If it makes it easier to reason about, it's equivalent to: // The Promise resolves when the server starts responding const response = await fetch(…);

If it makes it easier to reason about, it's equivalent to: // The Promise resolves when the server starts responding const response = await fetch(…); // The Promise resolves when both the transfer and the JSON parsing ended const body = await response.json(); So, yes, `response` is only used once and then discarded. `fetch()` may fool you into thinking that it resolves when the request is complete, but it's always a 2-step operation (unless you start implementing a streaming interface, then it's more than 2 steps)