API-Direct Documentation

Infrastructure for the AI Agent Economy. Deploy production APIs in 2 minutes with zero configuration.

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AI Agent Ready

API-Direct is specifically designed for AI agent automation with non-interactive flags, structured error codes, and machine-readable JSON output.

What is API-Direct?

API-Direct is the only platform where AI agents can autonomously deploy production APIs with built-in monetization, scaling, and marketplace distribution. Choose between our zero-config hosted infrastructure or bring-your-own-AWS (BYOA) for enterprise control.

Key Features

AI Agent Automation

Non-interactive CLI flags, structured errors, and JSON output perfect for AI agents.

Dual Deployment

Choose hosted (2-min deploy) or BYOA (enterprise control) deployment models.

Production Templates

AI-optimized templates for GPT wrappers, sentiment analysis, and more.

Built-in Monetization

Automatic billing, marketplace listing, and revenue sharing.

Installation

Install the CLI

Terminal

# macOS/Linux
curl -fsSL https://cli.api-direct.io/install.sh | sh

# Windows
iwr -useb https://cli.api-direct.io/install.ps1 | iex

# npm
npm install -g @api-direct/cli

# Go
go install github.com/api-direct/cli@latest

Verify Installation

apidirect --version
# Output: apidirect version 1.0.0

Quick Start

Deploy your first API in under 3 minutes.

1. Login to API-Direct

apidirect login

2. Create a New API

apidirect init my-sentiment-api --template sentiment-analyzer
cd my-sentiment-api

3. Deploy to Hosted Infrastructure

apidirect deploy --hosted

Success!

Your API is now live at https://my-sentiment-api-abc123.api-direct.io

4. Test Your API

curl -X POST https://my-sentiment-api-abc123.api-direct.io/analyze \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "X-API-Key: your_api_key" \
  -d '{"text": "This is amazing!"}'

5. Publish to Marketplace

apidirect publish --price 0.05

AI Agent Guide

API-Direct is specifically designed for AI agent automation. This guide shows how AI agents can deploy and manage APIs autonomously.

Non-Interactive Automation

All commands support --yes and --force flags to skip confirmation prompts:

# Deploy without any prompts
apidirect deploy --hosted --yes --force

# Publish without confirmation
apidirect publish --price 0.05 --yes

# Delete API without "Are you sure?"
apidirect delete my-api --yes

Machine-Readable Output

Use --output json for structured data that AI agents can parse:

apidirect deploy --hosted --output json

Returns:

{
  "success": true,
  "api_url": "https://my-api-abc123.api-direct.io",
  "deployment_id": "deploy-1703123456",
  "api_name": "my-api",
  "status": "success",
  "deployment_type": "hosted",
  "features": ["auto-scaling", "ssl", "monitoring"],
  "endpoints": ["POST /analyze", "GET /health"]
}

Structured Error Handling

All errors include specific error codes for programmatic handling:

{
  "success": false,
  "error": {
    "error_code": "QUOTA_EXCEEDED",
    "message": "You have reached your plan limit of 5 APIs",
    "suggestion": "Upgrade your plan at https://console.api-direct.io/billing",
    "recoverable": true
  }
}

Complete AI Agent Workflow

# AI agent executes this workflow autonomously:

# 1. Check authentication status
apidirect auth status --output json

# 2. Create and deploy API
apidirect init sentiment-api --template sentiment-analyzer
cd sentiment-api
apidirect deploy --hosted --yes --output json

# 3. Test the deployed API
curl -X POST $API_URL/analyze \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"text": "Test message"}'

# 4. Publish to marketplace
apidirect publish --price 0.05 --yes --output json

# 5. Monitor and scale
apidirect logs sentiment-api --tail
apidirect scale sentiment-api --replicas 3

apidirect deploy

Deploy your API to hosted infrastructure or your own AWS account.

Usage

apidirect deploy [api-name] [flags]

Flags

Flag	Description	Default
--hosted	Deploy to API-Direct hosted infrastructure	true
--yes	Skip all confirmation prompts	false
--force	Force deployment even if API exists	false
--output	Output format (json)	text

Examples

Basic hosted deployment:

apidirect deploy

AI agent deployment (non-interactive):

apidirect deploy --hosted --yes --force --output json

BYOA deployment:

apidirect deploy --byoa