curl -X GET 'https://api.openai.com/v1/files/file-id/content' \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $OPENAI_API_KEY"

# GET /files/{file_id}/content (OpenAI API)
Base URL: https://api.openai.com/v1
Auth: Authorization; OpenAI API key; required.
Last verified: 2026-10-20

> Retrieve file content

## Critical Gotchas
* The Responses API is the primary interface for new text and tool workflows; Chat Completions remains a separate compatibility API.
* Audio transcription uploads use multipart form data rather than a JSON request body.

## cURL
curl -X GET 'https://api.openai.com/v1/files/file-id/content' \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $OPENAI_API_KEY"

## Parameters
| Name | In | Type | Required | Description |
| :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| file_id | path | string | Yes | The ID of the file to use for this request. |

## Response example
"binary"

---
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GET

GET /files/{file_id}/content — OpenAI API

OpenAI API key (required); https://api.openai.com/v1

OpenAI API

Retrieve file content

Base URL: https://api.openai.com/v1
Auth: Authorization: Bearer <OPENAI_API_KEY>
Last verified: 2026-10-20 · upstream hash matched

Actions Try in browser→

Agents: curl -H "Accept: text/markdown" this URL
→ 166 tokens · Vary: Accept

Critical gotchas

The Responses API is the primary interface for new text and tool workflows; Chat Completions remains a separate compatibility API.

Audio transcription uploads use multipart form data rather than a JSON request body.

cURL

curl -X GET 'https://api.openai.com/v1/files/file-id/content' \  -H "Authorization: Bearer $OPENAI_API_KEY"

Parameters

Name	In	Type	Required	Description
file_id	path	string	Yes	The ID of the file to use for this request.

Response 200 OK

"binary"

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