Does Canvas LMS officially support POST /files_api used during content import?

[brandon42]

Hi Canvas Community,

In Course > Settings > Import Course Content, when using "Content Type" = "unzip .zip file into folder" (usually to import a ZIP file as course material), I observed that Canvas sends a request to this endpoint:

POST https://canvas-lms.lomtech.net/files_api

It appears this happens during the content import process, likely to extract and upload the ZIP file contents.

🔍 My Questions:

1. Is POST /files_api an official Canvas API endpoint, or is it used internally only?

2. If it's official, is there any documentation available in the Canvas LMS API Reference?

3. Is it safe to use this endpoint for custom import flows, or would that be unsupported or risky?

This is directly related to what users do via Course > Settings > Import Course Content, and I'm trying to understand whether this behavior is supported for API-based automation as well.

Any insight or confirmation would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

[JennyDruckrey · Accepted solution]

Hello,

It looks like you should be able to do content uploads through the API-- but I would refer to this documentation:  https://canvas.instructure.com/doc/api/live#!/content_migrations.json/create_content_migration_cours...

Look under content migrations/POST /v1/courses{course_id}/content_migrations (Create a content migration).  The note for this endpoint will also direct you to look at the files API endpoint (Files/POST v1/folders/{folder_id}/files (Upload a File). 

I hope this helps provide a little more information.

[brandon42]

Thank you for your help.