The json1 extension (currently) stores JSON as ordinary text.

Backwards compatibility constraints mean that SQLite is only able to store values that are NULL, integers, floating-point numbers, text, and BLOBs. It is not possible to add a sixth “JSON” type.

The json1 extension does not (currently) support a binary encoding of JSON. Experiments have been unable to find a binary encoding that is significantly smaller or faster than a plain text encoding. (The present implementation parses JSON text at over 1 GB/s.) All json1 functions currently throw an error if any of their arguments are BLOBs because BLOBs are reserved for a future enhancement in which BLOBs will store the binary encoding for JSON.

The “1” at the end of the name for the json1 extension is deliberate. The designers anticipate that there will be future incompatible JSON extensions building upon the lessons learned from json1. Once sufficient experience is gained, some kind of JSON extension might be folded into the SQLite core. For now, JSON support remains an extension.

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