2021 State of the API Report

Postman State Of The API Report Postmanauts researching ontop of graphs. Illustration.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Key Findings Global Growth of APIs Who Works with APIs A Day, Week, or Year in the Life API-First and Other Strategies API Leadership and Governance Executing on APIs Tooling for APIs and Development API Technologies The Pandemic, APIs, and the Future Methodology How to Share the Report Download the Report

Tooling for APIs and Development

API platforms and tools

When respondents were asked which API tools they use, Postman led the way, garnering mentions from 83% of respondents. Amazon Web Services, SwaggerHub, and Azure API Management also earned double digits at 36%, 25%, and 14% respectively.

Postman: 83%

Amazon Web Services: 36%

SwaggerHub: 25%

Azure API Management: 14%

Insomnia: 7%

SmartBear: 7%

Mulesoft: 6%

Oracle/Apiary: 5%

Apigee: 5%

Readme.io: 5%

Kong: 4%

RapidAPI: 3%

API Fortress: 3%

ReadyAPI: 3%

IBM API Connect: 2%

APIMatic: 2%

Talend: 2%

Stoplight: 2%

Rest United: 2%

Paw: 2%

Restcase: 2%

Boomi: 2%

Backstage: 1%

Tyk: 0%

Multiple responses allowed.

Platform vs separate tools

We asked respondents whether they prefer a single platform or a mix of tools to design, document, test, and deliver APIs. A combination of both was the most popular answer, garnering 43% of the responses, followed by one-third of respondents preferring a single platform.

Combination of platform and tools: 43%

Single platform: 33%

Separate tools for each function: 19%

No API tooling: 5%

Due to rounding, percentages may not add up to 100%.

When thinking about total cost of ownership, we found that tooling which performs multiple functions is the most beneficial. Tools that create documentation, enable people from different teams to collaborate, perform tests, and drive development all in one location provide us with a shared understanding and single go-to place to find everything related to an API.

DevOps tooling

DevOps practitioners rely on a number of tools, with Jenkins leading the way at 37%. Azure DevOps (26%), GitHub Actions (25%), AWS DevOps (23%), and GitLab Pipelines (22%) round out the top five.

Jenkins: 37%

Azure DevOps: 26%

GitHub Actions: 25%

AWS DevOps: 23%

GitLab Pipelines: 22%

Bitbucket Pipelines: 14%

Heroku: 9%

Google CI/CD: 8%

CircleCI: 7%

Atlassian Bamboo: 6%

Hashicorp Terraform: 5%

TeamCity: 5%

Travis CI: 4%

Octopus Deploy: 4%

Concourse CI: 2%

Buildkite: 2%

CodeShip: 2%

Other (please specify): 3%

None: 6%

Due to rounding, percentages may not add up to 100%.

Deploying APIs

Respondents deploying APIs reported using a number of different approaches. CI/CD pipelines were the most popular, at 57%, followed by deploying APIs in the cloud (38%), frameworks (34%), and custom-built deployment methods (27%).

CI/CD pipelines: 57%

In the cloud: 38%

Frameworks: 34%

Custom-built: 27%

Serverless: 23%

Gateways: 22%

On-premise: 22%

Code generation: 19%

Due to rounding, percentages may not add up to 100%.

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