SOAP API vs gRPC

Developers should learn SOAP API when working in enterprise environments that require high security, reliability, and transactional support, such as financial services, healthcare, or legacy systems meets developers should learn grpc when building microservices architectures, real-time applications, or systems requiring low-latency, high-throughput communication, such as in cloud-native environments or iot platforms. Here's our take.

SOAP API

Nice Pick

Developers should learn SOAP API when working in enterprise environments that require high security, reliability, and transactional support, such as financial services, healthcare, or legacy systems

Pros

• It is particularly useful for scenarios needing ACID compliance, stateful operations, or integration with systems that mandate WS-* standards like WS-Security for encryption and digital signatures
• Related to: xml, wsdl

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

gRPC

Developers should learn gRPC when building microservices architectures, real-time applications, or systems requiring low-latency, high-throughput communication, such as in cloud-native environments or IoT platforms

Pros

• It is particularly useful for polyglot systems where services are written in different languages, as it provides language-agnostic contracts via protobuf
• Related to: protocol-buffers, http-2

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

The Verdict

These tools serve different purposes. SOAP API is a concept while gRPC is a framework. We picked SOAP API based on overall popularity, but your choice depends on what you're building.

The Bottom Line

SOAP API wins

Based on overall popularity. SOAP API is more widely used, but gRPC excels in its own space.