eBay Trading Web Services

eBay Web Services provides programmatic access to the eBay marketplace. It enables third-party applications to build custom applications, tools, and services that leverage the eBay marketplace in new ways.

You can select a programming language (such as PHP, .NET, Java or any other language that you are comfortable with) to access eBay Web Services. We also have software developer kits (SDKs) for some of the popular languages to make your programming tasks easier. Go to the Developer Center for your language, from the following location, and all your resources are right there:

eBay Developers Program

http://developer.ebay.com

Typical eBay-enabled applications include item sales management (which could include integration with database inventory systems), item search utilities, user account management systems, systems that embed partner item listings in their Web pages, and applications that assist buyers in managing the listings they're interested in.

The power of eBay Web Services lies in making these applications possible independently of the eBay user interface. That is, your application doesn't need to change every time the eBay user interface changes, and it doesn't need to present data in the same way eBay does. Your eBay-enabled application can present data in custom ways that best meet your users' needs.

eBay Web Services supports two protocols:

XML/HTTPs: With the XML API, the request interface is an XML document. Each request is composed of XML elements that specify the request parameters (e.g., the properties of an item to be listed and additional processing instructions).

With the XML API, your application builds the request as an XML string, sets a number of HTTP headers, and sends the request to eBay using the HTTPS protocol. After processing the request, the eBay server sends a response back to your application, also via HTTPS. This response consists of an XML document containing the data that resulted from the original request. Your application then parses the XML to extract the data.

SOAP: With the SOAP API, the request interface is an object in your application's native programming language. You use a third-party SOAP client to generate business-object interfaces and network stubs from a WSDL document that specifies the eBay message schema, the service address (eBay's SOAP gateway URL), and other information. Your application works with data in the form of object properties, and it sends and receives the data by calling object methods. Your SOAP client handles the details of building the SOAP request and sending it to eBay, and converting the response back to an object that is easy to work with. This frees you from the need to build and parse XML documents yourself, so you can focus on managing and presenting the data itself. By simplifying the way you access eBay data, the SOAP API helps you to get your applications up and running more quickly and to adapt more easily to changes.

The SOAP API is built on open standards like SOAP and WSDL. These standards are supported by a wide-range of development tools on a variety of platforms.

Both the XML API and the SOAP API share the same schema, so the basic format of the input and output data is the same no matter which API you use. Regardless of whether you are using the SOAP API or the XML API, you are accessing the same eBay functionality and data. Thus, you can choose to use one or the other or both—whichever approach is best for you.

User-Contributed Notes