JSON for Modern C++  3.7.2

◆ object_t

template<template< typename U, typename V, typename... Args > class ObjectType = std::map, template< typename U, typename... Args > class ArrayType = std::vector, class StringType = std::string, class BooleanType = bool, class NumberIntegerType = std::int64_t, class NumberUnsignedType = std::uint64_t, class NumberFloatType = double, template< typename U > class AllocatorType = std::allocator, template< typename T, typename SFINAE=void > class JSONSerializer = adl_serializer>
using nlohmann::basic_json::object_t = ObjectType<StringType, basic_json, object_comparator_t, AllocatorType<std::pair<const StringType, basic_json> >>

RFC 7159 describes JSON objects as follows:


To store objects in C++, a type is defined by the template parameters described below.

Template Parameters
ObjectTypethe container to store objects (e.g., std::map or std::unordered_map)
StringTypethe type of the keys or names (e.g., std::string). The comparison function std::less<StringType> is used to order elements inside the container.
AllocatorTypethe allocator to use for objects (e.g., std::allocator)

Default type

With the default values for ObjectType (std::map), StringType (std::string), and AllocatorType (std::allocator), the default value for object_t is:

std::string, // key_type
basic_json, // value_type
std::less<std::string>, // key_compare
std::allocator<std::pair<const std::string, basic_json>> // allocator_type


The choice of object_t influences the behavior of the JSON class. With the default type, objects have the following behavior:

  • When all names are unique, objects will be interoperable in the sense that all software implementations receiving that object will agree on the name-value mappings.
  • When the names within an object are not unique, it is unspecified which one of the values for a given key will be chosen. For instance, {"key": 2, "key": 1} could be equal to either {"key": 1} or {"key": 2}.
  • Internally, name/value pairs are stored in lexicographical order of the names. Objects will also be serialized (see dump) in this order. For instance, {"b": 1, "a": 2} and {"a": 2, "b": 1} will be stored and serialized as {"a": 2, "b": 1}.
  • When comparing objects, the order of the name/value pairs is irrelevant. This makes objects interoperable in the sense that they will not be affected by these differences. For instance, {"b": 1, "a": 2} and {"a": 2, "b": 1} will be treated as equal.


RFC 7159 specifies:

An implementation may set limits on the maximum depth of nesting.

In this class, the object's limit of nesting is not explicitly constrained. However, a maximum depth of nesting may be introduced by the compiler or runtime environment. A theoretical limit can be queried by calling the max_size function of a JSON object.


Objects are stored as pointers in a basic_json type. That is, for any access to object values, a pointer of type object_t* must be dereferenced.

See also
array_t – type for an array value
version 1.0.0
The order name/value pairs are added to the object is not preserved by the library. Therefore, iterating an object may return name/value pairs in a different order than they were originally stored. In fact, keys will be traversed in alphabetical order as std::map with std::less is used by default. Please note this behavior conforms to RFC 7159, because any order implements the specified "unordered" nature of JSON objects.

Definition at line 15026 of file json.hpp.

basic_json(const value_t v)
create an empty value with a given type
Definition: json.hpp:15754