This article was originally published on The NewStack on July 25, 2024.

Free SDK hub offers software development kits for a wide range of popular APIs, making it easier and faster to integrate services into applications.

APIs are everywhere. They are a mission-critical way for companies to expose their products and services to the world, with 72% of organizations considering API adoption a crucial component of their business strategy and future growth.

As API integrations become central to business operations, minimizing the time needed for API integration is crucial for developers. Using software development kits (SDKs) is a key factor in reducing API integration time.

Reducing API Integration Time to Increase Revenue

Whether API integrations are fueling a new product launch, forming new partnerships or connecting internal services, minimizing the time developers spend on these integrations can significantly enhance revenue growth. These are the top drivers we’ve heard on how reducing API integration time has helped increase revenue:

Sales Cycles

For many B2B companies, building an API integration between their and their customer’s products is a requirement for the sale. Shortening API integration time accelerates sales cycles by facilitating faster integrations and contract signings. This allows businesses to capitalize on sales opportunities sooner, driving more sales and increasing revenue.

Faster Time to Market

Expedited integrations lead to quicker product development, allowing businesses to capture market share before competitors. Being first to market with new features or products can attract more customers and capture market share before competitors do, directly contributing to revenue growth.

Increased Developer Productivity

Reducing time on complex integrations allows developers to concentrate on core functionalities, enhancing the product and attracting more customers. According to a report by McKinsey, businesses that reduce their development cycles and invest in engineering scaling opportunities are those that reap the rewards in revenue growth. Higher productivity means more features and improvements, leading to a better product that can attract and retain more customers.

Improved Customer Experience

Quickly integrating APIs and rolling out new features enhances the customer experience. A more reliable and feature-rich product leads to higher customer satisfaction, retention and referrals, all of which boost revenue.

Benefits of Using an SDK

Given the critical nature of APIs in today’s business environment, companies are providing developers with a wide range of tools to help reduce the API learning curve. These tools include making API spec documentation public, keeping documentation up to date with the latest API changes, providing testing and validation tools for API endpoints, and engaging with developer communities for API feedback.

However, the most effective tool for reducing overall API integration time is the use of an SDK that allows developers to use prebuilt libraries to simplify API calls and data handling. SDKs can accelerate software development time by up to 50% by simplifying integration and reducing the amount of custom development required.

Some of the top benefits of using an SDK to reduce API integration time include:

Faster Development Cycles

Imagine you’re integrating a payment gateway into your e-commerce application. Without an SDK, you’d need to handle every aspect of the API integration manually — from authentication to error handling. This can be time-consuming and prone to errors. An SDK provides ready-made functions and tools that abstract API complexity, allowing you to focus on building features rather than dealing with low-level API details.

Language Native

SDKs are crafted to be language-native, offering idiomatic interfaces that integrate seamlessly with your existing codebase. This minimizes the learning curve, enhances intuitive integrations, and broadens your developer reach. Moreover, SDKs typically include IntelliSense support and type safety, which improve code accuracy and productivity by providing intelligent code suggestions and preventing errors in your requests.

Without an SDK, you must manually construct your requests and verify them against the API documentation. With an SDK, all the initial setup, guesswork, and manual verification are eliminated, as the types and authentication patterns are included within the library.

Example:

//Without SDK

async () => {  
  const url = 'https://api.petstore.com/v1/pets';

  const params = new URLSearchParams({  
    yourQueryParameter: 'your-query-parameter',  
  }).toString();

  const response ç= await fetch(`${url}${params ? '?' : ''}${params}`, {  
    method: 'POST',  
    headers: {  
      'Content-Type': 'application/json',  
      Authorization: `Bearer YOUR_API_TOKEN`,  
      'your-header-parameter': 'your-header-parameter',  
    },  
    body: JSON.stringify({  
      id: 10,  
      name: 'doggie',  
      category: {  
        id: 1,  
        name: 'dogs',  
      },  
      photoUrls: ['photoUrls'],  
      tags: [  
        {  
          id: 8,  
          name: 'dog-tag',  
        },  
      ],  
      status: status,  
    }),  
  });

  const data = await response.json();

  console.log(data);  
};

//With liblab SDK

import { Category, Pet, Petstore, Tag, Status } from 'petstore';

(async () => {  
  const petstore = new Petstore({ token: 'YOUR_API_TOKEN' });

  const category: Category = {  
    id: 1,  
    name: 'dogs',  
  };

  const tag: Tag = {  
    id: 8,  
    name: 'dog-tag',  
  };

  const status = Status.AVAILABLE;

  const pet: Pet = {  
    id: 10,  
    name: 'doggie',  
    category: category,  
    photoUrls: ['photoUrls'],  
    tags: [tag],  
    status: status,  
  };

  const { data } = await petstore.pet.addPet(pet, {  
    yourQueryParameter: 'your-query-parameter',  
    yourHeaderParameter: 'your-header-parameter',  
  });

  console.log(data);  
})();

Comprehensive Documentation

A high-quality SDK will include extensive documentation and code samples that allow developers to quickly get started with API calls in their native language.

Enhanced Security

APIs often require secure handling of sensitive data, and SDKs ensure security best practices by default. They help your integrations comply with the latest standards and reduce the risk of security vulnerabilities. Without an SDK, you would need to manually implement authentication patterns for each request. However, with an SDK, you can authenticate once, and the SDK will securely reuse these credentials for every subsequent request.

Example:

// Without SDK  
String username = "YOUR_USERNAME";  
String password = "YOUR_PASSWORD";

String basicToken = Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString((username + ":" + password).getBytes());

int id = 1;

HttpRequest request = HttpRequest.newBuilder()  
    .uri(URI.create("https://api.petstore.com/v1/pet/" + id))  
    .header("Accept", "application/json")  
    .header("Authorization", "Basic " + basicToken)  
    .method("GET", HttpRequest.BodyPublishers.noBody())  
    .build();  
      
HttpResponse<String> response = HttpClient.newHttpClient().send(request, HttpResponse.BodyHandlers.ofString());  
System.out.println(response.body());

// With liblab SDK  
PetstoreConfig config = PetstoreConfig.builder()  
  .basicAuthConfig(  
    BasicAuthConfig.builder()  
      .username("YOUR_USERNAME")  
      .password("YOUR_PASSWORD")  
      .build()  
  )  
  .build();  
Petstore petstore = new Petstore(config);

Pet response = petstore.petService.getPetById(1);  
System.out.println(response);

Improved Code Quality

Consistency is crucial in software development. When different team members implement API calls in various ways, it can lead to a fragmented code base that’s hard to maintain. SDKs promote a uniform approach, resulting in cleaner, more maintainable code.

Simplify Integrations with Free SDKs

SDKs are invaluable tools for simplifying API integration, enhancing productivity and ensuring robust, secure implementations. By leveraging SDKs, developers can focus on what they do best — building amazing applications.

To support developers in leveraging the benefits of SDKs, liblab has created liblab hub. liblab hub is a platform that provides free, easy-to-use SDKs for a wide range of popular APIs, making it easier than ever to integrate these services into your applications.

Whether you're working with sports, AI, DevTools, or customer relationship management (CRM) applications, the liblab hub has quality SDKs to reduce integration time for popular APIs in your industry. Explore liblab hub’s collection of free SDKs, and discover how SDKs can reduce your API integration time and boost revenue.