the request fails with a 400 (Bad Request).

This header is supported in versions 2019-02-02 and later.
Origin Optional. Specifies the origin from which the request is issued. The presence of this header results in cross-origin resource sharing (CORS) headers on the response.
x-ms-upn Optional. Version 2023-11-03 and later. Valid for accounts with hierarchical namespace enabled. If true, the user identity values that are returned in the x-ms-owner, x-ms-group and x-ms-acl response headers will be transformed from Microsoft Entra object IDs to User Principal Names. If the value is false, they're returned as Microsoft Entra object IDs. The default value is false. Note that group and application object IDs are not translated, because they don't have unique friendly names.
x-ms-client-request-id Optional. Provides a client-generated, opaque value with a 1-kibibyte (KiB) character limit, which is recorded in the analytics logs when storage analytics logging is enabled. We highly recommend that you use this header when you're correlating client-side activities with requests that are received by the server. For more information, see About Azure Storage Analytics logging.
x-ms-structured-body Optional. Version 2025-01-05 and later. If specified, the service will return the blob content encoded in the structured body format. The value of this header contains the message schema version and properties.

Currently, the only value supported is XSM/1.0; properties=crc64, indicating the response will use crc64 checksum segments in the encoded message. If the value does not match this, the operation fails with error code 400 (Bad Request).

This operation also supports the use of conditional headers to read the blob only if a specified condition is met. For more information, see Specify conditional headers for Blob Storage operations.

Request headers (customer-provided encryption keys)

As of version 2019-02-02, you can specify the following headers on the request to read a blob that's encrypted with a customer-provided key. Encryption with a customer-provided key (and the corresponding set of headers) is optional. If a blob has previously been encrypted with a customer-provided key, you must include these headers on the request to complete the read operation successfully.

Request header Description
x-ms-encryption-key Required. The Base64-encoded AES-256 encryption key.
x-ms-encryption-key-sha256 Optional. The Base64-encoded SHA256 hash of the encryption key.
x-ms-encryption-algorithm: AES256 Required. Specifies the algorithm to use for encryption. The value of this header must be AES256.

Request body

None.

Response

The response includes an HTTP status code, a set of response headers, and the response body, which contains the contents of the blob.

Status code

A successful operation to read the full blob returns status code 200 (OK).

A successful operation to read a specified range returns status code 206 (Partial Content).

For more information about status codes, see Status and error codes.

Response headers

The response for this operation includes the following headers. The response may also include additional standard HTTP headers. All standard headers conform to the HTTP/1.1 protocol specification.

Syntax Description
Last-Modified The date/time when the blob was last modified. The date format follows RFC 1123.

Any operation that modifies the blob, including an update of the blob's metadata or properties, changes the last-modified time of the blob.
x-ms-creation-time Version 2017-11-09 and later. The date/time when the blob was created. The date format follows RFC 1123.
x-ms-meta-name:value A set of name-value pairs that's associated with this blob as user-defined metadata.
x-ms-tag-count Version 2019-12-12 and later. If the blob has any tags, this header returns the number of tags that are stored on the blob. The header isn't returned if there are no tags on the blob.
Content-Length The number of bytes present in the response body.
Content-Type The content type that's specified for the blob. The default content type is application/octet-stream.
Content-Range Indicates the range of bytes that's returned in the event that the client requested a subset of the blob by setting the Range request header.
ETag Contains a value that you can use to perform operations conditionally. For more information, see Specify conditional headers for Blob Storage operations. If the request version is 2011-08-18 or later, the ETag value is enclosed in quotation marks.
Content-MD5 If the blob has an MD5 hash and this Get Blob operation is to read the full blob, this response header is returned so that the client can check for message content integrity.

In version 2012-02-12 and later, Put Blob sets a block blob's MD5 hash value even when the Put Blob request doesn't include an MD5 header.

If the request is to read a specified range and the x-ms-range-get-content-md5 is set to true, the request returns an MD5 hash for the range, as long as the range size is less than or equal to 4 MiB.

If neither of these sets of conditions is true, no value is returned for the Content-MD5 header.

If x-ms-range-get-content-md5 is specified without the Range header, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).

If x-ms-range-get-content-md5 is set to true when the range exceeds 4 MiB, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).
x-ms-content-crc64 If the request is to read a specified range and the x-ms-range-get-content-crc64 is set to true, the request returns a CRC64 hash for the range, as long as the range size is less than or equal to 4 MiB.

If x-ms-range-get-content-crc64 is specified without the Range header, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).

If x-ms-range-get-content-crc64 is set to true when the range exceeds 4 MiB, the service returns status code 400 (Bad Request).
Content-Encoding Returns the value that was specified for the Content-Encoding request header.
Content-Language Returns the value that was specified for the Content-Language request header.
Cache-Control Returned if the header was previously specified for the blob.
Content-Disposition Returned for requests against version 2013-08-15 and later. This header returns the value that was specified for the x-ms-blob-content-disposition header.

The Content-Disposition response header field conveys additional information about how to process the response payload, and it can be used to attach additional metadata. For example, if the header is set to attachment, it indicates that the user-agent should not display the response. Instead, it shows a Save As dialog with a file name other than the specified blob name.
x-ms-blob-sequence-number The current sequence number for a page blob.

This header isn't returned for block blobs or append blobs.
x-ms-blob-type: <BlockBlob | PageBlob | AppendBlob> Returns the blob's type.
x-ms-copy-completion-time: <datetime> Version 2012-02-12 and later. The conclusion time of the last attempted Copy Blob operation where this blob was the destination blob. This value can specify the time of a completed, aborted, or failed copy attempt. This header doesn't appear if a copy is pending, if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a concluded Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.
x-ms-copy-status-description: <error string> Version 2012-02-12 and later. Appears only when x-ms-copy-status is failed or pending. Describes the cause of the last fatal or non-fatal copy operation failure. This header doesn't appear if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a concluded Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.
x-ms-copy-id: <id> Version 2012-02-12 and later. A string identifier for the last attempted Copy Blob operation where this blob was the destination blob. This header doesn't appear if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a concluded Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.
x-ms-copy-progress: <bytes copied/bytes total> Version 2012-02-12 and later. Contains the number of bytes that were copied and the total bytes in the source in the last attempted Copy Blob operation where this blob was the destination blob. It can show from 0 to Content-Length bytes copied. This header doesn't appear if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a concluded Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.
x-ms-copy-source: url Version 2012-02-12 and later. A URL of up to 2 KiB in length that specifies the source blob or file used in the last attempted Copy Blob operation where this blob was the destination blob. This header doesn't appear if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a concluded Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.

The URL that's returned in this header contains any request parameters that were used in the copy operation on the source blob. If the URL contains a Shared Access Signature (SAS) token, the signature (sig parameter) will not be included.
x-ms-copy-status: <pending | success | aborted | failed> Version 2012-02-12 and later. The state of the copy operation that's identified by x-ms-copy-id, with these values:

- success: Copy completed successfully.
- pending: Copy is in progress. Check x-ms-copy-status-description if intermittent, non-fatal errors slow copy progress but don't cause failure.
- aborted: Copy was ended by Abort Copy Blob.
- failed: Copy failed. See the x-ms-copy-status-description for failure details.

This header doesn't appear if this blob has never been the destination in a Copy Blob operation, or if this blob has been modified after a completed Copy Blob operation that used Set Blob Properties, Put Blob, or Put Block List.
x-ms-lease-duration: <infinite | fixed> Version 2012-02-12 and later. When a blob is leased, specifies whether the lease is of infinite or fixed duration.
x-ms-lease-state: <available | leased | expired | breaking | broken> Version 2012-02-12 and later. The lease state of the blob.
x-ms-lease-status:<locked | unlocked> The current lease status of the blob.
x-ms-request-id Uniquely identifies the request that was made, and can be used to troubleshoot the request. For more information, see Troubleshoot API operations.
x-ms-version Indicates the Blob Storage version that was used to execute the request. Included for requests that were made by using version 2009-09-19 and later.

This header is also returned for anonymous requests without a specified version if the container was marked for public access by using Blob Storage version 2009-09-19.