API
Unlock the power of APIs in your Bubble application
Last updated
Unlock the power of APIs in your Bubble application
Last updated
One of Bubble's most powerful features is its ability to connect to other applications on the web. By using what's called an API connection, your application can fetch data and execute commands in external software systems and vice versa.
In this section we'll cover how APIs work in general. This is a fairly technical section that takes an in-depth look at the underlying structure and mechanics of a .
The information in this section is not needed for you to set up incoming and outgoing API requests in Bubble, but by knowing the basics you may find it easier to understand external API documentation and Bubble's settings.
Bubble is a highly flexible platform. This means that while we offer robust API security features, we don't enforce their utilization. It is essential to possess an understanding of the fundamental principles of API management, such as and , in order to effectively secure one's implementation of the platform.
Throughout reading this guide you may find it useful to check our API Glossary if there are terms and definitions you are unsure about.
If you are unfamiliar with how APIs work, we recommend starting with our introductory articles. The rest of the manual and reference entries will be easier to follow with an understanding of the basic principles:
While there are an abundance of different services you can connect to via an API, most of the follow the same basic architecture called REST.
In this section we cover the different API tools that Bubble offers. An API is either incoming or outgoing.
An incoming request means that an external system is initiating a connection with your Bubble application to read/manipulate data or start a workflow. This is handled by the Bubble API.
An outgoing request means that your application initiates a connection with an external system to work with data or execute an action. This is handled by the API Connector.
