API settings

The top-level api field controls how the “Try it” modal on OpenAPI-powered pages sends requests — separate from a navigation group’s own openapi: { src, path } (which spec to use, and where it’s mounted; see API Reference (OpenAPI)).

{
  "api": {
    "proxy": false
  }
}

api.proxy

The “Try it” modal’s Send button always calls your API directly from the reader’s browser first. Many APIs don’t send back Access-Control-Allow-Origin headers permitting an arbitrary docs site’s origin, so the browser blocks that request. When api.proxy is true (the default), a blocked request is sent again through Writedocs’ own CORS proxy, and the response line says it went through the proxy.

One exception: a POST with no JSON body, no auth and no custom headers can reach your API even when the browser blocks the response, so it isn’t retried - that would risk running it twice.

Set api.proxy to false if you never want requests routed through a third party - requests your API blocks then fail with a CORS message.

A key a reader types into the playground is kept for the browser tab only (sessionStorage), and forgotten when the tab closes.