Concept / Term · Established
API query language and runtime
A typed API query language that lets a client request precisely the fields it needs rather than accepting a fixed response shape.
Field note
GraphQL is an API query language and runtime in which clients request the precise fields they need through a typed schema. One endpoint can serve many related data shapes.
Facebook developed GraphQL for mobile application data needs and released it publicly in 2015. The name reflects querying a connected graph of types and relationships.
A screen can request a customer, recent orders and selected product fields in one structured query rather than calling several fixed endpoints.
It gives clients flexibility and a discoverable contract, while moving complexity into schema design, query control, caching and server performance.
In a sentence“The dashboard’s GraphQL query asks only for order totals and customer names.”