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What is the difference between SOAP and REST?

Answer»

Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) and Representational State Transfer (REST) both are used to transfer data over the web. While SOAP is a protocol, REST is an architectural pattern. The major differences between SOAP and REST are:

SOAP
REST
SOAP is a protocol designed with a specification. It includes a WSDL file containing the required information about the web service and its location.
REST is an architectural pattern in which web services have features like being stateless, cacheable, layered, etc.
SOAP cannot make USE of REST.
REST can make use of SOAP.
SOAP uses service interfaces to expose its functionality to client applications.
REST uses Uniform Service Locators to provide access to the components on the hardware device.
SOAP Messages contain a lot of information which is why SOAP requires more bandwidth for data transfer.
REST messages are comparatively SMALLER than SOAP, as they are MOSTLY in the JSON format. Thus, REST does not require HIGH bandwidth.
SOAP only allows XML data format.
REST allows different data formats like JSON, XML, Plain TEXT, HTML, etc., with JSON being the most preferred and widely used format.


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