What is this?
YApi is a visual API management platform for developers, product managers and QA: one place to document, debug, mock and automatically test your APIs.
Is it a hosted service I sign up for, or something I run myself?
You run it yourself: YApi is a full web platform you deploy on your own server — typically the company intranet — and the whole team uses it through a browser.
How do I get it running?
Run 'npm install -g yapi-cli' and then 'yapi server' — a visual deployment wizard finishes setup in your browser; afterwards the site starts with 'node /server/app.js'. Unofficial Docker and docker-compose images also exist.
What does my server need before installing?
Node.js 7.6 or newer, MongoDB 2.6 or newer, and git — that is the whole checklist on the server side.
Any gotchas right after deployment?
The initial admin account uses the default password 'ymfe.org', so change it in the personal center after first login. Upgrades are painless though: 'yapi update' refreshes sources without affecting existing project data.
Does the team need to install anything to use it day to day?
No — once the server is deployed, members just open the instance URL in a browser and log in, so it works from any machine with a browser.
Is it free to use, including at work?
Yes — YApi is open source under the Apache License 2.0, and the README stresses it is free; no paid tiers are mentioned.
What can it do besides storing API docs?
Much of the workflow happens inside YApi: Postman-style request debugging, automated tests with Response assertions, and a built-in MockServer. Interfaces and their response structures are described with Json5 and Mockjs, and you can import existing data from Postman, HAR or Swagger.
How does the MockServer decide what to return?
Besides ordinary random mock data, it has a Mock Expectation feature: you define request filtering rules, and matching requests get your expected response instead of random values.
Can I generate client code from my API definitions?
Yes, via ecosystem tools: yapi-to-typescript generates TypeScript request functions, yapi-gen-js-code generates JavaScript request functions, and SwiftJSONModeler generates Swift models from YApi interface definitions.
Is this battle-tested or a hobby project?
It is widely used in production — the README lists companies like Qunar, Ctrip, Meituan, Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba, JD, Toutiao and Kuaishou among its customers.
What are similar projects?
metersphere, json-server, swagger-ui, awesome-nestjs, parse-server, msw, gin-vue-admin, BrasilAPI
Which topics is it in?
api-management, mocking, mock, swagger, mongodb, enterprise, testing, documentation, rest-api, developers, web-app, api
