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API Quickstart

how to get started with Parabol’s application programming interface

Two space-faring developers getting started using the Parabol API

From zero to your first API call in about five minutes. All you need is a Parabol account and a terminal.

1. Create a Personal Access Token

  1. In Parabol, open your profile (Avatar → Profile) and find the Personal Access Tokens panel.
  2. Click New Token. Give it a name you’ll recognize later (e.g. CI pipeline token).
  3. Pick the scopes it needs. Scopes come in read/write pairs per resource — meetings:read, meetings:write, teams:read, tasks:write, and so on. Start small: you can always create another token. For this quickstart you’ll want users:read and teams:read.
  4. Optionally restrict the token to specific organizations, teams, or pages under Resource Grants. By default it can access everything you can.
  5. Choose an expiration date (up to one year out) and create the token.

Copy your token now — it won’t be shown again. Tokens look like pat_ followed by 43 random characters. Store it like a password: in an environment variable or your secrets manager, never in source control.

export PARABOL_PAT="pat_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

2. Make your first request

The API is standard GraphQL over HTTPS: POST https://action.parabol.co/graphql with a JSON body and your token in the Authorization header.

curl -s https://action.parabol.co/graphql \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $PARABOL_PAT" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "query": "query GetViewerTeams { viewer { id name email teams { id name orgId isArchived } } }"
  }'

You should get back your own user record and every team you belong to:

{
  "data": {
    "viewer": {
      "id": "local|abc123",
      "name": "Ada Lovelace",
      "email": "[email protected]",
      "teams": [{ "id": "team123", "name": "Platform Team", "orgId": "org123", "isArchived": false }]
    }
  }
}

Everything in the API hangs off that single viewer root field — your teams, their meetings, tasks, templates, and pages.

3. Test and explore in GraphiQL

Open action.parabol.co/graphql in your browser while signed in to Parabol and you’ll get GraphiQL, an interactive explorer with autocomplete and inline docs for the entire schema. It’s the fastest way to figure out a query before you commit it to code.

Prefer tooling? Point Postman, Insomnia, or your codegen at the machine-readable schema:

  • SDL: https://action.parabol.co/graphql/schema.graphql
  • Introspection JSON: https://action.parabol.co/graphql/schema.json

Every API response also includes a Link: </graphql/schema.graphql>; rel="describedby" header, so tools (and agents) can find the schema on their own.

4. Know the guardrails

  • Missing scope? You’ll get a GraphQL error like Personal access token is missing required scope: MEETINGS_READ — create or edit a token with the scope you need.
  • Invalid or expired token? The API returns Invalid or revoked personal access token with an UNAUTHORIZED code.
  • Rate limits. Requests are metered by query complexity, with generous burst and hourly quotas that scale with your plan. If you hit a limit you’ll get an HTTP 429 with standard X-RateLimit-* and Retry-After headers — back off and retry.
  • Mutation errors are usually returned in-band: most mutations include an error { title message } field on their payload. Check it alongside your data.
  • The API is designed for server-side use — scripts, services, CI, and agents — not for calling directly from browser apps.

Next steps