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Kong Gateway Enterprise vs OpenLegacy 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

Kong Gateway Enterprise
Ranking in API Management
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
OpenLegacy
Ranking in API Management
36th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
AI Software Development (83rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the API Management category, the mindshare of Kong Gateway Enterprise is 5.8%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenLegacy is 0.9%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Kong Gateway Enterprise5.8%
OpenLegacy0.9%
Other93.3%
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

ES
Enterprise Architect at El Al
Seamless integration and efficient security boost API management capabilities
More plugins for additional integrations would be helpful and openness for traditional development languages, such as .NET, because many enterprises are looking for .NET solutions or incorporating with .NET solutions. I mostly missed local resellers or partners that we could use within our enterprise, because it was difficult for some tech personnel to work with remote tech support.
reviewer1042905 - PeerSpot reviewer
VP, Chief Enterprise Integration Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
The biggest advantage is how simple the technology was.
I'd like to see OpenLegacy develop its low-code/no-code (LCNC) solutions. They've expanded somewhat their horizons for integration beyond mainframe CICS, which is their sweet spot. They have some tooling in that area, but it's not as good as it needs to be. OpenLegacy handles the bread-and-butter TP monitoring stuff, but I am working for one of the six banks in the United States still using the Hogan mainframe, which has a slightly proprietary mechanism. But OpenLegacy currently doesn't have a connector for Hogan. So it would help if they could build one. That would appeal to financial institutions that still use Hogan, like US Bank, Wells Fargo, KeyBank, and Vanguard.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It boasts remarkable speed and stability, and these qualities, particularly the gateway's resilience, are standout features for me."
"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."
"The solution provides good performance."
"Kong Gateway helped to improve performance. It's good enough for our users."
"In our buying companies' perspective, it was easier to use compared to other platforms. The markets were pretty familiar with the solutions."
"The most valuable feature of Kong Enterprise is its capability to integrate with various security tools."
"I like everything about it. It provides the security we need."
"This is a solid intrusion prevention system that combines a firewall and antivirus in a single solution."
"Opens the door to connect modern web products to an old legacy system."
"OpenLegacy produces a war file which includes everything you need to deploy a Tomcat server."
"Using mainframe programs (not screens), the OpenLegacy services do not require any changes by the mainframe programmers, thus reducing development cycles."
"The biggest advantage of OpenLegacy was how simple the technology was. We were able to build out the OpenLegacy parts very quickly. We put together a couple hundred APIs in six months."
"Using OpenLegacy, the exposure of services is far easier and quicker. In many cases, exposure of services requires just a few clicks and takes only minutes. In very complex cases, it still only takes half a day. Without OpenLegacy, it would take us several months to create the same services."
"OpenLegacy provides a way to go from the outside world to the legacy mainframe, to move the old standard application to a REST API application. New digital services can be created in a few clicks and this can be done easily by COBOL programmers."
"It is possible to connect a service to a mainframe program or back transaction in a matter of minutes or hours at the most."
"It is possible to solve larger legacy API issues on an enterprise level with this product."
 

Cons

"Kong Enterprise has decided not to support the web portal feature anymore, but I think that feature should stay in the on-premises solution."
"The tool needs improvement in UX."
"Because it is open-source, it should be less expensive than others."
"For us, implementing Kong Gateway Enterprise with existing infrastructures and the cloud in tandem requires more effort than implementing MuleSoft or Azure APIM or AWS."
"The tool needs to improve in areas like documentation and UI."
"From an improvement perspective, the product should offer more readily available connectors and also allow for more seamless AI integrations."
"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."
"The OS upgrades are not as frequent as they should be and they are bulky."
"Customer support for the product is slow and not very good. It makes using the product difficult if you need help quickly."
"We would also be more than happy if the product had the option to work in the opposite direction – the ability to consume REST/SOW services in the outer world from the mainframe."
"The pricing of the solution could be more flexible and allow for once-off payment versus annual licensing. This would be more appealing to companies in Latin America."
"I would like to see SSL out-of-the-box. OpenLegacy certainly does SSL, but it was not the default for our use case. We are currently working with OpenLegacy to cross the SSL bridge and suspect that most users will want to do the same."
"Debugging and logging for programmers could be better."
"I'd like to see OpenLegacy develop its low-code/no-code (LCNC) solutions. They've expanded somewhat their horizons for integration beyond mainframe CICS, which is their sweet spot. They have some tooling in that area, but it's not as good as it needs to be."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Kong Enterprise's pricing is at par compared to the other technologies."
"Kong Enterprise's pricing is reasonable for our company size."
"Basically, my company uses the tool's open-source version."
"Kong Enterprise is cheaper than Apigee. I rate its pricing as four out of ten."
"I don't have any information on licensing costs currently."
"The licensing fees are paid yearly."
"The product is reasonably priced because it goes by the SaaS model."
"There is a need to pay towards the licensing charges...In some areas, the functionalities are available free of charge."
"The pricing of the solution could be more flexible and allow for once-off payment versus annual licensing. This would be more appealing to companies in Latin America."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
5%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Large Enterprise20
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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?
More plugins for additional integrations would be helpful and openness for traditional development languages, such as .NET, because many enterprises are looking for .NET solutions or incorporating ...
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cargill, Zillow, Ferrari, WeWork, Healthcare.gov, Yahoo! Japan, Giphy, SkyScanner
Many of openLegacy's global customers are among the Global 100 companies. Review case studies in these industries: Agriculture, Airport Authority, Automotive, Auto, Finance, Insurance, Government, Healthcare, Manufacturing, and Retailwww.openlegacy.com/case-studie...
Find out what your peers are saying about Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.