We compared MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager and Kong Enterprise based on our users reviews in five parameters. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below:
The opinions on the setup process for MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager vary, with some users finding it complicated in the past but noting improvements over time. In contrast, Kong Enterprise generally offers a smooth and easy installation process, although a few users encountered difficulties and needed professional assistance.
MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is highly regarded for its adaptability, expandability, gateway service, policy management at the API level, reliability, user-friendly interface, extensive range of connectors, seamless integration, diverse API options, and incorporation of security measures. On the other hand, Kong Enterprise distinguishes itself with its network services based on plugins, support for plugins, functionality derived from open source, features for authentication and authorization, customization through Lua scripting, impressive performance, and limitations on routing.
The users suggest that MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager could enhance its scalability, pricing options, performance, security options, and customization. On the other hand, Kong Enterprise could improve its pricing, automatic data API creation, customization, scaling up process, and developer portal.
The cost of setting up MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager can be high and varies compared to other options. Users have different opinions, with some finding it expensive and others considering it reasonable. In contrast, Kong Enterprise's pricing is influenced by factors such as scale and usage. It is open-source, indicating that it may be less expensive, although still higher than comparable products. The licensing costs for Kong Enterprise are considered reasonable.
Customers have reported positive experiences with the customer service and support of both MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager and Kong Enterprise. They found the support to be helpful, responsive, and prompt. Additionally, customers specifically praised Kong Enterprise's customer service for their assistance with Lua plugin installation.
Comparison Results
To summarize, MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager and Kong Enterprise have distinct characteristics. MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is highly regarded for its adaptability, expandability, and extensive toolset. However, users have encountered difficulties during the initial setup, faced limitations due to vendor coupling, and expressed concerns about pricing. Conversely, Kong Enterprise is praised for its seamless installation, network services based on plugins, and authentication capabilities. Nevertheless, users have recommended enhancements in pricing, customization, and scalability. Both products receive positive feedback regarding customer service and support.
"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 companies and must ensure they adhere to their allocated usage limits. Without rate limiting, there's a risk of excessive usage, which could result in significant costs."
"Kong Enterprise comes with some ready plug-ins, which is very good for the customers."
"Good at intercepting traffic and modeling APIs around that."
"This is a solid intrusion prevention system that combines a firewall and antivirus in a single solution."
"The route limiting feature is very valuable."
"Kong enterprise has significantly enhanced our ability to manage and secure our Microservices. Its most valuable feature is monitoring."
"The most valuable feature of Kong Enterprise is its capability to integrate with various security tools."
"The solution provides good performance."
"It provides all of the robust platform-enabled features."
"Both the cloud and on-premises options are available. Customers can leverage the MuleSoft Cloud platform to deploy the applications or set up their own online infrastructure to deploy applications."
"The most valuable feature of Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is the gateway that is provided."
"If you adopt the whole platform, you can build composable applications. This will cut your time creating new applications and updating them – once you have everything running – by up to 50%."
"The scalability is good. It's passable."
"The most valuable features are API development and API management."
"The most valuable features of the solution for securing APIs stem from the tool's ability to allow users to deploy policies."
"The most valuable features of Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager are the API gateway, rate limiting, and orchestration."
"Because it is open-source, it should be less expensive than others."
"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."
"It becomes difficult if you try to scale it up to multiple clusters."
"There should be an easier way to integrate with other solutions, even though it's the same API solution layer. Comparability will be a good improvement."
"The OS upgrades are not as frequent as they should be and they are bulky."
"The ease of billing is lost when Kong is not available directly on the Azure marketplace. This is one area where they can improve."
"Kong Enterprise has decided not to support the web portal feature anymore, but I think that feature should stay in the on-premises solution."
"We would like to see an automatic data API when we have a table in the database."
"We have issues with the tool's pricing. The product seemed to have most of the features required for the tasks I was working on. I didn't feel the need for additional features. However, one aspect that could be improved is making the platform more user-friendly for non-technical users. While it's not necessarily complex, it does require some familiarity. Unlike open-source tools available online, accessing and using this product may not be as straightforward. It needs to offer training to its users."
"Anypoint could be improved by making it more open and configurable for small companies, who tend not to consider the solution as it's expensive and requires a lot of costs upfront."
"Their studio performance is very slow, it requires a lot of memory, and should be improved."
"The pricing is a bit expensive."
"An area for improvement in MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is the process of applying policies because it's manual. It would be great if MuleSoft could make the process easier, particularly by automating it."
"The solution's price is high."
"The most important thing that should be improved is that it is too heavy."
"When compared to other integration technologies, it is slightly higher."
More MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager Pricing and Cost Advice →
Kong Gateway Enterprise is ranked 6th in API Management with 20 reviews while MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is ranked 4th in API Management with 47 reviews. Kong Gateway Enterprise is rated 7.8, while MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Kong Gateway Enterprise writes "Provides role-based access control and can be easily customized with Lua script". On the other hand, the top reviewer of MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager writes "Responsive technical support, low tickets issued showing great stability, and limitless expansion". Kong Gateway Enterprise is most compared with Microsoft Azure API Management, WSO2 API Manager, Apigee, Apache APISIX and Amazon API Gateway, whereas MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is most compared with Microsoft Azure API Management, Amazon API Gateway, Apigee, IBM API Connect and Layer7 API Management. See our Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager report.
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