Layer7 API Management Reviews

We use the product for HTTP traffic. It supports DNS and FDP protocols. 

The product supports more than just HTTP protocols; it also caters to JMS and FTP protocols.

The solution should prioritize ease of use and align with the growing trend of cloud-native environments. Customers are increasingly leaning towards cloud-native solutions, and while you can configure your topology in the cloud as a private solution, having a more inherently cloud-native approach is crucial.

Layer7 API Management also should feature built-in policies to minimize the need for extensive code writing. It needs to include more plug-ins. 

I have been using the product since 2018. 

I haven't seen many issues with the product's stability. 

I rate the product's scalability a seven out of ten. 

Layer7 API Management's deployment was straightforward. 

Layer7 API Management is cheaper than Apigee. 

I would choose Layer7 API Management's alternatives since it is not current. I rate it a five out of ten. 

It serves our development purposes, enabling the connection of both external and internal clients, for example.

It's a comprehensive tool that allows us to perform all the necessary tasks in one place. With other middleware API management tools, we might need multiple tools and layers to achieve the same results. This tool provides a single platform for managing security, real transformation, connectivity, and development, eliminating the need for additional add-ons.

It's quite satisfactory. However, I don't focus much on the cost perspective, but I understand that clients are often concerned about costs. They might be exploring other options due to the high cost associated with our current package.

Currently, we don't have any major issues, and any past issues we encountered were promptly resolved. Perhaps in terms of improvement, we could explore more robust connectivity options, but for our current needs, it's been solid. As for my company, we might consider migration, and there are tools like GMU migration, provided by the same vendor, which could potentially help us in that regard.

I have been using Layer7 API Management for the past eight years.

It is stable, as per our observations.

I've been primarily utilizing the on-premises version, and it has proven to be scalable as we've added more clients. However, I haven't yet ventured into the cloud aspect, so there's potential for further exploration in that regard.

It's not overly challenging. The documentation is quite comprehensive, and the support from the dot command is also reliable. Overall, it's a comfortable experience, and I haven't encountered any significant issues or concerns.

I would rate it an eight out of ten.

We use this solution for security as well as for monetization. I'm a certified CA API management professional and a user of this solution. We are vendors of Layer7.

I like the simplicity of developing APIs.

The development portal could be improved. Following Layer7's acquisition of Broadcom, the technical support and sales teams have not been good and both those areas need to be improved. I'd also like to see the latest code support with open API specs and JavaScript which is lacking. 

I've been using this solution for six years. 

This is definitely a stable solution. 

The product is scalable, up or down, according to your needs and there are no issues. We receive somewhere between 30,000-60,000 hits per day. 

Technical support is responsive, but since the merge with Broadcom the support has not been as good. They're not interested in getting on a call to quickly try to resolve an issue.

Neutral

We also use API Apigee which is more complex. You have to know XML coding and tags, for example. With Layer7 you drag and drop assertions and name them. With Apigee, after selecting the policies, you need to write some logic into it.

The initial setup is very simple. It's straightforward and you can just go through the mock ups step by step and implement. I do the deployment myself, it's very simple. 

The cost depends on how many licenses you are trying to acquire. There is 
a perpetual licensing fee, and then you pay annually for support and maintenance. The price is competitive with other solutions. 

I am an Enterprise API architect and we are one of the biggest conglomerate organizations in Dubai. We have a lot of retail businesses,  automotive businesses, and other interests. What we are doing is using the API Management to build out a proper, consistent API layer for our legacy systems and microservices as well. That will enable us to expand our reach in digital channels. This will also help us serve the API Products for 3rd part consumptions.

We are already using Dell Boomi in our organization for ESB purposes and are more focused on that development right now and hope to do more with Layer7 in the future.  

Layer7 is the most important step in our Application Modernization strategy. We envision to create an Open Architecture which allows us to adapt to ever-changing market needs. It is a key enabler in decoupling the core applications from the digital channels thereby giving us the flexibility to build the plug n play architectural landscape. 

Because we have only used the gateway part of the Layer7 solution, we have not explored a lot of the potential and capabilities in detail. It would be premature to go into details about what we may use or discover will be useful in the future. We still have to go into production. Feedback in terms of usability or the broader scope of features is not possible. The product has more capabilities that we were looking for in an API gateway in terms of security as well. We plan to incorporate all its advantages.  

The gateway and security features were the two most important requirements for us and the product has definitely met our expectations. That is currently most valuable to us.  

Upcoming features that we will soon incorporate will be Developer Portal, Live API Creator and Blazemeter.

In terms of what could be improved, I think they do not have a good enough knowledge base on setting up the API Management Layer, especially on Azure using containers. In the corporate world, this solution is becoming very popular as we move forward.   

So something that I would like them to improve on is their information resources because we need more assistance / support from them to get our API Management Layer set up correctly on Azure. They still have a lot to do in this area in terms of support and building a community. But we have confidence, it would improve moving forward.  

When you talk about full API life cycle management, they lack inbuilt support of community forums as part of their offering which can be published to external developers. The forum can become an important hub for communication between our organization’s API Team and app developers who wish to use our APIs. Using the forums, developers will be able to post questions using the forum.

I think we are dealing with only a smaller part of the capabilities of Layer7 as we have just started using the gateway. So we are using it almost only as a gateway right now. We plan to broaden the scope and we are in the process of onboarding full API life cycle management as well. We only deployed it a few months back on the gateway level.  

We have not had many problems, but again, we are not testing under full, live production loads.  

We have not gotten far enough along to test the scalability of the product, but it was made for enterprise solutions so it should be readily scalable.  

From the support side, the Broadcom / CA Team has supported us well.

For APIs, we were using Broadcom API Gateway. We were using Dell Boomi iPaaS, we were using F5 load balancing, and a web application firewall. All of these components we have in our organization. We may be able to reduce the number of solutions.  

Broadcom is actually the same product as the CA Technologies API gateway. CA (Computer Associates) was bought out by Broadcom. So now the CA API is the Broadcom Layer7 management solution which they are updating and improving. We stayed with the product when the product changed names.  

The guys we used to do the installation were from a local UAE team. Their experience on Azure is limited. But at this point it is fine. I think we are more-or-less satisfied that what we have now is done correctly. 

We used combination of internal and external team because we thought it would save time and effort.  

When it comes to pricing, I think we cracked a good deal with Broadcom on Layer7. It may be because of the COVID-19 situation. Whatever the reason, from a pricing perspective we have found the solution to be a good deal for us.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Layer7 as a nine. Right now it is a bit premature to rate the product overall but in terms of the disappointment in the community support opportunities, I would rate it as a seven as of now.  

I think with the situation that we are in and with the current economic atmosphere, there is definitely a reason for those looking for an API solution to also consider open-source products. Instead of going with the proprietary products, sometimes considerations depend on the size of the organization and the budget. Every organization should first analyze what they need. If they need an enterprise-class product definitely Broadcom Layer7 is a good solution. But if an organization can manage their needs with an open-source product, or the team has a good knowledge of the APIs and the ability to customize, then I think that open-source can be a viable option. As long as the product is sufficient to fit the needs, moving forward with some sort of an open-source product is just as well.  

The most valuable features of Layer7 API Management are integration, ease of use, building APIs easily, and portal straightforward.

The overall cost of Layer7 API Management is high, they can improve it by making it less expensive. It is a stable platform, but Layer7 API vision and future are not clear

We have been using and implementing Layer7 API Management for approximately 10 years.

Layer7 API Management is a highly stable solution.

The support from Layer7 API Management could improve. We do not have a strong Latin American support. The support over the last two years has been poor. The vendor of Layer7 API Management, Broadcom, used to have approximately 500 employees here in Latin America but now they only have approximately 20.

You as customer has to find someone with a lot of experience in API Management so the users can take advantage of all the value the solution has.

The price of Layer7 API Management is too high and should be reduced. However, it is a good solution in the market.

I rate Layer7 API Management an eight out of ten.

We use a combination of Denodo and Layer7 API Management. The APIs are developed on Layer7 and then exported through Denodo. Layer7 provides the security layer, while Denodo facilitates data on demand. That combination is handy, and most organizations have a similar setup. That data is exported to API. The data modeling is done on Denodo and exposed through policies developed on Layer7 API Management.

It's good to have a tool for integrating data between organizations and applications. The combination of Denodo and Layer7 is beneficial. I feel like Layer7 would not be sufficient because most APIs need data on demand. We need to provide data on demand on top of some layers without going back into the native data systems. 

That will help developers not tax something on the line. We just develop on top of those databases or data layers. You prepare a logical data layer to provide an API exposed through Layer7. Using Layer7 and Teams or different applications can consume those data easily. 

API Management makes dealing with APIs easier. It'll help you to move ahead on your API application journey. The solution allows developers to create more advanced security policies

I feel like Apigee's API product is more interactive. You can drag and drop with those, but it's a little more difficult in Layer7. It's less user-friendly compared to that Apigee product. However, the overall user experience is okay. 

We have been using API Management for three years. 

Our deployment is stable. The company was using API Management before I joined. It's pretty stable and people are developing their APIs on it. The integration Layer7 provides works well in our environment.

API Management is scalable. We did some horizontal scaling and adopted a clustered approach, with two or three nodes behind that. We have that kind of scalability in our environment, and we have a hard drive. We're processing millions of jobs a day that are handled well with the cluster setup we have in place.

Solutions technical support actually falls. I mean, in our area, we have to get a team around it, so that some of the APIs won't get fail and the possibilities of capturing the records. Second thing is to deliver the migration of the APIs to higher environment. So this falls API, I mean, under support task and that too includes performing lifecycle management, upgrading the API versions. So last year we did from nine to ten. So this changes are there in the bucket of support and we do handle around that part of task.

I rate Layer7 API Management eight out of 10. There's a steep learning curve, and I have spent two or three years looking at the documentation that comes with it. It's a bit difficult compared to some other products like Apigee.

We are using Layer7 API Management as an enterprise service bus, ESB, and B2B security gateway.

There is not a comparable solution on the market to Layer7 API Management. It has been useful for our organization.

The most valuable feature of Layer7 API Management is that their policy is really easy to develop and it is flexible.

The UI design could be improved in the next release.

I have been using Layer7 API Management for approximately six years.

The solution is stable.

Layer7 API Management is scalable.

We have two people in my company that uses this solution. We are will need to train more people.

We are attempting to expand usage but because we cannot find resources, we will try to change to some other product. We were using it for a long time. It's a little difficult to transfer every feature that we have, but we are still open to finding another product, such as NGINX. We are on the POC of NGINX, but it keeps changing. The organization is trying to stop using this product as we have a lack of resources, but right now we found that some of the features cannot transform easily. Then we want to expand, I'm confused as well about what we are doing.

The initial installation was straightforward. We split the release and the patching takes a few minutes with a few mouse clicks. We automate most of the process.

We have an in-house team that does the implementation.

There is an annual license for the use of this solution. I think we are paying for some support maintenance fees, included in that license. I don't know how it works. They should provide more information.

We have been evaluating NGINX. I have found NGINX has a better UI than Layer7 API Management. Most of the features that NGINX has are already supported in Layer7 API Management.

We have found it's really difficult to find the right resource in our Canadian market. It is more difficult to hire new developers who can support Layer7 API Management.

My advice to those wanting to implement this solution is if they have the right resource, this is a really nice product and I recommend it because it's really flexible and that they can build and customize with the vendor directly. I really am with this product.

I rate Layer7 API Management a nine out of ten.

Our clients use the solution for a secured layer to protect their API. Most of them have two kinds of API, the frontend, and backend.

There are many beneficial features in this solution that protect against attacks, such as SQL, injection, and the internet.

The Policy Manager tool that is used to manage the solution is very heavy to use because it is based in Java. Sometimes it takes a long time to load. There could be some improvements to it. If they could make Policy Manager on a web page that would be a good alternative.

I have been using the solution for approximately three years.

I have found the stability very good.

When I have used technical support they helped me a lot. Sometimes they took a long time to respond because we had very complex issues that we asked them for help with, but I think it is a very good service.

The initial setup was very easy and straightforward. However, the first and second time we did it was a bit complex because we were not used to the installation.

We have done the implementation and the time it takes depends on the client's use case. You can do the installation and have some APIs working to generate some values for the clients in approximately 30 days.

This solution is a bit more expensive than competitors.

My clients evaluate others solutions before they chose this one, such as AWS, and Apigee from Google. The most common option that they evaluated was Apigee because of the price.

The main difference was AWS and Apigee to this solution is they have a lower price but they do not have all the features that this solution has. It depends on the client, they have to decide between what features they want to implement. If there are not many features to implement they can go with Apigee or AWS, but if there are more complex implementations they try to go with Layer7.

I would recommend this solution to others. I really like the solution.

I rate Layer7 API Management a nine out of ten.

We are using it for controlling all web services, traffic, or API traffic. All connections are going through the Layer7 API gateway. That is done for the purpose of security, management, and governance.  

The ability to control the web services. Actually what it is being mostly used for is to control the access. Most of the access is being controlled through IP filtering, IP whitelist. In addition to that, we are moving slowly towards using more client certificates.  

The user interface — what they call the Policy Manager — is somewhat poor but I think that is because of the technology they have chosen. It is a Java desktop. The user interface for a Java desktop is difficult to make and it is not easy to make it look flashy. If they move to a web interface, that is another problem.  

It cannot match the native Windows interface, but it is okay. It needs to be improved, I guess. That is the only thing I believe needs to be improved in Layer 7. It needs to be easier to navigate and use.  

I have been using Layer7 for almost seven years.  

Layer7 is absolutely stable. It impresses me as a product because it never goes down. It always does what it is supposed to do.  

The organization is connected through Layer7. It is just there in between the applications, so there are no end users. It is maintained by a very limited staff and I think that is a really nice thing about it. There are just three people using it in the sense that they are acting as operators. You can say that one person is doing it full time, the other two are doing it incidentally and being back up to the main role. This limited team is made up of one dedicated admin and the other two are architects. The integration architects do internal integration consultancy. But they also act as a backup for the admin.  

Layer7 is fully rolled out so there are no plans to further expand usage. We cannot go any further.  

There is a technical support representative that we use in the Netherlands and they are okay. They do their work and it has all been fine. There was only one time in the beginning that we did have contact support in the United States, but this was a very specific issue and it was the only time we had to do it.  

The thing is that the product is doing what it is supposed to do so there is no need to really call support. The only service calls we make to support are for moving to new releases. We need to do some preparation and get educated so that nothing goes wrong. But instead of going through all the upgrade documentation, we hire someone to do it for us. They do it in a day when it would take five days if we did it by ourselves.  

There are some complexities to the installation, of course, but I do not think it is very complex overall. On the other hand, I would not say that it is straightforward. What we did was have the Layer7 people come to help us get educated. There was a company representative from the Netherlands who came to help us with courses and learning about the product and he explained things well. That was sufficient in order to get started.  

There were no initial shocks or difficult things with the installation. It ran fairly smoothly.  

But I say that it is not simple because it is not a minor effort. You have to prepare and do things as you roll it out. It is not enough to just connect it, put on the networks, and plug-and-play. You need a somewhat educated staff of people who are technically savvy enough to work with the product. But if you do everything right, then you will not have any trouble.  

The part that is the most complex is where you have to define policies. In that case, you have to know what you are doing. If you want to accomplish some things that are more innovative then you need to understand everything.  

The deployment developed gradually. We deployed five different instances and we worked on them one-by-one. It went pretty smoothly and according to our plans. We just started with one connection, then we added another connection, and then we could see what it was doing and how it behaved. You have to understand what it is doing before slowly moving into the next step.  

When you introduce a gateway, you need to reroute all the connections. You need to inform the users that they have to change the addresses in their programs. It is really a major operation. The exercise is a healthy one because you end up having to put everything in order. So the deployment itself has a value.  

We bought the product long ago. At that time it was a reasonably low price and it was a perpetual user's license. There was no need for additional licenses.  

It was a great deal if you look at it in that perspective. I think that there are some costs for maintenance that we are being charged, but that is not really something to worry about and it seems fair.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate this solution as a nine-out-of-ten. In order to rate it 10, it would need to be perfect. What I find other people saying is that the product portal for API development lacks some features. People who need that functionality are not impressed. They say it is lagging behind the competition. That is not my experience so I do not know anything about it. I have to guess they are right from their first-hand experience.  

What I do not know — but it could be a potential problem — is when you have to deploy the products in the cloud. That might be an issue. Because it is best-of-breed, you are not going through Microsoft or Amazon or Google. That means that you are not working with a solution native to those platforms. You may need to implement an infrastructure product somewhere in the hosting platform — for example, in Microsoft cloud — and I think it is kind of a challenge.  

Layer7 has published on their site that this can be done. But the cloud companies will probably do things in order to help promote the use of their own products and by that measure discourage customers from using products like Layer7. That might be a problem for the people who want to use the Layer7 API Management.  

We use Layer7 API Management to manage API gateway and customize policy scripts.

The product works well from an implementation perspective.

Layer7 API Management’s price could be reduced.

I rate the product’s stability an eight out of ten.

We can create multiple gateways using the product. It has good scalability. It is suitable for enterprise customers who have many APIs and microservices.

We have used WSO2, Kong, MuleSoft, and other open-source products.

The initial setup process is easy and flexible.

Our customers found the product’s cost a little higher. They are looking for open-source solutions.

We evaluated Salesforce.

I rate Layer7 API Management an eight out of ten.