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Layer7 API Management vs MuleSoft API Manager vs TIBCO Cloud API Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of Layer7 API Management is 2.7%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of MuleSoft API Manager is 4.9%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO Cloud API Management is 1.0%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
MuleSoft API Manager4.9%
Layer7 API Management2.7%
TIBCO Cloud API Management1.0%
Other91.4%
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

NikhilChaudhari - PeerSpot reviewer
Valued for its drag-and-drop functionalities, the available policy options, and the excellent security features
I work as a PG developer, primarily dealing with Layer7 API Management and MuleSoft API management. My focus is mainly on VM management platforms such as Layer7 and Apigee Layer7 API Management is most valued for its drag-and-drop functionalities, the available policy options, and the excellent…
D.Rajesh Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved Integration Efficiency and Potential for Further Enhancements in Monitoring and User Experience
The policies in MuleSoft API Manager are significant features. We get the policies by default, with more than 25 out-of-the-box policies. If any additional requirement exists specific to the customer, there is a custom policy framework. We can build the policy according to our requirement, and deploy and enable it at the API Manager level to consume across different business groups, environments, or organizations altogether within the platform. Developing the custom policy is not challenging; you just need to follow the custom policy framework to implement. The custom policy and the different levels of SLAs of the API Manager are notable. Regarding the monitoring side of the API Manager, MuleSoft provides substantial monitoring with logs, offering search capability, raw data accessibility, and different subscriptions. With the top tier, integration with third-party platforms such as ELK or Splunk becomes unnecessary because all search capabilities, dashboards, and functional monitoring can be built within the platform itself. This is excellent from the monitoring perspective, and there have been recent improvements focusing on observability. For DevOps, if you want to make your continuous integration and continuous deployment effective, irrespective of the tool, there are options to integrate. For example, you can use the Maven plugin, platform APIs, or CLI to build your end-to-end DevOps cycle.
AftabAlam - PeerSpot reviewer
Trust and reliability have been established with long-term usage and significant integration benefits
TIBCO Cloud API Management offers API management plus the ability to orchestrate all inbound and outbound API calls. When an API is exposed to the external system, it functions as a single integration. Behind the scenes, you can perform extensive API modeling, aggregation, and downstream systems can have more than one API and give the response back to a single API call. It has many features such as orchestration rule engine, which makes it quite good. TIBCO Cloud API Management has brought numerous benefits for our organization, especially in product maturity and support. Sales and support are strong areas, and I think it is very good. If they do not get the right support, then they should consider other options. The sales and support also provides cost optimization.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's pretty easy to use, and once we have templating set up we can add new APIs, at least through the gateway, and apply the security to them; it takes a minute."
"There are a couple aspects of performance. One is just speed and uptime, and it's stellar in that regard. The other is, how much effort is it to put it in place in the first place, and then how much effort is it to keep it operational. That's where its real strength is. I'm able to do things quickly and easily that I couldn't do before​."
"Almost all security features are available out-of-the-box and can be deployed rapidly."
"Ease of use."
"The solution fills our two most important concerns in seeking an API solution by providing a reliable gateway and security options."
"It has improved API governance and gives analytics to API performance."
"Key features include: lightweight mediation, transformation from JSON to XML and XML to JSON, API portal and API key management, the Developer Portal, and Circuit Breaker is a cool feature, too."
"The latest version that just came out at the first of October really was a powerful move in the right direction. I was very, very pleased with that because it allows now beginning to use information of things. We've got this IOT infrastructure that we can plug into, and for my use cases there are a lot of outdoor sensors that provide valuable information to my customers."
"The stability overall has been pretty great."
"MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is a low-code product."
"The security features are good. It's easy to configure the end-to-end integration with existing applications."
"The most effective features of Anypoint API Manager for policy enforcement include security enforcement, rate limiting, client enforcement, traffic control, service level agreement policies, and caching policies."
"The MuleSoft Exchange and the Experience Hub stand out as the most valuable features."
"The solution has a feature called Flex, which is a low-latency API layer for passthrough APIs where you want data mapping but with very low latency and high scalability."
"We have all the policies available via drag and drop. It made it very easy."
"The entire offering and suite of tools that this solution provides have been very valuable. We are able to manage APIs on runtime on a cloud basis which has been very useful."
"The most valuable aspect of Mashery is its stability."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to have different packages based on the API keys. The same core system can have different packages based on different environments."
"The control that we have and the security features are very valuable. With regard to API implementation or API orchestration, it works very well in the cloud because as soon as you create an API with one click, you can actually expose your APIs."
"Very few outages or SLA issues."
"It is easy to work with ."
"It has something called packages. In that way, it's good because we have some pre-built packages. So, if you want to onboard different APIs, we can just add them to the package, and it's there."
"The reason why we selected the solution originally was because of its ability to have a gateway both on-premise and in the cloud. This is the most valuable aspect of the solution for us."
"When we did the product evaluation, we saw that TIBCO Mashery offers end-to-end API life cycle management. It provides all API features that are required for managing the complete life cycle. It includes the developer portal and tools for API monitorization. The out-of-box security features that TIBCO Mashery provides are enterprise-grade, which gives it an edge over other API products."
 

Cons

"The OTK, however, is a complex upgrade. They tend to change the schemas on the database behind it, between the versions, which can be a pain to have to migrate all of our existing clients from one database schema to the other."
"​There is still room for improvement for the CA API Developer Portal. It is still not on par with what the competencies are."
"Some users say that the API lacks some features and is lagging behind the competition although that has not been my personal experience."
"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."
"CA double up portal is a pain. It is something that we are struggling with right now."
"Layer7 API Management could have a live API creator feature, so my team can easily create APIs. Right now, the product doesn't have that feature."
"The solution should prioritize ease of use and align with the growing trend of cloud-native environments."
"The architecture of the solution does not allow for flexibility in using different components for the gateway architecture."
"From an API management perspective, MuleSoft's API Manager is not as powerful as some other tools available."
"It is not a very scalable solution."
"The solution is missing a monetization module."
"There are some loopholes in the security policies that could be improved."
"Since most components are situated in the cloud, there's one particular hosted in the cloud. This presents a considerable challenge. While all other components are implemented on-premises, this specific one isn't permitted to be hosted in the cloud as per customer requirements. Shifting this component to an on-premises environment requires a significant effort."
"One improvement is maybe to add a plugin in the API manager. Let's say an organisation is using SOAP services or legacy APIs. Maybe I don't want to migrate it to rest API, but my plugin should be able to convert Jason to XML. Basically, protocol transformation features in API Manager."
"In the next release, Mulesoft should make it easier for people who don't have the native connectors to build their own rather than using the APA from the power platform or outlet."
"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."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management should improve its installation and make it easy."
"The management console of API and customers' applications are not the most intuitive."
"The way agile life cycle is working needs improvement. I also want to see more support for open API standards. I want to see some improvement on the protocol transformation. That is quite missing now. These are the three main issues."
"We observed delays under heavy load conditions, and without proper tuning, changes could take an extended period to filter and become effective."
"Monetization is not that great in API management. You need customization. Improvements are needed with sandbox local as well as with monetization. Those features are missing."
"The security needs improvement, specifically, propagation of security to an API. Calling other APIs is something that is missing in the product and that makes us think about going to a competitor."
"They can fix some stability issues and probably make it more user-friendly so that not only an IT savvy person but an end-user can also easily navigate through this solution."
"I'd like to see TIBCO integrate authentication and security features into Mashery."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This solution is a bit more expensive than competitors."
"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."
"CA API Management has a licensing path. If you want more features, it requires more licenses and more installation time."
"It was very high at that time. We are a Broadcom CA partner, and we got it only for testing purposes. We didn't pay anything for it."
"There are some costs for maintenance that we are charged, but that seems fair because we get the support."
"If you do a TCO of more than five years, then you will see a big jump in costs for some vendors."
"Our customers found the product’s cost a little higher. They are looking for open-source solutions."
"It's my manager who takes care of the pricing. But I keep on hearing that it's a little pricey, it's on the higher side. That is what he says."
"MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is an expensive solution."
"It is really expensive from a Zimbabwean perspective."
"If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the product price as six and a half to seven."
"I'm unsure about licensing costs because I'm not the person who handles this. But, ballpark, it's probably somewhere around $300,000-$400,000 or something like that."
"The product's main drawback is its cost. It's expensive for our company, and their recent change in pricing strategy last year complicated things further. That's the only thing we're not happy with."
"It is extremely high, and I would rate it one out of ten."
"The licensing model is based on how many cores are used. It is a very simple licensing scheme."
"The licensing fees are approximately $80,000 USD per year and there are costs for additional functionality, as well as premiums for connectors to systems such as Oracle and SAP."
"Its price is pretty reasonable. There are some lightweight API options available in the market, but given the feature set that TIBCO provides, its price is really reasonable."
"We have secured terms on which we have been happy to renew for a number of years."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management is not an expensive solution."
"Licensing is quite flexible."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Healthcare Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Retailer
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business23
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise84
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise43
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Layer7 API Management?
Pricing is more than average. While I am used to Layer7 API Management ( /products/layer7-api-management-reviews ), s...
What needs improvement with Layer7 API Management?
Broadcom's push for upgrades from version nine to ten, ten to 10.3, and onwards to twelve needs improvement in migrat...
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 sof...
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...
What do you like most about Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager?
The most valuable features of the solution for securing APIs stem from the tool's ability to allow users to deploy po...
What do you like most about TIBCO Cloud API Management?
The platform's most valuable features are its capabilities to support security measures such as tokenization, token r...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Cloud API Management?
My primary role was to assess the solution from a capability perspective. So, there are some issues with the licensin...
What needs improvement with TIBCO Cloud API Management?
There are some areas for improvement in TIBCO Cloud API Management, especially regarding network protocols such as SM...
 

Also Known As

CA API Management, CA Live API Creator, Espresso Logic, CA API Gateway
Anypoint API Manager
Mashery API Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. IBM  2. Microsoft  3. Oracle  4. Salesforce  5. SAP  6. Cisco  7. Dell  8. HP  9. Adobe  10. VMware  11. Accenture  12. Capgemini  13. Deloitte  14. PwC  15. Ernst & Young  16. Infosys  17. TCS (Tata Consultancy Services)  18. Wipro  19. Cognizant  20. HCL Technologies  21. Tech Mahindra  22. Fujitsu  23. Hitachi  24. NEC  25. NTT Data  26. Ericsson  27. Nokia  28. Siemens  29. AT&T  30. Verizon  31. Vodafone  32. Orange
Coca-Cola, Splunk, Citrix, UCSF, Vertu, State of Colorado, National Post, TiVo, Deakin, LLS, Oldcastle Precast, ParcelPoint, Justice Systems, Ube, Sumitomo Corporation, PacificComp, University of Witwatersrand, Groupe Initiatives, Camelot, Panviva
uShip, Sabre, TouchTunes, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, athenahealth, Coca-Cola Enterprises, CentralIndex.com, Constant Contact, Edmunds.com, FoodEssentials, Getty Images, Klout, Rovi, Rotten Tomatoes, Sportradar, TomTom, ACTIVE.com
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google and others in API Management. Updated: August 2025.
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