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Comparison with Alternative Libraries

This document provides a brief comparison between @apical-ts/craft and other popular TypeScript OpenAPI client generators.

@apical-ts/craft​

  • ✅ Exact typings with Zod v4
  • ✅ Discriminated unions for response payloads based on status codes
  • ✅ Typed error handling / no unknown exceptions
  • ✅ Default response handling
  • ✅ Modular, tree-shakable output
  • ✅ Multiple success (2xx) responses handling
  • ✅ Multiple content types response handling
  • ✅ Server-side validation support
  • ✅ Integration with popular frameworks (via AI-generated adapters)
  • ✅ Wildcard status code handling (e.g., 5xx)
  • ✅ Recursive schema support
  • ✅ Maintenance and active development
  • ❌ Strong Community support

@heyapi/openapi-ts​

  • 🟡 Exact typings with Zod v4 (solid baseline coverage, handling of some edge cases remains a bit rough)
  • ❌ Discriminated unions for response payloads based on status codes
  • 🟡 Typed error handling / no unknown exceptions (typed aliases and transport options, but no status-aware semantic error union)
  • 🟡 Default response handling (type-level support, generic runtime passthrough for non-OK responses)
  • 🟡 Modular, tree-shakable output (flat SDK is tree-shakeable, but generated output is more centralized than craft)
  • ❌ Multiple success (2xx) responses handling in the SDK surface
  • ❌ Multiple content types response handling
  • 🟡 Server-side validation support (via fastify plugin)
  • ✅ Integration with popular frameworks via adapters (excellent ecosystem of plugins and integrations)
  • 🟡 Wildcard status code handling, e.g., 5xx (type-level support, generic runtime passthrough)
  • ✅ Recursive schema support (with some any leakage in recursive z.lazy(...))
  • ✅ Maintenance and active development
  • ✅ Strong Community support

Hey API is actually stronger than this checklist suggests, especially regarding ecosystem breadth and transport ergonomics if you need a lot of customization (interceptors, parseAs, responseStyle, throwOnError, responseTransformer).

Massimo​

  • ❌ Exact typings with Zod v4 (uses ajv for validation and generated TypeScript types)
  • ✅ Discriminated unions for response payloads based on status codes
  • ❌ Typed error handling / no unknown exceptions
  • ❌ Default response handling (breaks typings and client generation)
  • ✅ Modular, tree-shakable output (client is generated dynamically based on OpenAPI spec)
  • ✅ Multiple success (2xx) responses handling
  • ❌ Multiple content types response handling
  • ✅ Server-side validation support (via ajv)
  • ❌ Integration with popular frameworks via adapters
  • ✅ Wildcard status code handling (e.g., 5xx)
  • ❌ Recursive schema support
  • ✅ Maintenance and active development
  • 🟡 Strong Community support

Orval​

  • ❌ Exact typings with Zod v4 (loose schemas with zod v3)
  • ❌ Discriminated unions for response payloads based on status codes (simple unions)
  • ❌ Typed error handling / no unknown exceptions
  • ✅ Default response handling
  • ✅ Modular, tree-shakable output
  • 🟡 Multiple success (2xx) responses handling (breaks handling multiple content types)
  • 🟡 Multiple content types response handling (breaks handling multiple success responses)
  • ✅ Server-side validation support (via hono plugin)
  • ✅ Integration with popular frameworks via adapters
  • ✅ Wildcard status code handling (e.g., 5xx)
  • ❌ Recursive schema support
  • ✅ Maintenance and active development
  • ✅ Strong Community support

openapi-zod-client​

  • ❌ Exact typings with Zod v4 (loose schemas with zod v3)
  • ❌ Discriminated unions for response payloads based on status codes
  • ❌ Typed error handling / no unknown exceptions
  • ❌ Default response handling
  • ❌ Modular, tree-shakable output
  • ❌ Multiple success (2xx) responses handling
  • ❌ Multiple content types response handling
  • ❌ Server-side validation support
  • ❌ Integration with popular frameworks via adapters
  • ❌ Wildcard status code handling (e.g., 5xx)
  • ❌ Recursive schema support
  • ❌ Maintenance and active development
  • ❌ Strong Community support