API Versioning and Backward Compatibility
Learn strategies for evolving APIs without breaking existing clients, including versioning schemes and compatibility rules.
Why APIs Must Evolve Carefully
Once an API has clients, you cannot freely change it. Renaming a field or removing an endpoint can break every consumer. Versioning lets you evolve the API while existing clients keep working.
Breaking vs Non-Breaking Changes
Know the difference:
- Non-breaking: adding a new optional field, adding a new endpoint
- Breaking: removing a field, renaming a field, changing a type, making an optional field required
Non-breaking changes can ship without a new version; breaking ones cannot.
All lessons in this course
- RESTful API Design Principles
- GraphQL and gRPC
- Message Queues & Event-Driven
- API Versioning and Backward Compatibility