RESTlets vs. Other NetSuite Integration Options

RESTlets provide one option for integration with NetSuite. Other options include REST web services and Suitelets.

Note:

For a comparison of RESTlets with REST web services, see REST Web Services and Other Integration Options.

Important:

The concurrency limits that apply to SOAP and REST web services and RESTlets are unified. For information about concurrency governance, see Web Services and RESTlet Concurrency Governance.

RESTlets Compared to SuiteTalk Web Services

The following table compares the characteristics of RESTlets with those of REST web services.

Attribute	RESTlets	REST web services
Supported Functionality	For a list of supported functionality, see SuiteScript 2.x RESTlet Script Type.	For a list of supported functionality, see Overview of SuiteTalk REST Web Services.
Supported Authentication Method	User credentials, token-based authentication, OAuth 2.0 Important: You can't use user credentials to authenticate new RESTlets. If you try, you'll get an HTTP error. For more information, see Using User Credentials for RESTlet Authentication.	Token-based authentication, OAuth 2.0
Supported Content Types	JSON, text/xml	Standard content types: JSON, OpenAPI 3.0
Environment	More suitable for low bandwidth use cases, programmable endpoint that needs deployment.	No coding and script deployment needed on the server side, suitable for low bandwidth use cases.
Performance	You can create a RESTlet to handle all actions for a business flow in one call. RESTlets can be tailored for a specific need and are highly efficient.	Similar to SuiteTalk SOAP operations, but REST may need fewer calls to accomplish a business flow. REST web services also support technology that is not supported in SOAP, for example, SuiteQL.

Note:

Use REST web services for system-to-system integrations.