GraphQL API Design Principles
Learn the fundamentals of GraphQL, including schemas, queries, mutations, and subscriptions, for flexible API design.
What is GraphQL?
Welcome to GraphQL API Design! GraphQL is a powerful query language for your APIs and a runtime for fulfilling those queries with your existing data.
Think of it as a way for clients (like your mobile app) to ask for exactly the data they need, no more, no less. It's an alternative to traditional REST APIs.
GraphQL vs. REST APIs
While REST APIs typically have multiple endpoints, each returning a fixed data structure, GraphQL uses a single endpoint.
- REST: Often leads to over-fetching (getting more data than needed) or under-fetching (needing multiple requests for related data).
- GraphQL: Solves this by allowing clients to specify the data shape, reducing network requests and improving efficiency.
All lessons in this course
- Introduction to Serverless with Node.js
- GraphQL API Design Principles
- Building a GraphQL Server with Apollo
- GraphQL Subscriptions for Real-Time Data