Integrating external API data into WordPress: Troubleshooting RapidAPI connection

Other Questions RapidAPI
1

Hey everyone, I’m stuck trying to pull info from an external API into my WordPress site. I’m using the Rest Countries API from RapidAPI, but I’m hitting a wall.

I’ve set up my XAMPP environment with Composer and added the Unirest PHP library. Here’s what my composer.json looks like:

{
  "require-dev": {
    "apiconnect/php-client": "^2.0"
  }
}

In my WordPress code, I’m using wp_remote_get() to make the API call:

$api_response = wp_remote_get('https://country-data-api.example.com/all', [
  'headers' => [
    'API-Host' => 'country-data-api.example.com',
    'API-Key' => 'your_api_key_here'
  ]
]);

if (!is_wp_error($api_response)) {
  $response_body = wp_remote_retrieve_body($api_response);
  $country_data = json_decode($response_body);
  var_dump($country_data);
} else {
  echo 'API request failed';
}

But all I’m getting is a ‘technical difficulties’ error. Any ideas what I’m doing wrong or how to debug this? Thanks in advance for any help!

2

hey man, ive had similar issues w/ API stuff. make sure ur using the right headers for RapidAPI - X-RapidAPI-Key and X-RapidAPI-Host. also check if ur hosting provider blocks outgoing connections. u can test w/ curl or postman. if that doesnt work, try enabling WP debugging in wp-config.php to get more details. good luck!

3

Having dealt with similar API integration issues, I can offer some insights. First, ensure your API credentials are correct and up-to-date. RapidAPI often requires specific headers, so double-check you’re using ‘X-RapidAPI-Key’ and ‘X-RapidAPI-Host’ in your request.

Next, verify your server can actually reach the API endpoint. Sometimes, hosting providers block outgoing connections. A quick test with cURL or a tool like Postman can confirm this.

If those check out, enable WordPress debugging by adding these lines to your wp-config.php:

define(‘WP_DEBUG’, true);
define(‘WP_DEBUG_LOG’, true);
define(‘WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY’, false);

This will log errors to a debug.log file in wp-content, providing more details about the ‘technical difficulties’ you’re encountering.

Lastly, consider increasing the timeout for your API request. Sometimes, slow responses can cause issues. Add a ‘timeout’ parameter to your wp_remote_get() call, like this:

$api_response = wp_remote_get(‘YOUR_API_URL’, [
‘headers’ => […],
‘timeout’ => 30
]);

4

As someone who’s integrated quite a few APIs into WordPress sites, I can tell you that ‘technical difficulties’ errors can be frustrating. From what I see in your code, there are a couple of things that stand out to me.

First, your composer.json file doesn’t seem to include the Unirest library you mentioned. You might want to add “mashape/unirest-php”: “^3.0” to your require section.

Secondly, your API call structure looks a bit off. For RapidAPI, you typically need to set the ‘X-RapidAPI-Key’ and ‘X-RapidAPI-Host’ headers. Try modifying your wp_remote_get() call like this:

$api_response = wp_remote_get('https://restcountries-v1.p.rapidapi.com/all', [
  'headers' => [
    'X-RapidAPI-Host' => 'restcountries-v1.p.rapidapi.com',
    'X-RapidAPI-Key' => 'your_actual_api_key_here'
  ]
]);

Also, enable WordPress debugging to get more detailed error messages. Add these lines to your wp-config.php:

define('WP_DEBUG', true);
define('WP_DEBUG_LOG', true);
define('WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY', false);

This will log errors to a debug.log file in your wp-content directory, which should give you more insight into what’s going wrong. Hope this helps!