Ryan McCue, one of the leaders of the WordPress REST API project, together with engineers from Automattic, released a plugin called REST API Console. This plugin provides a console inside the WordPress admin area that lets us test the WordPress REST API directly.
The plugin originally came from a feature used on WordPress.com. As the WordPress RESTful API plugin became more widely used for application development, debugging REST API endpoints became increasingly inconvenient. The REST API Console plugin was created to solve that problem and make it easier to debug WordPress REST API endpoints from inside the dashboard.
The REST API Console plugin only works with version 2.0 or later of the WP REST API plugin. At the time of writing, it had not yet been uploaded to the official WordPress plugin directory, so it had to be downloaded from GitHub and installed manually. After activation, its interface appears under Tools > REST API Console.
With this plugin, you can directly retrieve, modify, or delete content on a WordPress site. It is best used on a local installation. The plugin can only connect to the same site where it is installed and cannot access remote WordPress sites. If you need to access data from a remote WordPress site, a client such as Postman or Paw is a better choice.
This plugin fills a practical gap in the workflow: it makes the WordPress REST API much easier to inspect and test during development.
