GIPHY API Profile: Make Your Project More Fun with GIFs

We’ll be the first to admit, we love a good GIF. Who doesn’t? For this 12 Days of APIs profile, we talked to Product Engineer Tim Frietas to learn more about the GIPHY API so awesome.

Fair warning, there are plenty of GIFs ahead. We couldn’t resist 🙂

So, why is the internet obsessed with GIFs?

While there are other content forms that can play video (with or without audio), Tim explained, “The real magic of GIFs is that, because they’re so ancient, virtually any device can handle the format.”

What the GIPHY API does

GIFs are a great way to bring a little bit of fun into your app. With the GIPHY API, you can embed the world’s largest GIF library into your program. There are plenty of features that you could add into your app with GIPHY, including adding a GIF search function, trending section or a keyboard. Check out the overview of GIPHY’s endpoints here.

Fun fact: GIPHY lets you separate your GIFs by “rating.” You can filter GIFs generated by those rated G, PG, PG-13 or R.

We also love the fact that the GIPHY API supports over 30 languages, so everyone can get in on the GIPHY love.

Who uses the GIPHY API?

If you’ve used a GIF, you’ve probably already called the GIPHY API without realizing it. GIPHY works with a number of online games (including Words With Friends), tech companies (Facebook and Twitter),  and content companies (ex. Hulu, Netflix). They were even one of the first third party integrations on Slack and just integrated with WhatsApp!

You can check out more partnerships and integrations on the GIPHY labs page.

Why we ❤️ the GIPHY API…No API Key (!!!)

But maybe the *best* thing about the GIPHY API is the fact that you don’t need to generate an access_token. GIPHY provides a public beta key for anyone to use.

Just use dc6zaTOxFJmzC as the API key to test the API. If you want to submit an app for production, you can request a production key here.

How to call the GIPHY API

It really is painless. Here’s how:

1. Visit the GIPHY API package page on RapidAPI.
2. Type in the public beta key (dc6zaTOxFJmzC) as the apiKey
3. Make a test call in the browser!
4. Click on the link result to see the GIF you generated.

So, go ahead and play around with it. If you want to incorporate the GIPHY call into your app or script, just log in to RapidAPI and export the code snippet into the language of your choice (Node.js, Python, PHP, Objective-C, Java or cURL).

Projects built with the GIPHY API

There are lots of cool projects we’ve seen built with GIPHY. Basically, if you have any sort of communication associated with your app (ex. emails, texts, pop-up displays or interfaces), adding a GIF can make it that much more fun. For example, when we went to the 2016 MLH Prime Southwest Finals, one group built a golf game using a cell phone and a selfie stick (seriously). The app would email the player the results of the game with a GIF based on whether they won or lost. The GIFs would be generated randomly using the GIPHY API’S translateTextToGiF endpoint and the keywords “happy” or “sad.”

One of Tim’s favorite projects allows you to embed GIPHY GIFs into your VIM. Check it out here!

Finally, we built an API Smash project called TextAGif where you can text someone a GIF using the Twilio and GIPHY APIs. Check out the full tutorial blog post or GitHub!

Follow along for even more APIs!

We’re doing #12DaysOfAPIs, so be sure to check back for more!

In case you missed them, check our interviews and profiles on the Postmates Delivery API and the Square eCommerce API.