JSONPath Array Index — Access Elements by Position

Array Index Access in JSONPath

Array indexing in JSONPath uses square brackets with a numeric index to access elements at specific positions. Indices are zero-based, meaning the first element is at index 0.

Syntax

$.array[0]       // first element
$.array[1]       // second element
$.array[-1]      // last element
$.array[-2]      // second to last

Positive Indices

Given:

{
  "fruits": ["apple", "banana", "cherry", "date", "elderberry"]
}

• $.fruits[0] returns "apple"
• $.fruits[2] returns "cherry"
• $.fruits[4] returns "elderberry"

Negative Indices

Negative indices count from the end of the array:

• $.fruits[-1] returns "elderberry" (last element)
• $.fruits[-2] returns "date" (second to last)
• $.fruits[-5] returns "apple" (same as index 0 for a 5-element array)

Nested Array Access

For multi-dimensional data:

{
  "matrix": [[1, 2, 3], [4, 5, 6], [7, 8, 9]]
}

• $.matrix[0][0] returns 1 (top-left)
• $.matrix[1][2] returns 6 (second row, third column)
• $.matrix[-1][-1] returns 9 (bottom-right)

Out of Bounds

When the index exceeds the array length, most implementations return an empty result set rather than throwing an error. This is a key difference from many programming languages.

Index vs. Slice vs. Filter

Method	Syntax	Returns
Index	[2]	Single element
Slice	[0:3]	Range of elements
Filter	[?(@.active)]	Elements matching condition

Array indexing is the simplest and most efficient way to grab a known element from an ordered list.