SOAP & gRPC

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.

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