07 Dynamic Discovery

title: Dynamic API Discovery with HATEOAS weight: 17 date: 2026-06-28 lastmod: 2026-06-28 description: Enable dynamic API discovery in HATEOAS where clients discover endpoints and actions at runtime by following links from a root entry point without hard-coded URLs. tags: [api-development, hateoas]

Dynamic API discovery in HATEOAS starts from a root entry point that contains links to all major resources. Clients navigate the API by following rel values without knowing URL structures. This decouples clients from server URL organization.

```python
# Root entry point (GET /api)
{
    "_links": {
        "self": {"href": "/api"},
        "users": {"href": "/api/users", "rel": "collection"},
        "orders": {"href": "/api/orders", "rel": "collection"},
        "products": {"href": "/api/products", "rel": "collection"},
        "search": {"href": "/api/search{?q}", "rel": "search", "templated": true},
        "me": {"href": "/api/users/me", "rel": "self", "method": "GET"},
        "auth": {"href": "/api/auth/login", "rel": "auth", "method": "POST"}
    }
}

# Client discovers and follows users link
# Client never constructs /api/users manually

What's Next

Now learn about media types in Hypermedia APIs and HATEOAS.