json-path/JsonPath · error · InvalidPathException

Expected wildcard token to end with ']' on position

Error message

Expected wildcard token to end with ']' on position 

What it means

InvalidPathException thrown by readWildCardToken when a wildcard '*' inside brackets is not immediately followed by a closing ']'. A bracketed wildcard like [*] must be terminated by ']' right after the '*'; any other character makes the path unparseable.

Source

Thrown at json-path/src/main/java/com/jayway/jsonpath/internal/path/PathCompiler.java:505

    //
    // [*]
    // *
    //
    private boolean readWildCardToken(PathTokenAppender appender) {

        boolean inBracket = path.currentCharIs(OPEN_SQUARE_BRACKET);

        if (inBracket && !path.nextSignificantCharIs(WILDCARD)) {
            return false;
        }
        if (!path.currentCharIs(WILDCARD) && path.isOutOfBounds(path.position() + 1)) {
            return false;
        }
        if (inBracket) {
            int wildCardIndex = path.indexOfNextSignificantChar(WILDCARD);
            if (!path.nextSignificantCharIs(wildCardIndex, CLOSE_SQUARE_BRACKET)) {
                int offset = wildCardIndex + 1;
                throw new InvalidPathException("Expected wildcard token to end with ']' on position " + offset);
            }
            int bracketCloseIndex = path.indexOfNextSignificantChar(wildCardIndex, CLOSE_SQUARE_BRACKET);
            path.setPosition(bracketCloseIndex + 1);
        } else {
            path.incrementPosition(1);
        }

        appender.appendPathToken(PathTokenFactory.createWildCardPathToken());

        return path.currentIsTail() || readNextToken(appender);
    }

    //
    // [1], [1,2, n], [1:], [1:2], [:2]
    //
    private boolean readArrayToken(PathTokenAppender appender) {

        if (!path.currentCharIs(OPEN_SQUARE_BRACKET)) {

View on GitHub (pinned to 62a4c9f0f6)

Solutions

1. Ensure every bracketed wildcard is written as [*] with a closing bracket
2. Check for characters between '*' and ']' in the path string
3. Validate the assembled path with JsonPath.compile() before use

Example fix

// before
JsonPath.read(json, "$..book[*")
// after
JsonPath.read(json, "$..book[*]")

static boolean wildcardsClosed(String path) {
    int i = 0;
    while ((i = path.indexOf('*', i)) != -1) {
        if (i > 0 && path.charAt(i - 1) == '[') {
            int j = i + 1;
            while (j < path.length() && Character.isWhitespace(path.charAt(j))) j++;
            if (j >= path.length() || path.charAt(j) != ']') return false;
        }
        i++;
    }
    return true;
}

try {
    return JsonPath.read(json, path);
} catch (InvalidPathException e) {
    if (e.getMessage().startsWith("Expected wildcard token")) {
        throw new IllegalArgumentException("Wildcard '*' must be written as [*] in: " + path);
    }
    throw e;
}

When it happens

Trigger: Compiling paths like "$..book[*x" or "$[* , ?]" — the significant char after '*' is not ']'.

Common situations: Hand-edited paths where the closing bracket was deleted, dynamic concatenation of segments missing ']'.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid ... format", "must be in format X", "does not look like a ..." — invalid argument format errors across CLI tools and libraries — this error's family across 17 libraries.

Related errors

• Could not find matching close quote for %s when parsing : %s
• Could not find matching close for %s when parsing regex in :
• Expected character: %c
• Filter must start with '[' and end with ']'.
• Filter must start with '[?' and end with ']'.

AI-assisted analysis of json-path/JsonPath@62a4c9f0f6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/d94f791aec243af5. Report an issue: GitHub.