GraphQL HTTP

📚 Documentation | 📦 PyPI | 🔧 GitHub

A lightweight, production-ready HTTP server for GraphQL APIs built on top of Starlette/FastAPI. This server provides a simple yet powerful way to serve GraphQL schemas over HTTP with built-in support for authentication, CORS, GraphiQL integration, and more.

Features

• 🚀 High Performance: Built on Starlette/ASGI for excellent async performance
• 🔐 JWT Authentication: Built-in JWT authentication with JWKS support
• 🌐 CORS Support: Configurable CORS middleware for cross-origin requests
• 🎨 GraphiQL Integration: Interactive GraphQL IDE for development
• 📊 Health Checks: Built-in health check endpoints
• 🔄 Batch Queries: Support for batched GraphQL operations
• 📡 Subscriptions: GraphQL subscriptions streamed over Server-Sent Events (graphql-sse compatible)

Installation

uv add graphql_http

Or with pip:

pip install graphql_http

Quick Start

Basic Usage

from graphql import GraphQLSchema, GraphQLObjectType, GraphQLField, GraphQLString
from graphql_http import GraphQLHTTP

# Define your GraphQL schema
schema = GraphQLSchema(
    query=GraphQLObjectType(
        name="Query",
        fields={
            "hello": GraphQLField(
                GraphQLString,
                resolve=lambda obj, info: "Hello, World!"
            )
        }
    )
)

# Create the HTTP server
app = GraphQLHTTP(schema=schema)

# Run the server
if __name__ == "__main__":
    app.run(host="0.0.0.0", port=8000)

Using with graphql-api

For building GraphQL schemas, use graphql-api:

from graphql_api import GraphQLAPI
from graphql_http import GraphQLHTTP

api = GraphQLAPI()

@api.type(is_root_type=True)
class Query:
    @api.field
    def hello(self, name: str = "World") -> str:
        return f"Hello, {name}!"

server = GraphQLHTTP.from_api(api)
server.run()

Subscriptions (Server-Sent Events)

GraphQL subscriptions are served over Server-Sent Events, following the GraphQL over SSE protocol in distinct connections mode: each operation gets its own SSE connection, results stream as next events, and a final complete event signals the end of the stream.

Any request whose Accept header includes text/event-stream (with a non-zero q-value) is answered over SSE — subscriptions stream one next event per result, while queries and mutations respond with a single next followed by complete. A valid subscription sent without Accept: text/event-stream is rejected with 406 Not Acceptable.

Defining a subscription with graphql-api

Any field returning an AsyncGenerator becomes a subscription:

import asyncio
from typing import AsyncGenerator

from graphql_api import GraphQLAPI
from graphql_http import GraphQLHTTP

api = GraphQLAPI()

@api.type(is_root_type=True)
class Root:
    @api.field
    def hello(self) -> str:
        return "world"

    @api.field
    async def countdown(self, start: int = 3) -> AsyncGenerator[int, None]:
        while start >= 0:
            yield start
            start -= 1
            await asyncio.sleep(1)

server = GraphQLHTTP.from_api(api)
server.run()

Consuming with curl

curl -N \
  -H "Accept: text/event-stream" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"query": "subscription { countdown(start: 3) }"}' \
  http://localhost:5000/graphql

event: next
data: {"data":{"countdown":3}}

event: next
data: {"data":{"countdown":2}}

event: next
data: {"data":{"countdown":1}}

event: next
data: {"data":{"countdown":0}}

event: complete
data: 

Consuming with the graphql-sse JavaScript client

The graphql-sse client uses distinct connections mode by default (singleConnection: false):

import { createClient } from 'graphql-sse';

const client = createClient({
  url: 'http://localhost:5000/graphql',
});

const unsubscribe = client.subscribe(
  { query: 'subscription { countdown(start: 3) }' },
  {
    next: (result) => console.log(result),   // { data: { countdown: 3 } } ...
    error: (error) => console.error(error),
    complete: () => console.log('done'),
  },
);

Behavior notes

• Auth: SSE requests go through the same JWT/auth enforcement as regular requests. Authentication failures are returned as HTTP-level JSON errors (401/403) before any stream is opened. The introspection auth-bypass never applies to subscription operations.
• Errors: per the graphql-sse protocol, errors raised before execution starts — missing query, parse errors, validation errors, and subscribe() failures — are delivered over the accepted 200 text/event-stream response as a next event carrying the errors, followed by complete (a 400 would leave e.g. a browser EventSource with no error detail). Resolver errors during the stream ride inside next payloads as standard GraphQL errors; a fatal source error emits a final next carrying the error, then complete.
• Middleware & execution context: subscription events resolve through the same middleware chain and executor_class as queries and mutations, so field-authorization or error-masking middleware applies to streamed results too.
• Keep-alive: while a stream is idle the server emits : ping SSE comments every 15 seconds so intermediary proxies don't drop the connection. Configure with GraphQLHTTP(..., sse_keepalive_interval=30.0) (must be positive; None disables pings).
• Concurrency limit: at most sse_max_streams subscription streams (default 100) may be open concurrently per server; further subscription requests are rejected with 429 Too Many Requests until a slot frees up. Pass sse_max_streams=None to remove the limit.
• Disconnects: when the client closes the connection the underlying subscription generator is closed promptly — including await-based cleanup in its finally block — with no leaked tasks.

Related Projects

• graphql-api - Build GraphQL schemas with decorators
• graphql-db - SQLAlchemy integration for database-backed APIs
• graphql-mcp - Expose GraphQL as MCP tools

See the documentation for configuration, authentication, and advanced features.

Documentation

Visit the official documentation for comprehensive guides, examples, and API reference.

Key Topics

• Getting Started - Quick introduction and basic usage
• Configuration - Configure your HTTP server
• Authentication - JWT and auth setup
• Testing - Test your GraphQL endpoints
• Examples - Real-world usage examples
• API Reference - Complete API documentation

License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details.