Best Practices

API best practices ensure reliable, secure, and maintainable APIs that provide excellent developer experience. Following established patterns and conventions reduces complexity and accelerates adoption.

Design Principles

RESTful Design

Resource-Oriented URLs

# Good - Resource-oriented, hierarchical
GET /api/v1/users                    # List users
GET /api/v1/users/123               # Get specific user
POST /api/v1/users                  # Create user
PUT /api/v1/users/123               # Update user
DELETE /api/v1/users/123            # Delete user
 
# Nested resources
GET /api/v1/users/123/orders        # User's orders
GET /api/v1/orders/456/items        # Order items
 
# Bad - Verb-oriented, non-standard
GET /api/v1/getUsers
POST /api/v1/createUser
GET /api/v1/user/delete/123

HTTP Methods Usage

Consistent Error Handling

Standard Error Format

Input Validation and Sanitization

Request Validation

Security Best Practices

Authentication Patterns

JWT Implementation

Rate Limiting

Advanced Rate Limiting

Performance Optimization

Caching Strategies

Multi-Level Caching

Database Optimization

Query Optimization

Documentation Standards

API Documentation Best Practices

Comprehensive OpenAPI Documentation

# Best practices for OpenAPI documentation
openapi: 3.0.3
info:
  title: User Management API
  version: 2.1.0
  description: |
    # User Management API
    
    This API provides comprehensive user management capabilities including:
    
    - User account creation and management
    - Authentication and authorization
    - Profile management
    - User search and filtering
    
    ## Getting Started
    
    1. Obtain an API key from the developer portal
    2. Include the API key in the `X-API-Key` header
    3. All requests must use HTTPS
    4. Rate limits apply based on your subscription tier
    
    ## Response Format
    
    All responses follow a consistent format:
    ```json
    {
      "data": {...},
      "meta": {
        "timestamp": "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z",
        "version": "2.1.0"
      }
    }

Error Handling

Errors include detailed information for troubleshooting:

{
  "error": "VALIDATION_ERROR",
  "message": "Request validation failed",
  "details": [...],
  "trace_id": "req_abc123",
  "timestamp": "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z"
}

contact: name: API Support Team email: api-support@example.com url: https://support.example.com (opens in a new tab)

license: name: MIT url: https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT (opens in a new tab)

servers:

url: https://api.example.com/v2 (opens in a new tab) description: Production server
url: https://staging-api.example.com/v2 (opens in a new tab) description: Staging server

paths: /users: get: summary: List users description: | Retrieve a paginated list of users with optional filtering.

Filtering Options

Email: Exact match on email address
Name: Partial match on user name
Status: Filter by account status
Date Range: Filter by creation date

Performance Notes

Results are cached for 5 minutes
Maximum 1000 results per request
Use pagination for large datasets

Rate Limits

Standard: 1000 requests/hour
Premium: 10000 requests/hour

tags:

Users parameters:
name: email in: query description: | Filter users by email address (exact match).

Example: user@example.com schema: type: string format: email example: "john@example.com"
name: name in: query description: | Filter users by name (partial match, case-insensitive).

Minimum 2 characters required. schema: type: string minLength: 2 maxLength: 100 example: "john"
name: limit in: query description: Number of users to return (max 1000) schema: type: integer minimum: 1 maximum: 1000 default: 50 example: 100

responses: '200': description: List of users retrieved successfully headers: X-Total-Count: description: Total number of users matching filters schema: type: integer example: 1250 X-Rate-Limit-Remaining: description: Requests remaining in current window schema: type: integer example: 995 content: application/json: schema: type: object properties: data: type: array items: ref: '#/components/schemas/User' meta: ref: '#/components/schemas/ResponseMeta' examples: successful_response: summary: Successful user list response description: Example response with multiple users value: data:

id: "user_123" email: "john@example.com" name: "John Doe" status: "active" created_at: "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z" meta: timestamp: "2024-01-15T10:35:00Z" version: "2.1.0" total: 1250

empty_response: summary: Empty result set description: No users match the specified criteria value: data: [] meta: timestamp: "2024-01-15T10:35:00Z" version: "2.1.0" total: 0

'400': ref: '#/components/responses/BadRequest' '401': ref: '#/components/responses/Unauthorized' '429': ref: '#/components/responses/TooManyRequests'

components: schemas: User: type: object required:

id
email
name
status
created_at properties: id: type: string description: | Unique user identifier.

Format: user_ followed by 20 alphanumeric characters pattern: '^user_[a-zA-Z0-9]20' example: "user_abc123def456ghij7890"

email: type: string format: email description: User's email address (unique across system) maxLength: 255 example: "john.doe@example.com"

name: type: string description: User's full name minLength: 1 maxLength: 100 example: "John Doe"

status: type: string enum: [active, suspended, pending_verification] description: | Current account status:

active: User can access all features
suspended: Account temporarily disabled
pending_verification: Email verification required example: "active"

created_at: type: string format: date-time description: Account creation timestamp (ISO 8601) example: "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z"

last_login_at: type: string format: date-time nullable: true description: Last login timestamp (null if never logged in) example: "2024-01-16T14:22:00Z"

example: id: "user_abc123def456ghij7890" email: "john.doe@example.com" name: "John Doe" status: "active" created_at: "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z" last_login_at: "2024-01-16T14:22:00Z"


Following these best practices ensures APIs are secure, performant, maintainable, and provide excellent developer experience. Consistent application of these patterns across all APIs creates predictable interfaces that developers can easily understand and integrate with.

API Lifecycle Overview