diff --git a/include/haproxy/http-t.h b/include/haproxy/http-t.h
index ab4756c11..140a9beed 100644
--- a/include/haproxy/http-t.h
+++ b/include/haproxy/http-t.h
@@ -131,6 +131,44 @@ enum http_etag_type {
 	ETAG_WEAK
 };
 
+/* Indicates what elements have been parsed in a HTTP URI. */
+enum http_uri_parser_state {
+	URI_PARSER_STATE_BEFORE = 0,
+};
+
+/* HTTP URI format as described in rfc 7230 5.3.
+ * As the first character is used to identify the format, absolute-form and
+ * authority-form are not differentiated.
+ */
+enum http_uri_parser_format {
+	URI_PARSER_FORMAT_EMPTY,
+	URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ASTERISK,
+	URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ABSPATH,
+	URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ABSURI_OR_AUTHORITY,
+};
+
+/* Parser context for a HTTP URI. Must be initialized with http_uri_parser_init
+ * before its usage.
+ *
+ * The parser API is not idempotent. For an initialized parser instance, each
+ * URI element can be extracted only once using its related function :
+ * - http_parse_scheme
+ * - http_parse_authority
+ * - http_parse_path
+ *
+ * Also each element must be extracted in the order of its appearance in the
+ * URI according to the rfc 3986. However, it is possible to skip the parsing
+ * of elements which are of no interest.
+ *
+ * If the above rules are not respected, the parsing functions return an empty
+ * ist.
+ */
+struct http_uri_parser {
+	struct ist uri;                     /* HTTP URI for parsing */
+	enum http_uri_parser_state state;   /* already parsed HTTP URI elements */
+	enum http_uri_parser_format format; /* rfc 7230 5.3 HTTP URI format */
+};
+
 #endif /* _HAPROXY_HTTP_T_H */
 
 /*
diff --git a/include/haproxy/http.h b/include/haproxy/http.h
index 991eece49..faf00a034 100644
--- a/include/haproxy/http.h
+++ b/include/haproxy/http.h
@@ -131,6 +131,42 @@ static inline enum http_etag_type http_get_etag_type(const struct ist etag)
 	return ETAG_INVALID;
 }
 
+/* Initialize a HTTP URI parser to use it with http URI parsing functions. The
+ * URI format is detected according to its first character.
+ */
+static inline struct http_uri_parser http_uri_parser_init(const struct ist uri)
+{
+	struct http_uri_parser parser = {
+	  .uri    = uri,
+	  .state  = URI_PARSER_STATE_BEFORE,
+	};
+
+	/* RFC7230, par. 2.7 :
+	 * Request-URI = "*" | absuri | abspath | authority
+	 */
+
+	if (!istlen(parser.uri)) {
+		parser.format = URI_PARSER_FORMAT_EMPTY;
+	}
+	else {
+		/* detect the format according to the first URI character */
+		switch (*istptr(parser.uri)) {
+		case '*':
+			parser.format = URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ASTERISK;
+			break;
+
+		case '/':
+			parser.format = URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ABSPATH;
+			break;
+
+		default:
+			parser.format = URI_PARSER_FORMAT_ABSURI_OR_AUTHORITY;
+			break;
+		}
+	}
+
+	return parser;
+}
 
 #endif /* _HAPROXY_HTTP_H */