Most API integrations fail not because the API is bad, but because the integration is built optimistically. The happy path works. The edge cases do not.
Here is what we see most often in codebases we inherit.
No retry logic. Third-party APIs go down. Rate limits get hit. Network packets get dropped. If your integration does not handle transient failures gracefully, every outage cascades directly into your product.
Tight coupling. When the third-party API changes its schema, your entire data pipeline breaks. The fix is an anti-corruption layer — a translation boundary that absorbs upstream changes without touching your domain model.
No versioning strategy. APIs deprecate endpoints. If you are not pinning to a specific API version and monitoring deprecation notices, you are building on sand.
No observability. You find out the integration is broken when a customer complains, not from a dashboard. Every integration should emit structured logs and fire alerts on failure rates above a threshold.
Build integrations with the assumption that the third party will let you down. Design for it. Test for it. Your users will never see the difference.
