An Application Programming Interface or API is a set of instructions by which computers or software can connect and communicate with each other. It comes as a designed interface that defines what is offered as a service to other pieces of software.
An Application Programming Interface or API usually comes accompanied by documentation and a reference with details on how to consume the underlying service.
This serves the purpose of hiding or abstracting internal implementations of the application and exposing only those parts a programmer will find useful and keeping them consistent even if the internal details later change.
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