SOAP & gRPC

Duration: 5 min  •  Difficulty: Hard

Besides REST and GraphQL, there are other types of APIs for specific needs.

1. SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)

  • Format: XML (very verbose/long).
  • Character: Extremely strict, formal, and has high security standards.
  • Usage: Still commonly used in banking, legacy enterprise systems, and airline systems.
  • 2. gRPC (Google Remote Procedure Call)

  • Format: Protocol Buffers (binary, not text).
  • Speed: Very fast and lightweight compared to REST JSON.
  • Usage: Inter-Microservices communication (backend-to-backend) where speed is everything (e.g., Netflix, Google).
  • gRPC Diagram

    gRPC Diagram