Build a REST API Design Review
Review this REST API design: [describe endpoints]. Check for REST best practices, status code correctness, rate limiting needs, authentication gaps, and pagination strategy. Suggest improvements with examples.
Many APIs fail at scale because design reviews happen too late; this prompt catches issues early.
When you're building a REST API, getting the design right from the start saves countless hours of refactoring later. The Build a REST API Design Review prompt helps developers, architects, and technical leads catch architectural problems before they become production nightmares. Whether you're working on a small internal API or a public-facing service that needs to handle thousands of requests, this prompt acts as an experienced code reviewer who understands REST principles, HTTP semantics, and scalability patterns. It's particularly valuable for teams without dedicated API architects or for developers stepping into API design for the first time.
Using this prompt is straightforward. You describe your API endpoints in concrete detail where the placeholder says [describe endpoints]. For example, you might write "I have GET /users, GET /users/{id}, POST /users, PUT /users/{id}, DELETE /users/{id}, and GET /users/{id}/posts for retrieving a user's posts." Include the methods, paths, expected response formats, and any current implementation notes. The more specific you are about what each endpoint does and how it currently handles responses, the better feedback ChatGPT can provide.
ChatGPT will return a comprehensive review that evaluates your design against REST standards. Expect detailed feedback on whether you're using correct HTTP status codes for different scenarios, recommendations for authentication approaches like JWT or OAuth, pagination strategies to handle large datasets, and rate limiting implementations to prevent abuse. You'll get specific examples of improved endpoint designs and explanations of why certain changes matter for maintainability and performance.
For better results, run the review multiple times at different design stages rather than waiting until everything is finalized. Ask follow-up questions about specific concerns like versioning strategies or error response formats. This iterative approach with ChatGPT helps you make informed architectural decisions early and keeps your API maintainable as it scales.