You know that moment when you’re building an advanced workflow and the exact API call you need just doesn’t exist in a native n8n node? That’s the number one roadblock stopping people from building advanced automations. In this video, we break down REST APIs from the ground up and show you how to use n8n’s HTTP Request node to connect to basically any service, anytime. We keep it beginner-friendly and use JSONPlaceholder (no auth required) so you can focus on the mechanics: endpoints, methods, and what to send where. We walk through the four core HTTP methods you’ll see everywhere: GET (read), POST (create), PUT/PATCH (update), and DELETE (remove). I show how to pull full lists vs a single item, and how to filter early using URL paths or query parameters to lower API costs instead of grabbing everything and filtering later. Then we create resources with POST using both raw JSON bodies and “fields below” (form-style inputs), and we talk through PUT vs PATCH—PUT replaces the whole resource, PATCH only sends what changed. Finally, we combine methods into a practical workflow: GET a list, filter it, then batch DELETE items, plus a quick note on why “POST → wait → GET” is a super common real-world pattern.