When building REST APIs, Prisma Client can be used inside your route controllers to send databases queries.

REST APIs with Prisma Client

Supported libraries

As Prisma Client is "only" responsible for sending queries to your database, it can be combined with any HTTP server library or web framework of your choice.

Here's a non-exhaustive list of libraries and frameworks you can use with Prisma ORM:

REST API server example

Assume you have a Prisma schema that looks similar to this:

datasource db {
provider = "sqlite"
url = "file:./dev.db"
}
generator client {
provider = "prisma-client-js"
}
model Post {
id Int @id @default(autoincrement())
title String
content String?
published Boolean @default(false)
author User? @relation(fields: [authorId], references: [id])
authorId Int?
}
model User {
id Int @id @default(autoincrement())
email String @unique
name String?
posts Post[]
}

You can now implement route controller (e.g. using Express) that use the generated Prisma Client API to perform a database operation when an incoming HTTP request arrives. This page only shows few sample code snippets; if you want to run these code snippets, you can use a .

GET

app.get('/feed', async (req, res) => {
const posts = await prisma.post.findMany({
where: { published: true },
include: { author: true },
})
res.json(posts)
})

Note that the feed endpoint in this case returns a nested JSON response of Post objects that include an author object. Here's a sample response:

[
{
"id": "21",
"title": "Hello World",
"content": "null",
"published": "true",
"authorId": 42,
"author": {
"id": "42",
"name": "Alice",
"email": "alice@prisma.io"
}
}
]

POST

app.post(`/post`, async (req, res) => {
const { title, content, authorEmail } = req.body
const result = await prisma.post.create({
data: {
title,
content,
published: false,
author: { connect: { email: authorEmail } },
},
})
res.json(result)
})

PUT

app.put('/publish/:id', async (req, res) => {
const { id } = req.params
const post = await prisma.post.update({
where: { id: Number(id) },
data: { published: true },
})
res.json(post)
})

DELETE

app.delete(`/post/:id`, async (req, res) => {
const { id } = req.params
const post = await prisma.post.delete({
where: {
id: Number(id),
},
})
res.json(post)
})

Ready-to-run example projects

You can find several ready-to-run examples that show how to implement a REST API with Prisma Client, as well as build full applications, in the repository.

TypeScript

ExampleStackDescription
Backend onlyREST API with Express for TypeScript
Backend onlyREST API using Fastify and Prisma Client.
Backend onlyREST API using hapi and Prisma Client
Backend onlyNest.js app (Express) with a REST API
FullstackNext.js app (React, Express) and Prisma Client
FullstackNext.js app (React) with a REST API
FullstackImplement authentication using NextAuth.js

JavaScript

ExampleStackDescription
Backend onlyREST API using Express and Prisma Client
Backend onlyREST API using Fastify and Prisma Client
FullstackNext.js app (React) with a REST API
FullstackApp with NuxtJs using Vue (frontend), Express, and Prisma Client