How to get response body using HttpURLConnection, when code other than 2xx is returned?

If the response code isn't 200 or 2xx, use getErrorStream() instead of getInputStream().


Wrong method was used for errors, here is the working code:

BufferedReader br = null;
if (100 <= conn.getResponseCode() && conn.getResponseCode() <= 399) {
    br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(conn.getInputStream()));
} else {
    br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(conn.getErrorStream()));
}

This is an easy way to get a successful response from the server like PHP echo otherwise an error message.

BufferedReader br = null;
if (conn.getResponseCode() == 200) {
    br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(conn.getInputStream()));
    String strCurrentLine;
        while ((strCurrentLine = br.readLine()) != null) {
               System.out.println(strCurrentLine);
        }
} else {
    br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(conn.getErrorStream()));
    String strCurrentLine;
        while ((strCurrentLine = br.readLine()) != null) {
               System.out.println(strCurrentLine);
        }
}