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Best answer

Why doesn't Zapier have an API?

  • 23 October 2019
  • 9 replies
  • 1667 views
PaulKortman
Userlevel 7
Badge +10

I know, crazy question, right? A middleware having it's own API...


But I and my team are often in webhooks and we first test them within postman, before moving into Zapier... as I was copy-pasting some webhooks into Zapier I wondered why in the world am I doing manual copy-pasting (a repetitive task) when I'm the systems/automation guy telling my clients they shouldn't be doing that yet here I am doing it.


So I started digging into exporting a webhook from postman and then thinking through how to "import" it into Zapier, and I know I could write a script, or even a zap that would adjust the formatting as needed.


But there's no API, no way to create a Zap step from a script/webhook etc.


Is it on the roadmap for Zapier? I know Zapier Manager exists, but what I want to do is have API access to manage my Zaps, create new steps, edit steps, enable/disable zaps etc. from a webhook.


I know, an API to control an app that integrates with APIs... it's so meta! But I would use it!


icon

Best answer by Danvers 20 December 2019, 15:52

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This post has been closed for comments. Please create a new post if you need help or have a question about this topic.

9 replies

AndrewJDavison_Luhhu
Userlevel 7
Badge +10

Oh, Zapier desperately needs an API.

For handling support requests, for errors, for usage stats - there are so many external tools I could build that would make my work easier!


We're Zapier Certified Experts - we help businesses do cool stuff with automation | www.luhhu.com
alex
Userlevel 7
Badge +2

Definitely agree with this. Sounds like a facentating discussion to really hammer out where this could be most valuable.

There are more minor things like "be able to invite a team member via the API", and then there is going deep like actually editing existing zaps.

Being able to pull via the API a list of all of our zaps, folder structure, active vs inactive. That would be super helpful regarding documentation. Pulling some of this information out into Airtable to better organize/manage.

I'd be curious to hear of some examples of how you would be using the edit zap functionality via the API specifically. I definitely come back to more of a raw/barebones JSON editor view for some of the power-user type of "tested this in Postman and need to quickly create 3 steps via webhooks which is much easier to manually code versus using the actual Zapier editor."


Alex (efficient.app)
PaulKortman
Userlevel 7
Badge +10

One of the ways I would use the edit Zap functionality is to copy individual steps and move/add them to other zaps, or to add a path above a step and move all those steps into one or more of the paths



Need Additional help? Feel free to reach out here: https://zapier.com/experts/connex-digital/
ChrisP
Userlevel 7
Badge

Agree with this 100%.

An API would allow me to add so much value to my existing workflows:

Statistics (my way)

Better search across all zaps for example which spreadsheets are involved in what zaps. What Mandrill templates are linked to what Zaps

Zap Change Logs (at present I can never roll anything back)

I could also have more granular control on what type of halted/error messages I get

Could even someday build a custom portal for customers to log into

Opening up an API allows all sorts of creative use cases that internal devs could never dream up. Crowd Sourced Creativity. Then Zapier gets full statistics of what is popular or not. Its a win win.


Danvers
Userlevel 7
Badge +12

This is such an interesting discussion, thanks for starting it @PaulKortman!


Is there anything else that you would like to see a Zapier API do?


ChrisP
Userlevel 7
Badge

I could also see potential for linking up Lucid Charts with a Zapier API to automatically generate awesome zap flow diagrams.


PaulKortman
Userlevel 7
Badge +10

What @ChrisP said!!! ^^^^ (Lucid Charts!!)

Perhaps another thing would be to allow me to proactively test account authentication? I could then have my script do something or notify someone if an account authentication is failing.


Also document which apps I'm using (So I can boast on my website in an automated function) and reporting like Chris also mentioned. To be able to show clients and prospective clients alike how much time my zaps/automations are saving them.


But for me the real key as I mentioned above is Reading/Creating/editing/deleting zaps, zap steps, and zap paths. That would allow me to do a lot of magic that I cannot do today.


Need Additional help? Feel free to reach out here: https://zapier.com/experts/connex-digital/
Michael Lucas
Userlevel 2
Badge

@Danvers Are you able to confirm if this on Zapier's roadmap?


Danvers
Userlevel 7
Badge +12

@Shane It's not currently on Zapier's roadmap, but we haven't ruled it out.


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