Building REST APIs with Django REST Framework

Django REST Framework (DRF) is the go-to library for building APIs in Django. It provides serializers, viewsets, authentication, and pagination out of the box.

Start by installing DRF:

pip install djangorestframework

Add 'rest_framework' to INSTALLED_APPS, then create a serializer for your model:

Serializers convert Django model instances to JSON and back. ViewSets combine the logic for listing, creating, updating, and deleting resources into a single class.

DRF also includes a browsable API — a web-based interface for testing your endpoints directly in the browser. This makes development and debugging much faster.