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Building REST APIs with Vanilla PHP

Administrator admin API PHP Beginner Jan 09, 2026 12:41 AM 3 views

Simple PHP API

Learn how to build REST APIs using pure PHP without frameworks, giving you full control over your code.

Basic API Structure

// api.php
header('Content-Type: application/json');
header('Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *');

$method = $_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'];
$path = $_SERVER['PATH_INFO'] ?? '/';

switch ($method) {
    case 'GET':
        handleGet($path);
        break;
    case 'POST':
        handlePost($path);
        break;
}

function handleGet($path) {
    if ($path === '/users') {
        $db = getDB();
        $stmt = $db->query("SELECT * FROM users");
        $users = $stmt->fetchAll(PDO::FETCH_ASSOC);
        echo json_encode($users);
    }
}

Best Practices

  • Use PDO for database access
  • Validate and sanitize all input
  • Use prepared statements
  • Set proper HTTP status codes
  • Handle errors gracefully

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