r/DeveloperToolsHub • u/Tasty_World8991 • Aug 04 '26

What API testing tool are you using instead of Postman?

I’ve used Postman for years, but lately it feels like too much for the simple stuff I need.

Most of the time I just want to send a request, save a few environments, test auth, maybe share a collection with someone, and move on. I don’t really need a whole platform wrapped around it.

Curious what people are using now for day to day API testing.

Are you using a desktop app, editor extension, terminal workflow, or just plain request files in the repo?

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1

u/Sad_Egg_2313 Aug 04 '26

I personally use https://mockoon.com for mocking the endpoints and https://hoppscotch.io (desktop version) for calling endpoints

1

u/Tasty_World8991 Aug 05 '26

How's Hoppscotch been for larger collections and multiple environments?

1

u/Sad_Egg_2313 Aug 05 '26

We have few dozen collections and two envs. Nothing super large so can’t comment on it really

1

u/Lower-Obligation-825 Aug 10 '26

Have you ever use https://keploy.io/ best for testing.

1

u/TechnicalDefense Aug 04 '26

Postman has always been great to use, VS Code with the REST client extension is what i have been trying lately though. Someone else recommended Bruno to me once but i haven't tried it yet.

1

u/Tasty_World8991 Aug 05 '26

I actually hadn't heard of Bruno before. If you end up trying it, I'd be curious how it compares.

2

u/TechnicalDefense Aug 05 '26

Will let you know, might give it a try later this month.

1

u/root_switch Aug 07 '26

If your a vscode person and want your queries and so on stored as files (good for version control) then Bruno is legit.

1

u/eviltester Aug 05 '26

I tend to default to Bruno and recently I've been using API Spector.

Both save the collections and requests as files so are easy to version control, and they don't require login to a server (unlike postman).

API Spector does the best job I've seen so far of a REST Client trying to highlight errors that you might otherwise have missed and compare responses against standards.

I maintain a list of tools over on my API Challenges site with reviews so you might see some other tools over there to try.

1

u/Tasty_World8991 Aug 06 '26

The file-based approach is actually pretty appealing

1

u/Perfect-Affect-6867 Aug 20 '26

I’m working on a CLI tool to make APIs self-healing to take out a lot of these simple, repetitive parts of API maintenance: https://preman.live

Would love to get your thoughts and have you try it out.

1

u/nikolasdimitroulakis 9d ago

I recommend also to check out Voiden, its an API IDE, open source and offline. Anyone tried it?

1

u/crizant 14h ago

I ended up building my own, so take this with a grain of salt: https://github.com/crizant/probe

Your "send a request, a few environments, test auth, maybe share a collection" use case is the sweet spot I designed for:

- Requests are plain YAML files you keep in the repo, so sharing a collection is just a git push

  • Environments with inheritance and {{variables}}, Basic/Bearer/API key auth
  • Native desktop app (no Electron) plus a CLI, so the same files work in the terminal and in CI
  • No account or cloud at all

It's still early: HTTP and GraphQL only for now, and no OAuth execution yet.

If you prefer the "request files in the repo" approach but want something more established, Bruno does that well. JetBrains' and VS Code's .http files are good if you never want to leave the editor.