diff --git a/awx/api/views.py b/awx/api/views.py
index 0e957393c4..36b6d213c1 100644
--- a/awx/api/views.py
+++ b/awx/api/views.py
@@ -1660,7 +1660,7 @@ class UnifiedJobStdout(RetrieveAPIView):
 
     def retrieve(self, request, *args, **kwargs):
         unified_job = self.get_object()
-        if request.accepted_renderer.format in ('html', 'api'):
+        if request.accepted_renderer.format in ('html', 'api', 'json'):
             scheme = request.QUERY_PARAMS.get('scheme', None)
             start_line = request.QUERY_PARAMS.get('start_line', 0)
             end_line = request.QUERY_PARAMS.get('end_line', None)
@@ -1668,20 +1668,24 @@ class UnifiedJobStdout(RetrieveAPIView):
                 scheme = 'ansi2html'
             dark_val = request.QUERY_PARAMS.get('dark', '')
             dark = bool(dark_val and dark_val[0].lower() in ('1', 't', 'y'))
-            content_only = bool(request.accepted_renderer.format == 'api')
+            content_only = bool(request.accepted_renderer.format == 'api' or \
+                                request.accepted_renderer.format == 'json')
             dark_bg = (content_only and dark) or (not content_only and (dark or not dark_val))
             conv = Ansi2HTMLConverter(scheme=scheme, dark_bg=dark_bg,
                                       title=get_view_name(self.__class__))
+            content, start, end = unified_job.result_stdout_raw_limited(start_line, end_line)
             if content_only:
                 headers = conv.produce_headers()
-                body = conv.convert(unified_job.result_stdout_raw_limited(start_line, end_line), full=False)
+                body = conv.convert(content, full=False)
                 data = '\n'.join([headers, body])
                 data = '<div class="nocode body_foreground body_background">%s</div>' % data
             else:
-                data = conv.convert(unified_job.result_stdout_raw_limited(start_line, end_line))
+                data = conv.convert(content)
             # Fix ugly grey background used by default.
             data = data.replace('.body_background { background-color: #AAAAAA; }',
                                 '.body_background { background-color: #f5f5f5; }')
+            if request.accepted_renderer.format == 'json':
+                return Response({'range': {'start': start, 'end': end}, 'content': body})
             return Response(data)
         elif request.accepted_renderer.format == 'ansi':
             return Response(unified_job.result_stdout_raw)
diff --git a/awx/main/models/unified_jobs.py b/awx/main/models/unified_jobs.py
index 152d5910aa..aa9a48f826 100644
--- a/awx/main/models/unified_jobs.py
+++ b/awx/main/models/unified_jobs.py
@@ -523,13 +523,24 @@ class UnifiedJob(PolymorphicModel, PasswordFieldsModel, CommonModelNameNotUnique
         return_buffer = ""
         if end_line is not None:
             end_line = int(end_line)
-        for line in self.result_stdout_raw_handle().readlines()[int(start_line):end_line]:
+        stdout_lines = self.result_stdout_raw_handle().readlines()
+        for line in stdout_lines[int(start_line):end_line]:
             return_buffer += line
-        return return_buffer
+        if int(start_line) < 0:
+            start_actual = len(stdout_lines) + int(start_line)
+            end_actual = len(stdout_lines)
+        else:
+            start_actual = int(start_line)
+            if end_line is not None:
+                end_actual = min(int(start_line)+int(end_line), len(stdout_lines))
+            else:
+                end_actual = len(stdout_lines)
+        return return_buffer, start_actual, end_actual
 
     def result_stdout_limited(self, start_line=0, end_line=None):
         ansi_escape = re.compile(r'\x1b[^m]*m')
-        return ansi_escape.sub('', self.result_stdout_raw_limited(start_line, end_line))
+        content, start, end = self.result_stdout_raw_limited(start_line, end_line)
+        return ansi_escape.sub('', content), start, end
 
     @property
     def celery_task(self):