API Management: What Is It & Why Does It Matter?

API Management is a set of tools and processes that enable organizations to create, manage, and scale APIs. It enables organizations to securely access, monitor, and control their API services. API Management also allows for the integration of new technologies into existing systems. Through API Management, organizations can quickly deploy new applications and services while ensuring the security of their data. Furthermore, API Management helps organizations reduce costs associated with development and maintenance by providing an efficient way to manage multiple APIs in one place. With API Management, organizations can take advantage of the latest technologies while staying secure and compliant with industry standards.

According to the research report, the global API management market was valued at USD 3.6 billion in 2021 and is expected to reach USD 26.4 billion by 2030, to grow at a CAGR of 24.9% during the forecast period.

However, many of these tasks require external services and data. Depending on the organization’s approach, inventory, pricing, point of sale, and shipping data may all live in separate systems. Or the organization may rely on external services to accomplish certain tasks, like integrating with PayPal to process payments and integrating with UPS to provide delivery date and shipping cost estimates.

When time is short and your customers have easy access to competitors’ websites, user experience is more critical to your business’s success than ever. To combine capabilities and data from multiple systems, companies have turned to application programming interfaces (APIs).

Benefits of API Management

APIs alone will not offer the oversight and visibility an organization needs to ensure they are meeting the needs of users while safeguarding their APIs from unauthorized access and malicious use. With proper API management, organizations gain the following advantages.

Governance and Security

API management ensures compliance with corporate policies and external regulations around data privacy. Businesses can also enforce rules around data governance and API security to ensure they are not leaving backdoors into their applications and sensitive data.

Security can also apply to limiting access to applications or users with the correct API keys or other authentication credentials. API management ensures only those with proper permissions can leverage its services.

Automation

API management also saves time for the developers who build these interfaces. Many management platforms support templatizing and automating the creation of APIs to eliminate redundant work and accelerate deployment.

The centralized directory of APIs also avoids duplicate work by allowing developers to check for APIs that may already fulfill their desired function. These new efficiencies allow the development team to follow agile methodologies without sacrificing quality or security.

Analytics and Reporting

An API may log the requests it receives and its responses, but that data is not in a readily consumable format by default. API management tools provide analytics on usage so that developers can track the frequency of requests and identify popular services to guide future API development. These metrics can also be packaged into reports to share with the larger team and organization.

Distribution

Businesses use API management to create a developer portal where newly published APIs can be distributed along with their documentation. Sometimes known as an API store, this digital marketplace allows developers to search for APIs to meet their needs.

Onboarding

An API management system allows developers to store documentation in a portal where developers inside and outside the organization can access it. This centralized repository allows engineers to quickly implement the proper methods to call the API and know what response to expect, smoothing the onboarding process.

Now that you understand the benefits of API management for your organization, let’s review the common capabilities of API managers.

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