@GetMapping, @PostMapping, and friends are just @RequestMapping with the HTTP method baked in — composed meta-annotations for readability. They all feed the same RequestMappingHandlerMapping, which builds a RequestMappingInfo from the URL pattern, method, headers, and content types you declare, then matches incoming requests against it.
@RequestMapping — the general form
The original, most flexible annotation. It works at class level (a shared prefix) and method level, and accepts the full set of mapping conditions:
@RequestMapping(
value = "/api/orders/{id}",
method = RequestMethod.GET,
produces = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE,
consumes = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE,
headers = "X-API-Version=1",
params = "verbose")
OrderDto get(@PathVariable Long id) { ... }The composed shortcuts
Spring 4.3+ added method-specific variants. Each is annotated with @RequestMapping(method = …) internally:
@GetMapping→method = GET@PostMapping→method = POST@PutMapping→method = PUT@DeleteMapping→method = DELETE@PatchMapping→method = PATCH
They expose the same value, produces, consumes, params, headers attributes — only method is fixed.
@RestController
@RequestMapping("/api/orders") // class-level prefix
class OrderController {
@GetMapping("/{id}") OrderDto get(@PathVariable Long id) { ... }
@PostMapping OrderDto create(@RequestBody CreateOrder c) { ... }
@DeleteMapping("/{id}") void delete(@PathVariable Long id) { ... }
}How matching and narrowing work
Class-level paths combine with method-level paths. Among candidates, the mapping with the most specific pattern wins (an exact path beats /{id}). produces is matched against the request's Accept header, consumes against Content-Type — so you can route two methods on the same URL by media type. If a path matches but the method doesn't, Spring returns 405 Method Not Allowed; if consumes doesn't match, 415 Unsupported Media Type.