How to Follow or Disable Redirects in Go

You control redirects and HTTP/2 behavior using the GODEBUG environment variable or //go:debug directives in your source code. Set GODEBUG=http2client=0 to disable HTTP/2 for the client, or use //go:debug http2client=0 at the top of your main package file to compile this setting directly into the binary.

export GODEBUG=http2client=0,http2server=0

//go:debug http2client=0
package main

import "net/http"

func main() {
    // HTTP/2 is disabled for this client
    _ = http.Get("https://example.com")
}

GODEBUG acts like a master switchboard for your Go program's internal behaviors, allowing you to turn off specific features like HTTP/2 redirects or security checks. You can flip these switches temporarily via your terminal or permanently by writing them into your code. Think of it as a remote control that lets you revert your program to an older, more compatible version of itself without changing the actual code logic.