What are the most effective back-end web API design patterns?

To cover the drawbacks of a RESTful API you can implement few strategies: - You can use pagination which allows users to retrieve large data in small manageable chunks which also reduces the number of requests. - You can use tokens and authentication mechanisms (e.g. JWT, OAuth2.0) to maintain session-related info without violating the statelessness principle. You can leverage cookies as well for the same. - You can also use caching headers to reduce load on servers.

It depends on the framework you are using if you are using the JWT token on OPEN ID or MS API project it gives you the required statefulness by looking at the token. Version are confusing in start but they are there to support the old connected apps and move rest of them to newer version, also you can phase out the older connected apps to always use latest one.

RESTful (Representational State Transfer) API is one of the most effective and widely adopted design patterns for creating back-end web APIs. It is based on a set of architectural principles that promote simplicity, scalability, and interoperability. REST APIs use standard HTTP methods (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE) to interact with resources, which are represented as URLs. They follow a stateless client-server communication model and emphasize a uniform and predictable interface. RESTful APIs are resource-centric, meaning that each resource is uniquely identified by a URL, and interactions with these resources are performed using standard HTTP operations.

GraphQL is a flexible API design pattern that allows clients to request specific data using a single endpoint. Clients define their data needs with structured queries, reducing over-fetching and enabling efficient network communication. It offers strong typing and fosters collaboration between front-end and back-end developers, making it an efficient choice for modern web and mobile app APIs.

gRPC messages are about twice as lightweight as HTTP due to Protobuf encoding which serializes messages in binary format. Thus , there's a classic tradeoff: messages aren't human readable which makes it a bit harder on debugging, but it greatly reduces digital waste sent over the wire in comparison with HTTP.

gRPC, as a web API design pattern, excels in efficiency, performance, and versatility. It efficiently handles data serialization with Protocol Buffers (protobufs), making it ideal for large data volumes and microservices. It uses HTTP/2 for faster communication, supports various programming languages, and offers built-in features like authentication and load balancing. This strong-typing pattern enables real-time bidirectional streaming and benefits from a growing community. While it may have a learning curve, gRPC is a top choice for high-performance back-end APIs, particularly in scenarios with specific efficiency or scalability needs.

The Hybrid API pattern provides practical flexibility, allowing developers to choose the most suitable API approach for different use cases within a single API. It's beneficial when different parts of an application have varied requirements, like using RESTful for simple tasks and GraphQL for complex queries. However, it needs careful planning to maintain consistency and prevent complexity. Finding the right balance between different patterns is key for a successful Hybrid API.