# Flows "Custom HTTP request" data format issue - json being escaped

**URL:** <https://forums.knack.com/t/flows-custom-http-request-data-format-issue-json-being-escaped/20071>\
**Category:** Ask Developers\
**Created:** [December 5, 2025, 9:41pm UTC](https://forums.knack.com/t/flows-custom-http-request-data-format-issue-json-being-escaped/20071 "2025-12-05T21:41:12Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jake5](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forums.knack.com/jake5/32/5464_2.png) [@jake5](https://forums.knack.com/u/jake5)\
**Post date:** [December 5, 2025, 9:41pm UTC](https://forums.knack.com/t/flows-custom-http-request-data-format-issue-json-being-escaped/20071/1 "2025-12-05T21:41:12Z")

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Hi Knack community,

I’m working on a Flow that includes a “HTTP Request/Outgoing webhook” module, which needs to send json data to an external api. When setting up the external service for the module, I selected the data format “json” and created one simple body parameter where I intended to paste in my json structure and then add a few knack merge tags.

 ![Screenshot 2025-12-05 at 4.38.45 PM](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/knack/original/2X/3/318331956a175b38b07473eace8840b202cc5032.png)

The problem is that once the outbound request actually fires by knack flows engine, it is escaping all of the special characters like { } and “ in the json, making it unprocessable.

Here is an example showing the raw data received by the external server as sent by knack:

 ![Screenshot 2025-12-05 at 4.39.49 PM](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/knack/original/2X/f/fd32a9d4b98306d41af6b5fdb545622771fceaf8.png)

Does anyone know how to get this Flows HTTP outbound request module to just do what I tell it to do - send the raw text (json) I’m entering, without escaping things? Whoever built this seems like they never talked to a customer to figure out how they would actually want to use such a module.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Alaa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/65b543/32.png) [@Alaa](https://forums.knack.com/u/Alaa)\
**Post date:** [April 28, 2026, 6:55pm UTC](https://forums.knack.com/t/flows-custom-http-request-data-format-issue-json-being-escaped/20071/2 "2026-04-28T18:55:39Z")

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The request body appears intact in your screenshot. The “\n” you see are newline characters you included in your body parameter, and should be safe to ignore.