You’ve probably heard the words webhook and API (Application Programming Interfaces) mentioned more times than you can remember, but you have no idea what it’s all about. It’s completely normal if you don’t belong to the technology sector, but it doesn’t hurt to know how these systems work, which you may use constantly without knowing what’s behind them.

Although it may seem that certain concepts that escape us from our field are complicated to understand (or even to handle), I can assure you that this is not the case at all.

That’s why, in this post I want to explain in an easy and simple way what a webhook is, what an API is, what they are for and how they differ.

Open your eyes wide and let’s get started 🙂

What it a webhook

Within the world of web applications, data exchanges often occur between applications. Webhooks allow you to modify the behavior of an application and/or send or receive data between applications.

That is why we say that a webhook is an automated communication system that serves to notify a third party application of an event that occurs in your application or vice versa, triggering one or more actions depending on the webhook that is executed.

Webhooks can be used, for example, to connect your email marketing tool with your CRM. Every time someone joins your mailing list, a webhook with “User subscribed” is executed. The URL of the webhook in your CRM receives the data of the new subscriber to register him or update that contact in your CRM if he already exists, so you can have the information always updated automatically.

A very useful option to link applications is to use NoCode tools such as Make (ex Intgromat), Zapier or n8n that allow you to send data to hundreds of applications with which they integrate.

Examples of webhooks in Arkibot:

⇒ For example, in Arkibot we have a webhook at the end of a chat with a user that allows all the content of the conversation to be sent to the application you need (email, Slack, CRM, etc.). In that case, you can activate the webhook of finished chat indicating to which URL the content has to be sent and your application will have to have a webhook that allows to receive that data.

⇒ Another example is the webhook that allows you to send each message that a user writes in the chat so that you can intercept it and, for example, modify the answer and customize it for the user (stock, price…).

In short, a webhook is a tool that allows you to customize what your application does when an event occurs so that you can automate what happens when that event is executed

What is an API

In the case of the API, we are also talking about communication between web applications, but in a somewhat different way to Webhooks.

An API is like the vehicle that transports requests to your application to receive or send data. An API is the system that allows other applications or services to talk to your application in a standard format. This back and forth data flow that occurs is usually in JSON or XML format (just to ring a bell).

For example, your CRM can communicate with the API of your email marketing tool to be able to add or update your CRM customers as subscribers, send newsletters, etc.

Differences between webhook and API

It is very common to confuse APIS with webhooks because they are very similar concepts.

Therefore, if you want to know which one it is in a specific case, take a close look at who starts the communication. That is the main difference.

In the case of webhooks, we are automatically notified whenever a certain event occurs that triggers the execution of that webhook.

On the other hand, in the API, the communication starts from our application requesting through the API the information to a third party application.

When to use webhooks and when to use APIS

Although there is a lot of Galician in this team… here the answer I have to give you is it depends.

What does it depend on? 🎶

On what you need it for, of course.

For example, the APIS:

⇒ They are more flexible solutions.

⇒ They are used when information is constantly being updated.

⇒ Some technical knowledge is required to operate them.

⇒ They require you to either schedule calls to APISs or use NoCode tools that use those APISs to do “something” when you want them to.

On the other hand…

⇒ Applications that already have webhooks allow you to send or receive information when a certain event occurs to allow you to customize the behavior on that event.

⇒ You can also use NoCode tools to integrate these webhooks with other applications without the need for programming skills.

In Conclusions

As you have been able to see, here the thing is not about which is better, but about what you need it for. APIS and webhooks are systems that facilitate the tasks between web applications that we use on a daily basis and it all depends on the circumstances in which you are going to use them.

We use both systems, both in Arkibot as in Webempresa because neither excludes the other.

In Arkibot thanks to webhooks we can connect automation tools with applications to each other.

You can see that the possibilities of both systems can be many. I hope that thanks to this post, you have understood a little better what webhooks and APIS are for. 😉