<p>Our project is undergoing a refactor to a micro-services architecture, and we are currently considering different API gateway solutions.</p>
<p>We did our research, looked at the official sites for several solutions, went over some technical comparisons of different solutions, and read articles about our top picks.</p>
<p>So far our main contenders are <strong>Apachee APISIX</strong> and <strong>Kong</strong>, but we are quite torn between them and would like to get a general opinion from actual users.</p>
<p>Below are outlined the different properties and requirements of the project, I would appreciate it if any of you can point out some pros and cons of a solution you are familiar with in regard to them, and it would be great if someone facing similar requirements could share their experience with actually integrating one.</p>
<p><strong>General Info</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>The project is of medium scale, has an active user base, and sees daily use around the clock with an incoming traffic count of a few thousand per minute on the backend.</li>
<li>The project is hosted in a private network, and no cloud services are utilized, so we are looking for a good on-prem solution.</li>
<li>Looking for a rather lightweight solution.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Technical Info and Requirements</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>AD FS-based authentication.</li>
<li>Significant reliance on JWT.</li>
<li>Using WebSocket in some micro-services, specifically Socket.io.</li>
<li>Kubernetes deployment, supported by Helm.</li>
<li>Full-stack under Monorepo.</li>
<li>Repository and CI/CD are hosted and managed on GitLab.</li>
<li>The team is trained in several coding languages but prefers working mainly with Typescript as we use React for the front-end, and NestJS for the back-end.</li>
</ul>
<p>Thank you!</p>

<p>Both Kong and Apache APISIX are popular and feature-rich API gateway solutions. Choosing the right one depends on your specific requirements and use case.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>API Management Features: Both Kong and Apache APISIX provide a wide range of API management features including API authentication, rate limiting, caching, SSL/TLS termination, request/response transformations, and more.</p>
</li>
<li><p>Scalability: Both solutions are built to scale horizontally and vertically. However, Apache APISIX uses a more lightweight and efficient architecture, making it a better option for high performance and low-latency workloads.</p>
</li>
<li><p>Both solutions have a rich ecosystem of plugins and extensions, and can be installed and configured easily.</p>
</li>
</ol>
<p>In summary, for use cases with large-scale, high performance, and low-latency workloads, Apache APISIX might be a better fit.</p>
<p>There has one comparison page may help you: <a href="https://api7.ai/apisix-vs-kong" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://api7.ai/apisix-vs-kong</a></p>
