Feature request: HTTP Range support for serveStatic #1267
Description
Describe the feature
Describe the feature
serveStatic currently ignores HTTP Range requests. When a client sends a Range header, the server still responds with the full response body and does not include partial-content headers. This prevents:
Download resumption
Media seeking in browsers and video/audio players
Proper CDN and proxy behavior
This feature request proposes adding byte range support to serveStatic for GET and HEAD requests when the asset size is known.
Proposed behavior
Always advertise Accept-Ranges: bytes
Support only a single byte range
Ignore malformed or multi-range requests and serve the full response
For valid ranges:
Respond with 206 Partial Content
Include Content-Range and correct Content-Length
For HEAD, send headers only
For unsatisfiable ranges:
Respond with 416 Range Not Satisfiable
Include Content-Range: bytes */
Content-Length: 0
Important constraints
Preserve existing caching, encoding selection, fallthrough behavior, and 404/405 handling
Do not introduce new public exports
Keep all helper logic private within the serveStatic module
Use cases
Video/audio streaming
Resumable file downloads
Browser compatibility
Better support for media players and HTTP clients
Additional information
This behavior aligns with RFC 7233 and matches what users expect from static file servers. Most modern browsers automatically send range requests for media, and lack of support breaks playback and seeking.
No API changes are required—this is a backward-compatible internal enhancement to serveStatic.
Additional information
- Would you be willing to help implement this feature?