I don't remember when I learned about these, but they've been game changers, and everyone I've shared them with feels the same way. I use your use case often as well, though through `jq` because I'm more familiar with it, and sometimes wish to do transforms.
You can use `python -m json.tool` for just JSON formatting, which is convenient now that Python is available by default in most Linux distros. Jq is really excellent though.