API connectors: how they work and their pros and cons 

To help you build API integrations faster, integration platform as a service (iPaaS) and embedded iPaaS solutions offer “API connectors.”

These connectors offer several advantages to building either internal or customer-facing integrations, but they also aren’t without their drawbacks. 

To help you evaluate and decide whether it makes sense to use them, we’ll break down how they work, highlight real-world examples, and cover their pros and cons.

What is an API connector?

It’s a pre-built API connection that iPaaS or embedded iPaaS solutions offer and that you can access by passing an authentication and authorization flow. 

API connectors also provide a specific set of triggers and actions that are based on API endpoints, enabling you to build trigger-based automations that work across the integrated applications.

Related: What is an API connection?

API connector vs API

API connectors are often used interchangeably with APIs. However, they’re completely different.

An API is a method of accessing and interacting with data or functionality from a 3rd party system, while an API connector offers a way to access certain 3rd-party API endpoints from an iPaaS or embedded iPaaS solution.

How API connectors work

While API connectors can vary across integration providers, they typically offer the following features and functionality.

Authentication support

All API connectors should offer at least one method of authentication, whether that’s basic authentication, OAuth, API keys, personal access tokens, etc.

Mulesoft, an internal integration solution, for instance, supports both basic authentication and OAuth2 for their Jira connector.

Triggers and actions

Based on the endpoints a connector supports and the use cases it’s built to solve, it offers out-of-the-box triggers and actions.

For instance, Workato offers an integration solution for both internal and customer-facing use cases, so they need to support a wide range of triggers and actions for key business applications—like Asana.

Automation templates

The vendor and—for product integration solutions—customers can leverage the connector to quickly build out automation templates. 

These templates can help users brainstorm the most impactful integrations and workflow automations for their business, and they can also go on to adopt and customize any to meet their needs. 

For example, Zapier, a workflow automation platform, offers a wide range of automation templates across their library of connectors. Users can review them and adopt any by simply clicking on the “Try it” button and creating an account.

Ongoing maintenance

The integration providers also regularly maintain the connectors to ensure they’re performing well and to prevent potential vulnerabilities. This helps take at least some of the onus of maintaining integrations off of your developers.

For example, Workato applies continuous enhancements and updates to their Workday connector for every even-numbered version release. 

Examples of API connectors

Here are just a few API connectors from iPaaS and embedded iPaaS vendors.

Workato’s Salesforce connector

Their connector lets you access and perform actions on accounts, opportunities, contacts, and a host of other records, making the connector well suited to support various use cases.

This connector is relatively deep for a few reasons. Namely, Salesforce is likely one of Workato’s most in-demand integrations, and their customers have diverse integration needs for the CRM; and unlike many other iPaaS and embedded iPaaS solutions, Workato has been around 10+ years, so they’ve had more time to invest in their connectors.

Related: A look at Workato's competitors

Prismatic’s NetSuite connector

The embedded iPaaS solution supports a more finite list of actions with their NetSuite connector.

The “records” may refer to a wide range of resources. Given that they aren’t listed (or they’re buried within their site), it’s fair to assume that the connector doesn’t cover the vast majority of NetSuite’s endpoints. 

The reason for their shallow connector can potentially be explained by the fact that NetSuite’s API is complex and difficult to build to, and/or the team at Prismatic hasn’t prioritized building and maintaining this integration (assuming they have the resources to build and maintain this integration). 

https://www.merge.dev/blog/prismatic-pricing?blog-related=image

Paragon’s Workday connector

The embedded iPaaS solution supports “Beta” versions of certain API connectors, such as Workday.

Unlike the non-Beta API connectors listed on their site, the integrations page for Workday doesn’t list out any triggers and actions, making it seem as though it isn’t quite built yet or offers very limited functionality. 

Benefits of API connectors

API connectors offer a specific set of pros and cons. Let’s start with the former:

• Accelerates integration development. Your team doesn’t need to worry about building to individual endpoints and maintaining those connections

• Offers flexible implementation options. In the case of embedded iPaaS solutions, you can leverage them to build automations within your product, and/or you can enable customers to pick and choose the ones they want and use them however they see fit

• Lets you offer white label connectors. This makes it seem as though your team built and maintains the integrations

• Helps you focus less on building integrations. You can focus instead on building uniquely powerful automations

Drawbacks of API connectors

API connectors also have notable cons worth considering:

• They may not offer the endpoints you need. Whenever that’s the case, you’ll either need to build directly to the API provider or work with the integration solution to improve their connector (which can take time and may even come at an additional cost to your business)

• It’s still difficult to scale your integration builds, quickly. While the process of accessing API connectors may be relatively straightforward, the other steps involved in implementing integrations can be anything but. The workflow builders associated with these tools can be surprisingly complex and require extensive onboarding—even for engineers

• Integration solutions may falsely advertise their API connectors. In some cases, an iPaaS or embedded iPaaS vendor will say they support an API connector and that it covers certain triggers and actions just to stay competitive. And while they may start building them if you invest in their platform, the process of building and supporting the connector will take time, leading you to face a long time to value 

• The ongoing maintenance can be slow and ineffective. Many API providers take a long time to address bugs and make enhancements, which can lead to slow sync frequencies, leaked data, incomplete data syncs, and more

How to evaluate 3rd-party API connectors

API connectors are, clearly, not created equal. To help you find the best one for a given application, you should consider the following: 

Supported endpoints

A connector’s API endpoint support is abstracted away with terms like triggers and actions. As a result, you’ll need to review the full scope of triggers and actions available for a given connector across providers.

Fortunately, this work is made relatively easy, as most vendors list out the specific triggers and actions they support across their connectors.

AI capabilities for development and maintenance

LLMs are making the process of developing and improving connectors easier. But only some integration providers are taking full advantage.

Workato falls into the camp that does. 

They offer several copilots that support different facets of connector development and maintenance: Their Connector Copilot provides suggestions and instructions for implementing authentication logic, actions, and more for any new connector you want to develop; their Mapper Copilot can help you identify the appropriate fields to map between applications—and the list goes on.

Available authentication methods

API providers often support several forms of authentication, from OAuth 2.0 to basic authentication to API keys. 

Based on the integrations you’re looking to build, you may want to use the most secure method—OAuth 2.0—if possible. 

Fortunately, integration providers typically shed insight on the specific authentication methods individual connectors support via their docs, making it easy to compare your authentication options across providers.

Customizability

An API connector may not offer all the functionality your integration needs out of the box. 

With that in mind, you should look for connectors that let you add additional endpoints, provide several options for transforming data during the mapping process, and can access custom objects and fields.

https://www.merge.dev/blog/workday-connector?blog-related=image

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API connector FAQ

In case you have any more questions on API connectors, We've answered several more commonly-asked questions below.

What are some synonyms of API connector?

API connectors are also often referred to as app connectors, pre-built integrations, or third-party connectors.

They can also be application-specific. For example, an API connector for Salesforce can be called a “Salesforce connector.” 

What is the difference between an API connector and a custom connector?

An API connector offers the same functionality for every user out of the box while a custom connector refers to any connector that’s been modified to meet a user’s specific integration requirements.

When does it make sense to use API connectors?

It can make sense to use them for a wide range of reasons: 

• You need to accelerate your time to build integrations
• You don’t have enough developer resources to build integrations natively
• Your engineers don’t have bandwidth to maintain the integrations after they’re built
• The API provider doesn’t offer enough—or any—documentation

What are common examples of API connectors?

Popular software applications that offer APIs are widely offered as API connectors. To that end, Salesforce, Google Sheets, HubSpot, Dropbox, Workday, and QuickBooks are common connectors.