What is the difference between routes/web.php and routes/api.php?

 Interview Answer:

Laravel separates web-oriented and API-oriented routes so that applications can apply different middleware, state-management, and response conventions. Web routes normally support browser sessions, cookies, CSRF protection, and Blade responses. API routes are intended for stateless HTTP APIs and commonly return JSON.

Example:
Route::get('/products', [ProductController::class, 'index']);

For a browser page, the route may return a Blade view. For an API, the same business operation can return a JSON resource.

Scenario:
An e-commerce application has a customer website and a mobile application. Website routes can use session authentication and CSRF protection, while mobile/API routes can use token authentication. Keeping these concerns separated makes the application easier to reason about.

Interview follow-up:
Ask what middleware group each route uses in the Laravel version being discussed. Laravel's exact route bootstrap configuration can differ between major versions, so a strong answer should avoid assuming an old project structure.