Kong Gateway Enterprise vs OpenLegacy comparison

Kong and OpenLegacy are both solutions in the API Management category. Kong is ranked #6 with an average rating of 7.7, while OpenLegacy is ranked #36. Kong holds a 7.0% mindshare in APIM, compared to OpenLegacy’s 0.4% mindshare. Additionally, 92% of Kong users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 80% of OpenLegacy users who would recommend it.

Kong Gateway Enterprise

Read 25 Kong Gateway Enterprise reviews

7,788 Views
5,704 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

OpenLegacy

Read 5 OpenLegacy reviews

440 Views
229 Comparison Views

80% willing to recommend

Kong Gateway Enterprise

OpenLegacy

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

OpenLegacy and Kong Gateway Enterprise are prominent players in the API management and integration market. OpenLegacy has an advantage in cost-efficiency and usability for legacy systems, while Kong Gateway Enterprise is recognized for its extensive features suitable for microservices architecture.

Features: OpenLegacy excels in seamless legacy application integration, offers fast API creation, and is adaptable to various environments. Kong Gateway Enterprise is known for robust API management, scalability, and cloud-native environment support.

Room for Improvement: OpenLegacy could enhance scalability features and extend support for modern architectures. It might benefit from advanced security options and more robust monitoring tools. Kong Gateway Enterprise could focus on simplifying its deployment process, reducing initial configuration complexity, and lowering setup costs for smaller enterprises.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: OpenLegacy is praised for its simple deployment and minimal configuration requirements, providing efficient customer support. Kong Gateway Enterprise, while more complex to deploy due to extensive capabilities, is supported by comprehensive tools tailored for microservices with responsive customer service.

Pricing and ROI: OpenLegacy is appealing due to lower setup costs and rapid ROI from its seamless integration with existing infrastructure. Kong Gateway Enterprise, although requiring a higher initial investment, provides significant ROI with a comprehensive feature set that enhances functionality in large-scale environments.

To learn more, read our detailed Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy

June 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 856,873 peers since 2012

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

6th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

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

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of Kong Gateway Enterprise is 7.0%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenLegacy is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

API Management

Featured Reviews

ASHOK YADAV

Solutions Architect at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

Offers OIDC, Rate Limiting, Lambda functions but lacks software upgrades

Upgrading Kong Gateway Enterprise should be more sophisticated and innovative. The main issue is with the update process. Our DevOps and admin teams need to update multiple files, which is cumbersome. For instance, in cases where Palantir countries are involved, they have to update many files, which is not ideal. However, for other tasks like configuring the message routing and services and handling all the configurations, the process is acceptable. The software version upgrade process should be improved. Additionally, the DevOps portal should be integrated more natively. There are a few other areas for improvement, such as implementing automatic load balancing. The status of the office team, whether it is up or down, should be checked at the API gateway level to facilitate load balancing.

Read full review

reviewer1042905

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.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It offers a wide range of plugins that we leverage, including OIDC, Rate Limiting, Lambda functions, and more."

"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."

"Based on my experience, I would definitely recommend Kong Gateway Enterprise to other people."

"The most valuable feature of Kong Enterprise is its capability to integrate with various security tools."

"The solution provides good performance."

"The route limiting feature is very valuable."

"Kong's most valuable features are its lightweight performance when handling millions of requests and the ability to write custom plugins to enhance security, such as end-to-end encryption, even in the open-source version."

More Kong Gateway Enterprise pros

"OpenLegacy produces a war file which includes everything you need to deploy a Tomcat server."

"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."

"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."

"It is possible to solve larger legacy API issues on an enterprise level with this product."

"It is possible to connect a service to a mainframe program or back transaction in a matter of minutes or hours at the most."

"Opens the door to connect modern web products to an old legacy system."

"Using mainframe programs (not screens), the OpenLegacy services do not require any changes by the mainframe programmers, thus reducing development cycles."

"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."

Cons

"The product's price is an area of concern where improvements are required."

"Because it is open-source, it should be less expensive than others."

"The main challenge, in my opinion, is the price. It's difficult to convince our management to approve the budget to purchase it from our vendor. There are no technical problems."

"We would like to see an automatic data API when we have a table in the database."

"The software version upgrade process should be improved."

"From an improvement perspective, the product should offer more readily available connectors and also allow for more seamless AI integrations."

"The OS upgrades are not as frequent as they should be and they are bulky."

"It becomes difficult if you try to scale it up to multiple clusters."

More Kong Gateway Enterprise cons

"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."

"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."

"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."

"Customer support for the product is slow and not very good. It makes using the product difficult if you need help quickly."

"Debugging and logging for programmers could be better."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Kong Enterprise's pricing is reasonable for our company size."

"The product is reasonably priced because it goes by the SaaS model."

"The licensing is expensive."

"The price is really reasonable compared to that of alternative solutions."

"I don't have any information on licensing costs currently."

"There is a need to pay towards the licensing charges...In some areas, the functionalities are available free of charge."

"There are many factors that influence the price of Kong Enterprise, such as scale, licenses, and usage."

"Basically, my company uses the tool's open-source version."

More Kong Gateway Enterprise pricing and cost advice

"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."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which API Management solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Insurance Company

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

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 ...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

Ask a question

Earn 20 points

Comparisons

WSO2 API Manager vs Kong Gateway Enterprise

Compared 13% of the time

Microsoft Azure API Management vs Kong Gateway Enterprise

Compared 11% of the time

Apigee vs Kong Gateway Enterprise

Compared 11% of the time

Kong Konnect vs Kong Gateway Enterprise

Compared 10% of the time

More Kong Gateway Enterprise Competitors

MuleSoft API Manager vs OpenLegacy

Compared 20% of the time

IBM API Connect vs OpenLegacy

Compared 16% of the time

Amazon API Gateway vs OpenLegacy

Compared 13% of the time

webMethods.io vs OpenLegacy

Compared 12% of the time

SEEBURGER Business Integration Suite vs OpenLegacy

Compared 10% of the time

More OpenLegacy Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Kong Gateway Enterprise

June 2025

Download Kong Gateway Enterprise product report

Buyer's Guide

OpenLegacy

May 2025

Download OpenLegacy product report

Overview

Kong delivers a next generation API platform built for modern architectures. With a lightnight-fast, lightweight, and flexible core, Kong delivers sub-millisecond latency across all your services. Kong's is deployment-, vendor-, and pattern-agnostic, allowing you to run your services how you want, where you want, and with who you want - from baremetal to cloud, monolith to microservices, service mesh, and beyond.

Kong

OpenLegacy helps organizations quickly launch innovative digital services by extending their core back-end systems to the web, mobile and cloud in days or weeks versus months. Our microservice-enabled API integration and management software quickly reduces project backlog by automating and accelerating microservices and API creation, deployment, testing and management from core applications, mainframes and databases. Together, business and IT teams can quickly, easily and securely meet consumer, partner or employee demands for digital services without modernizing or replacing core systems, and without special programming skills or invasive changes to existing systems and architectures. OpenLegacy is designed for ongoing management of microservices APIs and is based on open standards, so our software plays nice with your current technology stack and supports agile, DevOps and continuous development. Learn why leading companies choose OpenLegacy at www.openlegacy.com.

OpenLegacy

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...

Buyer's Guide

Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy

June 2025

Free Report: Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy

Find out what your peers are saying about Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. OpenLegacy report.

See our list of best API Management vendors.

We monitor all API Management reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.