What is 418 I'm a teapot?
HTTP status 418 I'm a teapot was defined in the 1998 April Fools' RFC "Hyper Text Coffee Pot Control Protocol" (RFC2324). It never entered the official HTTP specs, but some servers and libraries return it for fun.
April Fools origins ☕
RFC2324 is a tongue-in-cheek protocol for controlling coffee pots; 418 is part of that joke.
What RFC2324 says
- Published on April 1, 1998 as a joke RFC.
- If you ask a coffee pot to brew tea, it replies with 418 “I’m a teapot.”
- Not part of the official HTTP/1.1 or HTTP/2/3 status code registry (IANA).
Example response
HTTP/1.1 418 I'm a teapot
Content-Type: text/plain
Short and stout.Where you might see it 🧪
You usually won’t meet 418 in production, but it pops up as an Easter egg.
Common appearances
- Some web servers return it on special paths (like /teapot) as a hidden joke.
- Test/diagnostic services or libraries sometimes expose a 418 endpoint.
- Docs and blogs cite it as a fun HTTP trivia item.
Caveats
- It is not an official status; clients may handle it unpredictably.
- Monitoring may flag it as an unknown/nonstandard status.
How to treat it in practice 💡
Keep 418 out of production APIs; stick to standard 4xx/5xx codes.
Recommendations
- Use standard HTTP statuses for errors and validation (400s/500s, not 418).
- If 418 shows up in logs, treat it as a harmless Easter egg unless proven otherwise.
- When teaching or demoing, mention clearly that 418 is a joke status, not a spec-blessed one.