What Is an API Developer Experience Audit?

In the software industry, quality developer experience (DX) is now an expectation. Most technology leaders agree investing in DX can significantly reduce costs. And as API-based products become more commonplace, there is a growing incentive to improve the API developer experience to stand out.

A developer experience audit is one way to improve the usability of an API. It involves walking through the API developer's experience, from creating an account and grabbing API keys to making calls and maintaining integrations for the long haul. By putting yourself in a developer's shoes, the process provides actionable insights on how to improve your developer-facing front end.

Unlike functional testing or security testing, a developer experience review is unique because it's all about the human element. You and your team may think your API docs and tutorials make sense, but they might not be as easy for external developers or partners. Assessing DX is paramount for building user empathy and seeing how folks use an API in the real world.

7 Key Steps of an API Developer Experience Review

Understanding an API's developer experience and improving it can enhance user engagement, increase signups, and lead to a better overall API product. In order to test this, an API developer experience review involves various phases. 

1. Initial Onboarding

First is assessing the getting started process. This usually involves creating an account, registering an app, adding payment details, and getting API keys. If the developer onboarding flow is not self-service, or if the developer dashboard is not usable, it can stunt adoption.

2. Making API Calls

Next is an audit of the actual integration experience. How easy is it to make an API request? How quickly can I get to 'Hello World'? Developers test APIs using various means, such as cURL in Terminal, third-party API testing applications like Postman, or through an integrated sandbox or playground. So, these experience testing APIs from different sources should be evaluated.

3. Checking Responses and Errors

Next is assessing the nitty-gritty of API requests and responses. Do error responses have detailed helpful messages? Are there consistent naming conventions throughout path names, methods, and parameters? Do HTTP methods conform to standard semantics? A developer usability audit looks into these call mechanics from the human perspective to see what can be improved.

4. Evaluating API Documentation 

Many developers go straight to the docs. As such, they're often the first impression a developer will have with an API. This part of the review assesses the quality of the API reference. Are the docs organized and well-structured with a nice-looking design? Are parameters and fields clearly described? Are there code samples, and if so, is there good language support? There are countless other points to consider with API documentation, like the changelog, versioning information, search and discoverability, and more.

5. Assessing Developer Resources

A developer portal typically has more than just the API reference. For instance, is there a public OpenAPI description file? Language-specific SDKs? A developer experience review considers the various types of interfaces and tools, including HTTP calls, SDKs, CLI, or IDE plugins, that programmers can use to access value from an API.

6. Reviewing Ongoing Maintenance

Consuming third-party APIs is more hassle than just a single integration — developer experience must consider the entire API lifecycle. Are changes clearly communicated, and how so? Is there a sunset and deprecation policy? Is there a changelog? Answers to these questions can determine the stability of the API and its overall maintenance burden.

7. Developer Support Channels

Just as helpful is the developer support side of things. Are there relevant tutorials, sample code, walkthroughs, or helpful customer success stories? How easy is it to get through to customer support? Is there a dedicated API support email? Having quality developer resources and a friendly support team is a big benefit to DX.

The Goals of A Developer Experience Audit

An API developer experience review is like the ultimate API usability assessment. It can expose developer pain points you didn't know existed or underscore the things you know you need to work on. This can bring numerous benefits to help improve your frontend.

• See how others use your product: Analyzing API developer experience can expose how others operate on your platform, exposing pain points.
• Get actionable insights: A DX review produces actionable feedback on improving the API's marketability.
• See if your API conforms to best practices: There is a litany of industry-standard expectations for RESTful HTTP APIs, many of which are unwritten rules.
• Improve developer satisfaction: Increase the likelihood of developer engagmeent and retention, and improve your Net Promoter Score (NPS).
• Stay on top of developer experience trends: Learn new cutting-edge styles and perks you hadn't considered.
• Decrease costs: Most technology leaders agree that investing in developer experience can reduce costs. 

Get An External API DX Review

It's hard to see the forest from the trees. This is why I believe it's helpful to get feedback from the outside. Similar to hiring a consultant to conduct user experience or usability testing services, working with a specialized API DX consultant helps treat your API as the product it is.

And now for the pitch... I am now actively booking clients as an API developer experience consultant! I have already done this with two customers, including reviewing the API developer experiences for Salad, an AI/ML platform, and Authenticating.com, a suite of authentication APIs. I really enjoyed these projects and would love to do more of them. 

Why Work With Me?

APIs are my beat. As a tech journalist, I have been following the API economy for over a decade. Over the years, I have evaluated hundreds, if not thousands, of web APIs. And I know intimately that not all API calls are made the same.

I was first a researcher for ProgrammableWeb, a defunct API directory that cataloged the burgeoning API space. Since 2015, I have been the Editor for Nordic APIs, a well-regarded blog and event series in the API community, where we share a ton of knowledge about API best practices, ways to improve documentation, and developer experience tips. I want to help organizations put this knowledge into practice.

I believe an emphasis on developer experience will only become more crucial in the future. And I especially enjoy working with early-stage companies to optimize their strategy. If you'd like to learn more about booking an API developer experience audit, visit this page to place an order, or feel free to contact me for more information.