There are many reasons that might lead you to undertake a full overhaul of your API documentation. It may stem from an audit that reveals errors, or even complete omissions. Maybe the API docs need better integration with other existing documentation, and perhaps there’s been some user feedback or a growing number of support tickets… If you’re interested in the question of why you should consider a documentation overhaul, we actually have a dedicated article waiting for you.
Once the decision is made and it’s time to roll up your sleeves… let’s take a moment to go through a practical guide: how to get started, what pitfalls to avoid, and how to keep things moving forward.
Audit
Before diving into this project, it’s important to begin with an audit, guided by two key questions:
- What seems overly complicated?
- What’s missing?
- What requires updates?
Start by taking inventory of what you currently have whether it’s obvious and easy to find or not. For example, maybe your API documentation is centralized in a single repository on GitHub/GitLab, but you might need to check if some docs are hiding in isolated repos. Maybe you also have a dedicated folder somewhere on a shared drive.
Another possible scenario: documentation that’s carefully maintained by a specific team (e.g. for APIs with very restricted access). Sometimes documentation is in specification format, like a JSON or YAML file. But in other cases, it’s diagrams, PDFs, or PowerPoint-style training slides. In the case of a code-first approach, with little to no existing documentation, many tools can help you create a comprehensive initial inventory, a foundation you can easily iterate on.
Once you’ve mapped what’s available, take a look at what’s missing: perhaps there are existing APIs that lack documentation entirely, or others that are coming soon and will need it.
This brings us to a crucial and often time-consuming step: the manual review. At this stage, list any undocumented endpoints, outdated or obsolete examples, and operations that need context or clarification. This isn’t about fixing yet, just listing.
It’s also a good time to identify:
- are all the endpoints for business-critical workflows covered? e.g: sending payments, buying an item, receiving the first webhook.
- endpoints most frequently used by your users
- endpoints that generate the most support tickets
It can be hard to estimate the workload up front (it depends on how many endpoints, versions, and docs you have), but this will give you a much clearer idea of the effort needed in the writing/editing phase. This step is often rushed but it really deserves your attention and diligence if you want to avoid delays or missed issues later on.
Preparing the structure
With the audit done, it’s time to think about the structure of your documentation and the prep work needed.
This is when you might decide to standardize your API documentation using a common spec format like OpenAPI or AsyncAPI, or even move to a more recent version of the spec to take advantage of new features that benefit both your users and your team.
You might also consider creating a dedicated Git repo for your documentation, providing a single, easy-to-maintain source. A folder structure might look like this:
/specs/: OpenAPI YAML/JSON files/docs/: Additional Markdown content (tutorials, getting started guides, FAQs), images, diagrams, etc.
This approach also helps you visualize how your API docs will be organized. Some might naturally belong in a shared hub or collection. Others might require separate access levels for customers or internal use. Sketching a quick hierarchy can take just a few minutes.
Using a naming convention helps you and others easily navigate through files and potential versions:
- Files:
v1-auth.yaml,v2-payments.yaml, etc. - Markdown sections:
README.md,CHANGELOG.md,CONTRIBUTING.md, etc.
The README is often the first interaction your users will have with your documentation: make sure to prepare it well.
Another key point: a style guide and glossary.
Using consistent terminology makes writing and reading much easier for example, choosing to always say endpoint vs. resource. Normalize your examples too, for a consistent experience across your documentation.
The glossary, while initially an internal resource during drafting, can be made public if relevant. It’s a collaborative tool that defines key terms clearly to avoid ambiguity.
Contextual information, unique to each API, greatly improves understanding and adoptability. Consider using external resources like tutorials, guides, and FAQs. And finally, let’s not forget tone and voice. You may already have a tone in place for your “non-API” docs, and you’ll likely want to match that. If this is new territory, ask yourself: how do you want to address your users? What experience do you want to create? Simply put: if you were in their shoes, how would you like to be spoken to?
Writing
With everything in place, you can begin writing (or editing) your description documents. Maybe your team includes tech writers or developers better suited to write certain docs. The key is to ensure at least one or two people are overseeing the overall progress. And just like with code, don’t forget peer review to ensure quality.
At Bump.sh, our own documentation includes many guides written by recognized API experts to support you in this stage. If you need any additional help, don’t hesitate to reach out. Here are a few tips to make your writing process as effective as possible:
Your APIs evolve and so should your documentation. Sometimes you’ll maintain multiple versions at once, or keep old versions for reference. This is where features like branching are useful. And where branching exists, so does deprecation.
To ease the workload for maintainers and writers, consider setting up CI/CD workflows. For a developer or tech writer, being able to deploy and test documentation with just a few commands can be a huge productivity boost. There are easy ways to implement this.
You may need to illustrate your docs visually (screenshots, diagrams, logos, etc.). To make the experience smooth, try to keep a consistent visual style, especially for things like image size and format.
Publishing
Writing will be an ongoing effort, which is why now’s the time to set up solid routines for the long term. Peer review, as mentioned, is essential, but other best practices help too, like using a checklist for each deployment PR or setting up a clear team of reviewers (tech writers, DevOps, etc.).
Once your content is ready, it’s almost time to publish… but go gradually. In your preferred API documentation tool, start preparing the structure: hubs, access rights, etc.
Then begin integrating the docs from your Git repo, storage solution, CI pipeline, etc. Prepare for a first review with a simple checklist like this:
- Are all the docs in the right place (hub, standalone, etc.)?
- Does the operation/endpoint order make sense (can often be sorted by tags)?
- Are additional resources (markdown, diagrams, etc.) well integrated?
- Do inserted images display correctly and are they in the right format?
- Have we tested how requests behave in the API Explorer?
Start testing the documentation internally, then consider sharing it with a few trusted users or power-users who can provide valuable feedback.
This pre-release phase is essential. At Bump.sh, we’ve recently seen this with users like Elastic and MongoDB: this stage helped ensure that the final documentation experience for their users would be smooth and polished. Their feedback confirmed the effort paid off.
Once published, don’t overlook the importance of announcing it. You might expect your users to naturally visit your docs but some may have stopped trying. If they were bad before they will need to be convinced it’s time for another look.
Sharing the launch helps highlight an essential piece of work that can also impact your brand and product image. Newsletter, social media, blog posts, case studies: there are plenty of ways to spread the word.
Post-launch
Congrats, your new API documentation is live (and we know how much work that takes)! You’ve implemented clear routines and review processes to ensure it stays updated and high quality.
But the journey doesn’t stop there: now’s the perfect time to gather feedback. This starts internally with your team’s opinions, but your support team will likely be the first to hear from your users. You can also use surveys or feedback tools.
Your API documentation should evolve along with your APIs: they must be a current, complete, and accurate reflection of how your APIs work. Maintaining documentation over time boosts API adoption and integration. It also signals professionalism and care for your users, something that reflects positively and lastingly on your brand. And to help you, setting up efficient and optimized workflows right from the start will save you valuable time and reduce the risk of oversights or mistakes.
Still, creating a high-quality developer portal can feel like a big challenge. Getting help from experts can save you a lot of time and energy. Our specialists are always available to support you with this kind of project: let’s talk!
