PUT
PUT /repos/{owner}/{repo}/issues/{issue_number}/labels — GitHub API
GitHub token (required); https://api.github.com
GitHub APISet labels for an issue
- Base URL
- https://api.github.com
- Auth
- Authorization: Bearer <GITHUB_API_KEY>
- Last verified
- 2026-10-20 · upstream hash matched
Actions Try in browser→
Agents: curl -H "Accept: text/markdown" this URL
→ 267 tokens · Vary: Accept
→ 267 tokens · Vary: Accept
Critical gotchas
GitHub recommends an Accept: application/vnd.github+json header and an explicit X-GitHub-Api-Version header.
Fine-grained tokens only authorize repositories and permissions selected when the token is created.
cURL
curl -X PUT 'https://api.github.com/repos/example-owner/example-repo/issues/10/labels' \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $GITHUB_TOKEN" \ -H 'Accept: application/vnd.github+json' \ -H 'X-GitHub-Api-Version: 2026-03-10' \ -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \ -d '{}'
Parameters
| Name | In | Type | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| owner | path | string | Yes | The account owner of the repository. The name is not case sensitive. |
| repo | path | string | Yes | The name of the repository without the `.git` extension. The name is not case sensitive. |
| issue_number | path | integer | Yes | The number that identifies the issue. |
| labels | body | string[] | No | The names of the labels to set for the issue. The labels you set replace any existing labels. You can pass an empty array to remove all labels. Alternatively, you can pass a single label as a `string` or an `array` of labels directly, but GitHub recommends passing an object with the `labels` key. You can also add labels to the existing labels for an issue. For more information, see "[Add labels to an issue](https://docs.github.com/rest/issues/labels#add-labels-to-an-issue)." |
Response 200 OK
[
{
"id": 208045946,
"node_id": "MDU6TGFiZWwyMDgwNDU5NDY=",
"url": "https://api.github.com/repositories/42/labels/bug",
"name": "bug",
"description": "Something isn't working",
"color": "FFFFFF",
"default": true,
"archived_at": "2023-01-01T12:00:00Z",
"archived_by": {
"name": "string",
"email": "string",
"login": "octocat",
"id": 1,
"node_id": "MDQ6VXNlcjE=",
"avatar_url": "https://github.com/images/error/octocat_happy.gif",
"gravatar_id": "41d064eb2195891e12d0413f63227ea7",
"url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat",
"html_url": "https://github.com/octocat",
"followers_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/followers",
"following_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/following{/other_user}",
"gists_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/gists{/gist_id}",
"starred_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/starred{/owner}{/repo}",
"subscriptions_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/subscriptions",
"organizations_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/orgs",
"repos_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/repos",
"events_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/events{/privacy}",
"received_events_url": "https://api.github.com/users/octocat/received_events",
"type": "User",
"site_admin": true,
"starred_at": "\"2020-07-09T00:17:55Z\"",
"user_view_type": "public"
}
}
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