# Returns every item category with its position in the category tree.

`GET /inventory/item-categories/tree`

Group: Inventory › Item Categories · Operation ID: `readItemCategoryTree`

Returns every item category with its position in the category tree, its parent, its ancestor path and its depth, in one request. It computes server-side the derived fields the collection cannot express: path, the ancestor names ending with the category's own, and level, its depth.

Every category appears, including a flat one that has never been placed in the tree: it comes back as a root, with parentId absent, level 0 and path its own name alone. Categories are ordered by name, not by tree position. The tree is capped at 6 levels deep, and hasChildren says whether a category has anything beneath it.

The result is an array, empty only when your tenant has no categories at all.

[Open in the interactive reference](https://docs.api.lensing.ai/?op=readItemCategoryTree)

## Parameters

| Name | In | Type | Required | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `Api-Version` | header | `"v1"` | yes | The API version this request targets, named by its public identifier. Required on every request; omitting it, or naming a version this company does not have, is answered with 400. This document describes version `v1`. |

## Response

`200` Success

Under `data` (readItemCategoryTreeOutput):

| Field | Type | Required | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `data` | array of object | yes | Every item category, each with its position in the tree, ordered by name. |
| `data[].id` | string | yes | The unique identifier for the item category. |
| `data[].name` | string | yes | The display name of the category, for example 'Hardware'. Not unique: two categories can share a name, so use id to address one. |
| `data[].description` | string | no | A free-form description of what the category covers. Absent when none was set. |
| `data[].parentId` | string | no | The identifier of the category this one sits under. Absent for a top-level category. See id on GET inventory/item-categories/:id. |
| `data[].level` | number | yes | The depth in the tree: 0 for a top-level category, 1 for its children, and so on, up to 5. |
| `data[].path` | array of string | yes | The ancestor names from the root down, ending with this category's own name. A root's path is its own name alone. |
| `data[].hasChildren` | boolean | yes | Whether any category sits beneath this one. |

## Statuses

- `400` — Invalid request or business failure
- `401` — Missing or invalid access token
- `403` — Not authorized
- `404` — Not found
- `429` — Too many requests
- `500` — Internal server error