☕ SharePoint Tip #14 — Graph API and SPFx: custom development demystified
Good morning! Here is your 15-minute SharePoint tip for today.
Day 14 | Week 3 — Integration, Automation & Migration
The Microsoft Graph API and Custom Development
As a Product Owner you won’t write code — but you need to understand the development landscape so you can scope work, estimate effort, and have credible conversations with developers.
Microsoft Graph API
The Microsoft Graph API is a single REST API endpoint that gives access to almost all Microsoft 365 data — including SharePoint. Via Graph, developers can:
- Read and write files in any SharePoint library
- Create and update list items
- Manage site permissions
- Search across SharePoint content
- Create and configure sites programmatically
Graph is the modern standard. If a developer says "I’m using the SharePoint REST API" for new work, ask why they’re not using Graph — Graph is the recommended approach for all new integrations.
Base URL: https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/sites/{site-id}/drives
SharePoint Framework (SPFx)
SPFx is Microsoft’s development framework for building custom components that run inside SharePoint pages. There are two types:
Web Parts — custom widgets that appear on SharePoint pages. Examples: a custom dashboard, a people directory, a news ticker from an external API, a property search tool.
Extensions — customise the SharePoint UI beyond pages: custom header/footer banners, custom column formatters, application customisers that run on every page load.
SPFx runs in the browser, is built with React and TypeScript, and deploys to the SharePoint App Catalog.
What a Product Owner needs to estimate custom dev
| Task | Typical effort |
|---|---|
| Simple web part (display list data) | 3–5 days |
| Complex web part (external API, custom UI) | 2–4 weeks |
| Full SPFx extension (site-wide) | 1–2 weeks |
| Power Platform flow (no code) | 1–3 days |
| Power App (medium complexity) | 1–2 weeks |
These are rough benchmarks — use them for initial backlog sizing, not contracts.
Try it today (5 minutes)
Go to https://developer.microsoft.com/graph/graph-explorer — this is Microsoft’s interactive Graph API tool. Sign in with your M365 account and run: GET /me/drive/root/children — this lists the files in your OneDrive via the API. You’re querying SharePoint through Graph in real time.
As a Product Owner
Always ask: can this be done with Power Platform before commissioning custom development? No-code/low-code solutions are faster, cheaper, and easier to maintain. Reserve SPFx for things Power Platform genuinely cannot do.
See you tomorrow at 6:00 AM with Tip #15 — Planning a file server migration to SharePoint!