Compare and contrast RESTful APIs and gRPC. When would you choose one over the other?
Java interview question for Advanced practice.
Answer
gRPC is often better for internal microservices communication, while REST is preferable for public-facing APIs.
Explanation
gRPC's high performance, streaming capabilities, and strongly-typed contracts (via Protocol Buffers) make it an excellent choice for communication between internal microservices where performance is critical. REST's widespread adoption, simplicity, and use of human-readable JSON make it a better fit for public APIs that need to be easily consumed by a wide variety of clients (including web browsers). gRPC is generally faster than REST (A is incorrect) due to its use of HTTP/2 and binary serialization. gRPC uses Protocol Buffers, not JSON (D is incorrect).