redoc

What is redoc?

Redoc is an open-source tool for generating interactive API documentation from OpenAPI (formerly Swagger) definitions. It provides a user-friendly interface for exploring and understanding API endpoints, parameters, and responses.

What are redoc's main functionalities?

Render API Documentation

This feature allows you to render API documentation from an OpenAPI specification file. The `init` method takes the path to the OpenAPI file, optional configuration options, and the HTML element where the documentation should be rendered.

const Redoc = require('redoc');
Redoc.init('path/to/your/openapi.yaml', {
  scrollYOffset: 50
}, document.getElementById('redoc-container'));

Customization Options

Redoc allows for extensive customization of the rendered documentation. You can change the theme, colors, fonts, and other styles to match your branding.

const Redoc = require('redoc');
Redoc.init('path/to/your/openapi.yaml', {
  theme: {
    colors: {
      primary: {
        main: '#dd5522'
      }
    }
  }
}, document.getElementById('redoc-container'));

Standalone HTML Generation

Redoc provides a CLI tool to generate a standalone HTML file from an OpenAPI specification. This can be useful for hosting static API documentation without needing a server.

const { exec } = require('child_process');
exec('npx redoc-cli bundle path/to/your/openapi.yaml', (error, stdout, stderr) => {
  if (error) {
    console.error(`Error: ${error.message}`);
    return;
  }
  if (stderr) {
    console.error(`Stderr: ${stderr}`);
    return;
  }
  console.log(`Stdout: ${stdout}`);
});

Other packages similar to redoc

swagger-ui

Swagger UI is another popular tool for generating interactive API documentation from OpenAPI specifications. It offers a more traditional interface compared to Redoc and is highly customizable. Swagger UI is often used in conjunction with other Swagger tools for a complete API development workflow.

api-docs

API Docs is a lightweight tool for generating API documentation from OpenAPI specifications. It focuses on simplicity and ease of use, making it a good choice for smaller projects or teams that need quick and straightforward documentation.

spectacle

Spectacle is a tool for generating API documentation from OpenAPI specifications with a focus on readability and user experience. It offers a clean and modern interface, similar to Redoc, but with different customization options and features.

README

Generate beautiful API documentation from OpenAPI

About Redoc

Redoc is an open source tool for generating documentation from OpenAPI (formerly Swagger) definitions.

By default Redoc offers a three-panel, responsive layout:

• The left panel contains a search bar and navigation menu.
• The central panel contains the documentation.
• The right panel contains request and response examples.

Live demo

If you want to see how Redoc renders your OpenAPI definition, you can try it out online at https://redocly.github.io/redoc/.

A version of the Swagger Petstore API is displayed by default. To test it with your own OpenAPI definition, enter the URL for your definition and select TRY IT.

Redoc features

• Responsive three-panel design with menu/scrolling synchronization
• Support for OpenAPI 3.1, OpenAPI 3.0, and Swagger 2.0
• Ability to integrate your API introduction into the side menu
• High-level grouping in side menu with the x-tagGroups specification extension
• Simple integration with create-react-app
• Code samples support (with vendor extension)
  

Usage

Redoc is provided as a CLI tool (also distributed as a Docker image), HTML tag, and React component.

Generate documentation from the CLI

If you have Node installed, quickly generate documentation using npx:

npx @redocly/cli build-docs openapi.yaml

The tool outputs by default to a file named redoc-static.html that you can open in your browser.

Redocly CLI does more than docs; check it out and add linting, bundling, and more to your API workflow.

Add an HTML element to the page

Create an HTML page, or edit an existing one, and add the following within the body tags:

    <redoc spec-url="http://petstore.swagger.io/v2/swagger.json"></redoc>
    <script src="https://cdn.redoc.ly/redoc/latest/bundles/redoc.standalone.js"> </script>

Open the HTML file in your browser, and your API documentation is shown on the page.

Add your own spec-url to the <redoc> tag; this attribute can also be a local file. The JavaScript library can also be installed locally using npm and served from your own server, see the HTML deployment documentation for more details.

More usage options

Check out the deployment documentation for more options, and detailed documentation for each.

Redoc vs. Redocly API Reference

Redoc is Redocly's community-edition product. Looking for something more? We also offer hosted API reference documentation with additional features including:

• Try-it console
• Automated code samples
• Pagination
• Extra theme options

Documentation and resources

• Reference docs - we take care of the hosting
• Redoc - detailed documentation for this open source project (also in the docs/ folder)
• Command-line interface to bundle your docs into a web-ready HTML file
• API linting, bundling, and much more with open source Redocly CLI

Showcase

A sample of the organizations using Redocly tools in the wild:

• Rebilly
• Docker Engine
• Zuora
• Discourse
• Commbox
• APIs.guru
• BoxKnight
• Quaderno API

Pull requests to add your own API page to the list are welcome

Configuration

Redoc is highly configurable, see the configuration documentation for details.

OpenAPI specification extensions

Redoc uses the following specification extensions:

• x-logo - is used to specify API logo
• x-traitTag - useful for tags that refer to non-navigation properties like Pagination, Rate-Limits, etc
• x-codeSamples - specify operation code samples
• x-badges - specify operation badges
• x-examples - specify JSON example for requests
• x-nullable - mark schema param as a nullable
• x-displayName - specify human-friendly names for the menu categories
• x-tagGroups - group tags by categories in the side menu
• x-servers - ability to specify different servers for API (backported from OpenAPI 3.0)
• x-additionalPropertiesName - ability to supply a descriptive name for the additional property keys
• x-summary - for Response object, use as the response button text, with description rendered under the button
• x-explicitMappingOnly - in Schemas, display a more descriptive property name in objects with additionalProperties when viewing the property list with an object

Releases

The README for the 1.x version is on the v1.x branch.

All the 2.x releases are deployed to npm and can be used with Redocly-cdn:

• particular release, for example, v2.0.0: https://cdn.redoc.ly/redoc/v2.0.0/bundles/redoc.standalone.js
• latest release: https://cdn.redoc.ly/redoc/latest/bundles/redoc.standalone.js

Additionally, all the 1.x releases are hosted on our GitHub Pages-based CDN (deprecated):

• particular release, for example v1.2.0: https://rebilly.github.io/ReDoc/releases/v1.2.0/redoc.min.js
• v1.x.x release: https://rebilly.github.io/ReDoc/releases/v1.x.x/redoc.min.js
• latest release: https://rebilly.github.io/ReDoc/releases/latest/redoc.min.js - points to latest 1.x.x release since 2.x releases are not hosted on this CDN but on unpkg.

Development

see CONTRIBUTING.md