Anthropic-compatible API
Understand the Anthropic Messages API shape and how it differs from the OpenAI-compatible surface.
Draft
Model interaction
Draft page
This page is an outline. It describes what will be covered and is not yet complete technical documentation.
Some inference servers expose an Anthropic-compatible Messages API alongside or instead of an OpenAI-compatible one. The two express similar capabilities with different request structures, and the differences matter when writing portable clients.
This page covers the shape conceptually; the service-specific details are in the llm- inference user guide.
What you will learn
- The structure of a Messages API request and response.
- How system prompts and message roles are represented.
- How tool use is expressed compared with the OpenAI-compatible surface.
- What to account for when supporting both APIs from one client.
Recommended outline
This page is an outline. The subsections below are the planned structure; they are filled in as the handbook is written.