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Amazon API Gateway vs IBM DataPower Gateway comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Amazon API Gateway
Ranking in API Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM DataPower Gateway
Ranking in API Management
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) (6th), Application Infrastructure (12th), SOA Application Gateways (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of Amazon API Gateway is 12.8%, down from 14.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 3.8%, up from 3.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Rahul Kundu - PeerSpot reviewer
Cost-effective serverless routing with room for extended timeout settings
We are using API Gateway to route the traffic to our Lambdas. Every API pass is linked to some of the Lambdas. When traffic hits CloudFront, it redirects it to API Gateway, which then redirects it to the respective Lambda server. We have different kinds of services invoked through these Lambdas…
Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts
While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Amazon API Gateway facilitates our serverless architecture, particularly with Lambda, by allowing us to perform various tasks. For instance, Lambda functions authorize API calls, execute multiple workloads, and integrate with other services like Azure and Kubernetes. Additionally, we leverage Lambda functions behind the Amazon API Gateway to query databases, process data, and interact with different systems."
"The solution is a managed service and requires minimal configuration, which makes it easy to launch an API."
"The solution is user-friendly."
"API Gateway is out of the box and works well with Amazon products."
"It is a stable solution."
"The solution is solid, robust, and scalable."
"It is a stable solution."
"It is very helpful, with our API-based applications."
"Its initial setup was straightforward."
"The solution is scalable, our customers are mostly South African banks and they handle mostly transactions with this solution."
"What I like most is the stability."
"My company has a good impression of IBM DataPower Gateway. What I like about it is that because it's an appliance, it's a turnkey solution that's very fast and out of the box. Compared to other gateways, I also like that IBM DataPower Gateway is function-rich. For example, for one of the projects, there was a need for specific transformation and security features available in IBM DataPower Gateway out of the box, so my team just needed to configure the appliance. There was no need for separate development, and I found it quite neat. Another valuable feature of IBM DataPower Gateway is that it's easy to integrate with other products."
"You don't have to have a separate DMC proxy because DataPower Gateway is an appliance and will take care of a lot of security features. These include data validations, encryption, as well as XML or any type of scripting or security threats that are present."
"The solution is straightforward and for large organizations, it functions well."
"The solution is robust."
"If you have an API application in your organization that you want to make safe and secure, in addition to your existing WAF or load balancer, this product comes with all those capabilities:"
 

Cons

"We would like to see more UI-based monitoring."
"If I take into consideration the past three to four years, during which I used the tool, I would say that some missing and external configurations were not possible in the product, and it was a bit difficult to manage."
"There should be more videos and documentation about the new features that are released every month."
"I am not completely satisfied with Technical Support."
"I would say Amazon API Gateway is a bit costly, but considering the feature level, it is very good."
"Amazon API Gateway can improve the user interface in some areas it could be more polished."
"The payment is a little bit on the costlier side when I look at the amount we have to pay."
"The solution should include change data capture (CDC) features that will help reduce workload"
"Small and medium-sized companies might look for cloud-hosted applications due to the cost."
"Traceability could be improved, especially for business operations. The traceability of the transactions could be an improvement point for DataPower to work on. It would be better if they provided JSON support. JSON protocol data has changed format. It started performing internal transformation to JSONx. This might be an additional complexity."
"Its support services could be better."
"Some pre-packaged connectors for integration with various applications, such as SaaS offerings, would be a useful addition."
"The two biggest issues of this solution are the complexity and the maintenance procedures."
"Scripting needs improvement. It's hard for our customers."
"DataPower isn't the most user-friendly tool. It is not an easy tool to use. Some things could use better wizards to guide you through processes."
"The DCDR process should be less complex."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's pricing is cheap and based on the number of requests coming to Amazon API Gateway."
"The product is a little expensive."
"Fees are volume-based."
"There are no licensing fees."
"My understanding is that it easily goes to $14,000 or $15,000 USD each month for each account, and we have several such accounts."
"AWS charges for data ingress and egress, which could be further reduced. This would be helpful for customers dealing with large amounts of data coming in or going out from their systems."
"There is an annual licensing cost to use Amazon API Gateway."
"The pricing model for API Gateway is advantageous due to its serverless nature, as it depends on traffic volume."
"The total cost of IBM DataPower Gateway would depend on the configuration, but in my experience, it can amount to 60,000 Euros per box, even for the virtual version. Usually, customers need high availability and a non-production environment, so the total price for IBM DataPower Gateway can be quite a lot. It can be 200,000 Euros or a similar figure."
"The cost is very high and requires all five components in the API management solution."
"The tool's initial costing is expensive for small banks and financial institutions."
"The cost of this product varies from customer to customer and the relationship with IBM, including how many offerings from IBM are already being used."
"The solution has a return on investment but is a little expensive."
"As far as I know, they have a perpetual license for this product. They are paying perpetual fees rather than an annual subscription or annual pricing."
"The licensing cost is very expensive."
"It is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
5%
Financial Services Firm
29%
Insurance Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Apigee or Amazon API Gateway?
Amazon API Gateway is a platform that supports the creation and publication of API for web applications. The platform can support thousands of simultaneous API calls, and it provides monitoring, ma...
How does Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager compare with Amazon API Gateway?
I have found that Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is the best integration tool out there for API management. It is easy to implement and learn; it provides several options for deployment, (including ...
Which is better - Azure API Management or Amazon API Gateway?
If you use Azure products, API Management is a great solution. It solves many of the problems of externalizing web services. For example, when you need versioning, establish a developer portal and ...
What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?
The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?
I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...
What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?
The DCDR process should be less complex. AI should improve developer efficiency and effort. Whenever I am writing code, it should give recommendations automatically by incorporating AI so I can wri...
 

Also Known As

No data available
WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Autodesk, Fox Digital Consumer Group, iFlix, UK Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), Miovision, Olympusat, PhotoVogue, Royale International Group, Veracode
RBL Bank, Availity
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon API Gateway vs. IBM DataPower Gateway and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.