Inspect network traffic with the in-app browser

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Use the in-app browser to inspect network requests made by web applications directly inside Postman. Inspecting network traffic can help you understand how an application communicates with APIs, investigate authentication flows, and debug frontend and backend issues. You can review requests as they occur, filter traffic, and open requests as HTTP requests in Postman for further exploration and testing.

With the browser developer tools, you can inspect page content, review console output, investigate application behavior, and troubleshoot issues while interacting with a web application.

The in-app browser is supported in Local View and Cloud View at the workspace level.

Open the in-app browser

To open the in-app browser in Postman, select Tools > Open web icon Browser in the footer. The browser opens in a new tab. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Cmd + Shift + B (Mac) or Ctrl + Shift + B (Windows/Linux).

Once the browser is open, navigate to the web application you want to inspect.

Inspect network traffic

As you interact with a web application, the in-app browser records the requests made by the page. You can inspect this traffic to understand how the application communicates with APIs.

To inspect network traffic, do the following:

  1. Open the in-app browser and navigate to a web application.
  2. In the right sidebar, click Bullet list icon Network.
  3. Interact with the page to generate network activity.
  4. Review the requests generated by the page in the right sidebar.

You can view the method, URL, status code, and duration for each request. You can also filter requests by URL or HTTP method to focus on the traffic you’re interested in.

To clear the network activity, click Clear.

The in-app browser maintains its own cookies and browser session independently of your main Postman session.

Work with requests

You can open requests in the in-app browser as HTTP requests, enabling you to explore and work with requests observed in a web application. You can also create a collection from these requests. For example, you can modify request details, resend requests, save them to collections, add tests, and investigate API behavior outside of the browser.

To open a request, click a request in the Bullet list icon Network tab. Postman opens a new HTTP request with the request URL, parameters, headers, and request body captured from the browser session.

To create a collection from requests, select the checkboxes next to the requests in the Bullet list icon Network tab, then click Create Collection. Postman creates a new collection with HTTP requests for each of the selected requests.

Use browser developer tools

The in-app browser includes browser developer tools for inspecting and debugging web applications.

To open the browser developer tools, click Console icon Tools in the browser toolbar. You can use developer tools to inspect page content, review console output, debug frontend behavior, and investigate issues while interacting with web applications.