Postman feels bloated—any lightweight alternatives for API testing?

For a faster, more streamlined alternative to Postman, here are some excellent options that match your requirements:

Bruno is probably your best bet - it’s a newer tool specifically designed to address Postman’s performance issues. It stores collections as plain text files (great for Git), has a clean GUI, supports OpenAPI imports, and is notably faster than Postman. The file-based approach makes it perfect for version control and CI/CD workflows.

Insomnia offers a cleaner, more responsive interface than Postman with solid OpenAPI support and Git sync capabilities. It’s less resource-heavy and has good keyboard shortcuts for quick testing.

HTTPie Desktop combines the popular HTTPie CLI with a GUI. It’s exceptionally fast, has great OpenAPI support, and since it’s built on the CLI tool, it integrates seamlessly with command-line workflows and CI pipelines.

REST Client (VS Code extension) might be perfect if you’re already in VS Code - you write requests in plain text files that are automatically Git-friendly, supports variables and environments, and is incredibly fast since there’s no separate application overhead.

For pure CLI with occasional GUI needs, curl with Swagger Codegen or OpenAPI Generator can auto-generate curl commands from your specs, then you can use tools like Postman Newman (CLI runner) or k6 for more advanced testing scenarios.

Bruno seems to hit all your points perfectly - it was literally created by developers frustrated with Postman’s bloat. The Git integration is seamless since everything is just files in your repo.

What’s your current pain point with Postman - is it mainly the performance or also the workflow integration?

Hi there,

You might want to check out Insomnia (lighter UI, OpenAPI support) or Hoppscotch (fast and browser-based).

For CLI, try HTTPie or Restish, both are great, and Newman works well for CI if you’re sticking with Postman collections.

- Bobby