What is the best way to tell if the API is online? I know I can check if the user has the Internet connection using navigator.onLine but how about the API?

Should I send a request to some simple endpoint and see if the data goes back to me?

What is the best way to tell if the API is online? I know I can check if the user has the Internet connection using navigator.onLine but how about the API?

Should I send a request to some simple endpoint and see if the data goes back to me?

• javascript

• Absolutely. There is no other way that you can check it. Make a call and check the [status](w3/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec10.html )of it. – Suresh Atta Commented Aug 9, 2017 at 12:07
• Try to use an ajax request using GET method. A 404 status code is the best sign that the server has not found anything matching the URI given, which means the api is not reachable at least in that endpoint. – Bmaed Riasbet Commented Aug 9, 2017 at 12:11

2 Answers 2

I would just simple do a simple "ping" type test, if your API was https://api.example./auth/user I would just do a simple GET request on https://api.example. if this returns the expected result you can assume the API is online. This isn't the best test because there still could be a problem with the API but the concept of it being on line is still checked.

If the service you are using has a status page 9/10 the API will be on there. You could use this page to your advantage by scraping the page and checking the status of the API. Say your using the Bitbucket API you could GET this page status.bitbucket and then check that the API state is OPERATIONAL.

Try this under try catch block and log error or do continue rest of the code based on that

try {
   //api request 
} catch (e)
   // log error
   // Set flag
}

Based on the flag, do you next action item