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Amazon API Gateway vs Kong Gateway Enterprise 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
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Kong Gateway Enterprise
Ranking in API Management
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of Amazon API Gateway is 13.3%, down from 14.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Kong Gateway Enterprise is 6.6%, up from 6.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Dinesh Agrawalla - PeerSpot reviewer
Requires minimal configuration and easy-to-launch
I would like to improve the restrictions and security elements of the solution, as there are certain configurations that are not currently supported. There are certain restrictions that cannot be implemented without web access. In the next release, I would like a feature that can validate requests and filter out any jQuery injections. Additionally, I would like to prioritize these requests. I've noticed that such features are usually not available in web applications.
AmitKanodia - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides role-based access control and can be easily customized with Lua script
Kong is meant for north-south communications, so it will be interesting to see what solutions they can come up with in the realms of east-west communications, service-to-service communications, and Zero Trust architecture. I believe that if they can provide for these areas, then they will be able to solve the overall integration and security concerns for microservices architecture in general.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"API Gateway offers a multitude of configuration parameters that enable versatile request filtering and protection against potential attacks."
"All information and data needs to be sanitized before it enters a private domain and we use this solution to do this."
"Integrating API Gateway with other AWS services was easy. It worked out of the box, so it worked perfectly."
"From my perspective of ease of use, it is very good."
"The solution is solid, robust, and scalable."
"The Lambda features are very cost-effective since you do not have to run your servers 24/7."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The product is really good when it comes to API lifecycle management, and it is not just something that includes the balancing part or the security aspect but also the routing and the fallback mechanism."
"Kong Enterprise has excellent plugin support."
"Kong enterprise has significantly enhanced our ability to manage and secure our Microservices. Its most valuable feature is monitoring."
"There are a few features that I like about Kong when it comes to authentication and authorization. Specifically, being able to use Kong for role-based access control (RBAC), and then further being able to integrate the RBAC mechanism with our enterprise directory, was very useful."
"Kong Enterprise comes with some ready plug-ins, which is very good for the customers."
"We use the solution for load-balancing, caching, and rate-limiting APIs."
"The features I like include ease of operation and implementation in a cloud environment, the dashboarding features for API statistics, and the user-friendly developer portal."
"Kong Gateway helped to improve performance. It's good enough for our users."
"It offers a wide range of plugins that we leverage, including OIDC, Rate Limiting, Lambda functions, and more."
 

Cons

"Currently, I'm not facing any issues with Amazon API Gateway, which satisfies my requirements. I'm pretty happy with what Amazon API Gateway offers, but as its pricing is on the higher side, that's one area for improvement in the solution. What I'd like to see in the next release of Amazon API Gateway is an improvement in the status checks you get from the monitoring feature of the solution. Currently, you get the number of requests received, the number of reports, etc., but if there are more details than what's given by Amazon API Gateway, that will improve the solution."
"I believe that there could be more features associated with analytics since it is an area where the product lacks."
"When using APIs, the manual bit for intermediate confirmation with VTL can be a challenge."
"The course management needs improvement. It's always an issue to set up the course management, especially when you use data form."
"The pricing could be improved. In cases where customers require real-time sync or real-time calling groups with IoT, the volume of data and time lag become a concern."
"The price could be lower."
"The payment is a little bit on the costlier side when I look at the amount we have to pay."
"Its support for SAM integration could be made more accessible."
"The tool needs to improve in areas like documentation and UI."
"Because it is open-source, it should be less expensive than others."
"Kong Enterprise has decided not to support the web portal feature anymore, but I think that feature should stay in the on-premises solution."
"Kong Enterprise needs to improve its pricing, which starts at hundreds of thousands of dollars. Pricing should be based on API usage rather than monthly. It should improve its documentation as well."
"The software version upgrade process should be improved."
"The solution should include policy features that are available in other solutions like MuleSoft API manager but missing in Kong Enterprise."
"Understanding the configurations and knowing what needs to be done can be a bit difficult initially."
"It becomes difficult if you try to scale it up to multiple clusters."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Amazon API Gateway is a very cheaply priced product."
"Amazon API Gateway has various pricing plans, but I cannot give the exact cost, though I can say that it's expensive. On a scale of one to five, I'd rate the pricing for Amazon API Gateway as two, as the solution is one of the most expensive products in the market for API management."
"Azure products are more cost-effective than AWS solutions"
"Since it's a serverless solution, Amazon API Gateway is not so expensive."
"I rate the platform's pricing a five out of ten."
"I am satisfied with the price."
"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."
"The product is expensive."
"Basically, my company uses the tool's open-source version."
"The price is really reasonable compared to that of alternative solutions."
"The product is reasonably priced because it goes by the SaaS model."
"It's expensive in Thailand (10 million baht, in Thai currency)."
"There is a need to pay towards the licensing charges...In some areas, the functionalities are available free of charge."
"The licensing fees are paid yearly."
"There are many factors that influence the price of Kong Enterprise, such as scale, licenses, and usage."
"The licensing is expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance 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 ...
How does Kong Enterprise compare with Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager?
The Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager was designed with its users in mind. Though it is a reasonably complex piece of software, it is easy to install and upgrade. While there are different things that ...
What do you like most about Kong Enterprise?
The tool's feature that I find most beneficial is rate limiting. In our usage, especially in the financial sector, we prioritize limiting API usage. This is crucial because we provide APIs to other...
What needs improvement with Kong Enterprise?
The open-source version of Kong does not support a dashboard, which would be very helpful. We use an open-source tool called Konga for basic dashboard needs, but it lacks support. It would be bette...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Autodesk, Fox Digital Consumer Group, iFlix, UK Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), Miovision, Olympusat, PhotoVogue, Royale International Group, Veracode
Cargill, Zillow, Ferrari, WeWork, Healthcare.gov, Yahoo! Japan, Giphy, SkyScanner
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon API Gateway vs. Kong Gateway Enterprise and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.