# gron

> MIT flatten JSON to greppable assignments

**Category:** DevOps  
**Pricing:** open-source  
**URL:** https://github.com/tomnomnom/gron  
**GitHub:** https://github.com/tomnomnom/gron  
**Added:** 2026-09-12

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## The Hook

gron makes JSON greppable — discrete path assignments you can fgrep, then `--ungron` back.

## What's Good

MIT. tomnomnom/gron. Flattens JSON into `json.path = value` lines so grep/fzf can find nested fields without learning jq first; `--ungron` reconstitutes filtered JSON. Classic API-exploration tool. Source github.com/tomnomnom/gron.

## The Catch

SOFT: last commit ~May 2025 — quiet but not abandoned folklore. Vs jq (filter language): gron is *flatten-for-grep*, not a transform DSL. Huge blobs become huge line piles; know when jq select() is the shorter path.

## Verdict

MIT greppable JSON. Free forever; flatten, grep, ungron — then graduate to jq when the filter is the point.