Mietype

Mietype is a term occasionally encountered in English-language technical writing as a misspelling or informal variant of MIME type. It is not part of formal standards, and there is no separate specification under that name.

MIME type stands for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions type. It designates the format of a piece of data, allowing software to understand how to process it. In practice, the MIME type is a type/subtype string such as text/html, image/png, or application/json. In HTTP, the Content-Type header carries the MIME type to indicate how the payload should be interpreted. Even though MIME originated in email, its usage extends to web browsers, servers, and APIs. Optional parameters, such as charset=utf-8, can accompany the type/subtype.

Correct spelling varies by language; in German it is commonly written as MIME-Typ. The authoritative registries for valid types are maintained by IANA under the media types registry. When documenting APIs or web responses, it is best to use the standard MIME type terminology and to spell it as MIME type rather than Mietype to avoid confusion.

See also: MIME type, Content-Type header, IANA media types.