Why my API route.ts is statically rendered ?

[AlexandreBardiaux]

Summary

I have an API route /api/practitioners/search. And that route is pre-rendered as static content during the build. So when I call my route, I get the data as of the time of the build, not the latest data. I read and tried all the things mentionned in the caching documentation of NextJS 14 but nothing worked.

I found a workaround by adding request.url;. So my route.ts file was

import { restClient } from "@/restClient";
import { NextResponse } from "next/server";

export async function GET() {
  const data = getDataFromBackend()

  return NextResponse.json(data);
}

and became

import { restClient } from "@/restClient";
import { NextResponse } from "next/server";

export async function GET(request: Request) {
  request.url;
  const data = getDataFromBackend()
 
  return NextResponse.json(data);
}

This way, it works fine. My route is dynamically rendered. The Fetch requests are cached, but I can simply add { cache: "no-store" } if I don't want it to be cached.

The fact that I "use" the request object (with request.url) makes sure that my route is dynamically rendered. Is there another (better) way to make this route dynamically and not statically rendered ? And why NextJS 14 statically renders a route ? If I call a route, it means that I want to trigger some action or get some data. In my opinion, a route should always be dynamically rendered. It is really confusing otherwise.

Additional information

No response

Example

No response

[icyJoseph]

Hi

You should be able to just do export const dynamic = 'force-dynamic' anywhere in the file.

• https://nextjs.org/docs/app/building-your-application/routing/route-handlers#opting-out-of-caching
• https://nextjs.org/docs/app/api-reference/file-conventions/route-segment-config#dynamic

The first link talks about ways to opt-out from the caching, which is the default behavior. The last option listed is called route segment config, and there you'll find the second link, which talks about controlling this via the dynamic export.

You could also activate the Next.js TypeScript plugin, https://nextjs.org/docs/app/building-your-application/configuring/typescript#typescript-plugin, and that'll give you auto-complete when working with export const dynamic.

[AlexandreBardiaux]

Thanks for the clarification 👍

[ShakChunni]

Thank you!

[MahidunNobi]

@icyJoseph Thank you very much for saving my day.