Webhooks vs Polling — Which Integration to Choose?

When integrating two systems, you have two fundamental approaches: polling (your system repeatedly asks "is there anything new?") and webhooks (the other system pushes an event to you the moment something happens). Choosing the right approach impacts latency, server load, cost, and reliability.

How Polling Works

With polling, your application sends HTTP requests at regular intervals — every 30 seconds, every 5 minutes — to check for updates. It's simple, reliable, and works with any API that supports GET requests.

Pros:

• Works with any API — no special setup needed
• Simple error handling — just retry on the next cycle
• Easy to implement and debug

Cons:

• Wasted requests when nothing has changed (up to 99% of calls)
• Delayed detection — up to one full interval behind real-time
• Higher server load and API rate limit consumption

How Webhooks Work

With webhooks, you register a callback URL with the external service. Whenever an event occurs (order placed, payment received, device alert), it sends an HTTP POST to your URL with the event payload.

Pros:

• Real-time — events arrive within milliseconds
• Efficient — no wasted requests
• Lower server load on both sides

Cons:

• Requires a publicly accessible endpoint
• Must handle retries, signature verification, and idempotency
• Missed events if your server was down during delivery

When to Use Webhooks vs. Polling

Use webhooks when you need real-time reactions — order notifications, payment confirmations, fleet alerts, IoT sensor events. With Lither's workflow automation, you can trigger entire multi-step processes from a single webhook event.

Use polling when the external API doesn't support webhooks, when you need batch processing, or when you want simpler error handling. Polling is also useful for aggregating data from multiple sources on a schedule.

Best Practice: Use Both (Hybrid Approach)

Many production systems use webhooks as the primary trigger and polling as a safety net. If a webhook delivery fails (your server was briefly down, network glitch), the polling job catches the missed event on its next cycle. This pattern is sometimes called "belt and suspenders" integration.

With Lither's API connections, you can set up both approaches in a single visual workflow — the webhook path handles real-time events, and a scheduled polling path reconciles any gaps.

Securing Your Webhooks

Always validate incoming webhooks:

1. Verify the signature — check the HMAC hash in the headers against your secret
2. Check the timestamp — reject events older than 5 minutes to prevent replay attacks
3. Implement idempotency — use the event ID to avoid processing the same event twice
4. Respond quickly — return 200 immediately, then process asynchronously