5 API Project Ideas

A few months ago, I created an API design project for a class I was teaching. Coming up with the design took some thought. However, it was a lot of fun!

Below are 5 API project ideas you can implement in your spare time for practice.

1. Payment APIs

2. Sports Ticketing APIs

3. Curb-Side Food Ordering APIs

4. Sports Fantasy Drafting APIs

5. Blog Content Management System (CMS) APIs

If you decide to design and implement any of these ideas, I recommend you put them in a public repository. I typically use GitHub or Bitbucket. I believe these projects would look good on your professional portfolio. Enjoy 😊!

#1 Payments APIs

The majority of companies deal with payment transactions from customers. This is an awesome project to wrap your brain around designing and building secure financial APIs. Build payment APIs that allow customers to pay with a debit card, credit card, and electronic check.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• How will I secure payment APIs?

• Should I implement masking and/or tokenization? Maybe encryption?

• Are there policies that I would like to apply?

• What data is needed for the mobile form factor? Desktop form-factor?

• Can I extend this to use external APIs like PayPal?

#2 Sports Ticketing APIs

This year's basketball playoffs are my inspiration for this project idea. Choose your favorite sports team and build APIs to support their ticketing system.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• How will I track ticket inventory?

  • Available Seats vs. Total Seats?

• How will I make payments?

• Could I integrate the ticketing system to make travel arrangements with 3rd party vendors like Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb?

#3 Curb-Side Food Ordering APIs

COVID-19 has transformed food pickup in the United States. Many of your favorite fast food restaurants now provide options that allow the customer to order via a mobile app. When the customer arrives at the restaurant, the food is brought out to the customer. This is called curbside pickup. Create APIs to support ordering and picking up food at your favorite restaurant.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• What APIs do I need to

  • Process Orders?

  • Pull customer profiles?

  • Make payments?

  • Scan incentives?

  • Describe the car and parking space.

• Could I leverage location APIs to find the closest restaurants?

#4 Sports Fantasy Drafting APIs

I have had the opportunity to play fantasy sports (without gambling). My favorite part was drafting the players. Create APIs to draft players and represent the draft board.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• How would I get the list of players?

  • Available Players vs. All Players

• Would I display individual player profiles so that the drafter can read up about the player?

• How do I keep track of the draft order?

• Could I integrate with 3rd party tools to pull player profiles and statistics?

• What APIs would I build to support these basic functions?

#5 Blog Content Management System (CMS) APIs

This idea is near and dear to my heart. Create APIs to support blogging.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• What APIs would I need to write, view and update posts and comments?

• Would my blog CMS APIs track viewership and likes?

• Could I integrate with social media APIs like Facebook and Twitter?

Well, I'm tapped out of ideas as you can incorporate APIs in building the majority of modern-day systems. Do you have any API project ideas? If so, share below in the comments.

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