REST API Best Practices REST Endpoint Design Examples

Table Of Content

• best practices for REST API design
• Benefits of Using Next.js for Server-Side Logic
• Use JSON as the Format for Sending and Receiving Data
• Most Common Codes to Use For HTTP Requests
• Use Plural Nouns For Name Collections

Additionally, the noun used for the API already perfectly describes the entity that is being manipulated. For example, if you skim through the payload below it takes some time to understand because instead of property names it includes an “id”. Even the property name “data” does not suggest anything meaningful aside from just being an artifact of the JSON design. A few extra bytes in the payload can save a lot of early confusion and accelerate adoption of your API. Notice how user-ids appearing on the left of the colon (in the position where other examples of JSON ideally have property names) creates confusion in reading the payload. Even if you’ve followed all of the steps above, you may find that there are edge cases that do not fit under your beautifully designed payloads.

best practices for REST API design

This example fetches weather data using the fetch API and handles both successful and error responses from the external service. Each member knows their part and sticks to it, ensuring a harmonious performance. Similarly, sticking to the established conventions in REST API design ensures a harmonious and efficient user experience. In the world of APIs, backward compatibility is akin to a time machine. It enables an API to operate with older versions and ensures uninterrupted service for existing users.

Benefits of Using Next.js for Server-Side Logic

Where kesh92 is the username of a specific user in the users collection, and will return the location and date of joining for kesh92. These are just some of the ways you could design parameters that strive towards API completion and help your end developers use your API intuitively. If you’re having second thoughts about a specific resource or collection’s functionality, then leave it for the next iteration. Furthermore, the use of API route handlers supports dynamic API routes, allowing for more flexible URL parameters. Pagination involves using query parameters such as ‘limit’ to specify the number of items per page and ‘offset’ to indicate the starting position from where to return items.

Use JSON as the Format for Sending and Receiving Data

And you can also use Postman, one of the most common API testing tools in software development, to document your APIs. One of the commonest versioning systems in web development is semantic versioning. For example, Python provides json.loads() and json.dumps() for working with JSON data. JavaScript, for example, has an inbuilt method to parse JSON data through the fetch API because JSON was primarily made for it. But if you are using any other programming language such as Python or PHP, they now all have methods to parse and manipulate JSON data as well. In the past, accepting and responding to API requests were done mostly in XML and even HTML.

Most Common Codes to Use For HTTP Requests

The Basics Of Designing an API Architecture - hackernoon.com

The Basics Of Designing an API Architecture.

Posted: Wed, 27 Oct 2021 07:00:00 GMT [source]

This may lead to potential confusion and errors in the process. Therefore, limiting nesting to one level is generally recommended. Resources in REST APIs are categorized into ‘documents’, ‘collections’, and ‘stores’, each following its consistent naming convention using plural or singular nouns as appropriate. Adhering to these conventions promotes the clarity and consistency of REST API endpoints, making it easier to work with a resource collection API. Imagine them as optional side quests in a video game that enhance the overall experience but are not necessary to complete the main mission.

Use Plural Nouns For Name Collections

Now we're catching all requests that are going to /api/v1/workouts with our v1WorkoutRouter. Naming your resources in plural has the big advantage that it's crystal clear to other humans, that this is a collection that consists of different workouts. We could name the creation endpoint /api/v1/workout because we'd like to add one workout, right? Basically there's nothing wrong with that approach – but this can lead to misunderstandings. After setting it all up we can now dive into the real implementation of our API.

You need to accommodate a (most likely) non-technical user. Getting the HTTP API running “nicely” using Postman or some similar tool is fine; the hard work is to encapsulate it all into the user interface. There are UX tools for this that will work with JavaScript (among others!) but that is off-topic. What is important, is the iterative process of design-implementation-documentation.

This occurs when the response surpasses its limit ( 10kb or 15kb per response). The solution here is to break the response down and give it to another service bit by bit. Atomicity is when multiple operations are grouped into a single logical entity. When using atomicity, poorly naming a function is just a terrible idea. When creating an API, try not to define everything in one function as much as possible.

Be Clear with Versioning

All resources have a set of methods that can be operated against them to work with the data being exposed by the API. REStful APIs comprise majorly of HTTP methods which have well defined and unique actions against any resource. Here’s a list of commonly used HTTP methods that define the CRUD operations for any resource or collection in a  RESTful API. When developing API routes in Next.js, it’s crucial to adhere to best practices for security and performance. This ensures that your application remains robust, secure, and efficient.

That's the reason why I'd like to define our swagger file to spin up our documentation inside the corresponding version folder. Always remember that the documentation is usually the first interaction consumers have with your API. The faster users can understand the documentation, the faster they can use the API. I think there's a lot truth in this statement because if an API is not well documented it can't be used properly and therefore becomes useless.

Oftentimes, different endpoints can be interlinked, so you should nest them so it's easier to understand them. This is because HTTP methods such as GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, and DELETE are already in verb form for performing basic CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations. Communication between the client (frontend) and the server (backend) isn't usually super direct. So we use an interface called an Application Programming Interface (or API) to act as an intermediary between the client and the server. As you might have seen, documenting your API must not always be a headache. I think the tools I introduced you to reduce your overall effort, and setting it all up is pretty straightforward.

Again, I've chosen to name the method inside here the same as the one in the service and the controller. Let's take a look at our current implementation and see how we can integrate this best practice. Although there's the term JavaScript in JSON, it's not tied to it specifically. You can also write your API with Java or Python that can handle JSON as well. Now that we have a really basic Express setup, we can extend our API with the following best practices. Even though this API is written in JavaScript and Express, the best practices are not limited to these tools.