Jackson serialization: ignore empty values (or null)

Question

You have the annotation in the wrong place - it needs to be on the class, not the field. i.e:

@JsonInclude(Include.NON_NULL) //or Include.NON_EMPTY, if that fits your use case 
public static class Request {
  // ...
}

As noted in comments, in versions below 2.x the syntax for this annotation is:

@JsonSerialize(include = JsonSerialize.Inclusion.NON_NULL) // or JsonSerialize.Inclusion.NON_EMPTY

The other option is to configure the ObjectMapper directly, simply by calling mapper.setSerializationInclusion(Include.NON_NULL);

(for the record, I think the popularity of this answer is an indication that this annotation should be applicable on a field-by-field basis, @fasterxml)

You can also set the global option:

objectMapper.setSerializationInclusion(JsonInclude.Include.NON_NULL);

Also you can try to use

@JsonSerialize(include=JsonSerialize.Inclusion.NON_NULL)

if you are dealing with jackson with version below 2+ (1.9.5) i tested it, you can easily use this annotation above the class. Not for specified for the attributes, just for class decleration.

You need to add import com.fasterxml.jackson.annotation.JsonInclude;

Add

@JsonInclude(JsonInclude.Include.NON_NULL)

on top of POJO

If you have nested POJO then

@JsonInclude(JsonInclude.Include.NON_NULL)

need to add on every values.

NOTE: JAXRS (Jersey) automatically handle this scenario 2.6 and above.