Glossary · letter A
API
Application Programming InterfaceThe communication contract between systems
Definition
A set of rules through which one application can request data from another or ask it to perform an action. When an online shop displays a live exchange rate, its backend called the bank's API, received the rate and displayed it on the page.
Business application
Integrations between business systems (ERP, CRM, WMS) typically happen through APIs. Without an API, every integration would require manual CSV export and import — slow, unreliable and impossible to scale.