Kong Gateway Enterprise vs MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager comparison

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13,943 views|10,542 comparisons
89% willing to recommend
MuleSoft Logo
17,313 views|13,997 comparisons
96% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Jul 30, 2023

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:

  • Ease of Deployment

    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.

  • Features

    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.

  • Room for Improvement

    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.

  • Pricing

    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.

  • Service and Support

    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.

To learn more, read our detailed Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager Report (Updated: March 2024).
767,847 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Q&A Highlights
Question: How does Kong Enterprise compare with Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager?
Answer: 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 one would want to keep in mind when setting it up, the overall process is straightforward. If you know what exactly you want out of the system, then the actual setup can be done with a reasonable amount of speed. Users are not faced with great challenges when it comes to upgrading the program. The potential upgrades can take two forms. The actual software that runs the Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager does not require that many upgrades to keep it running with the most up-to-date code. This saves time and resources for those who use it. Additionally, if you want to increase the scale of your operations, you can do so with ease. The only real limit to your scaling ability is how much you are willing to pay. It is the type of program that is designed for the use of entities like banks, which may have to scale up operations a great deal. The technical support team for the Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager operates with great efficiency and skill. When they are notified of issues, they do a triage and address them by order of severity and urgency. This speaks to their high level of professionalism. They are extremely responsive when issues arise and work quickly to arrive at a resolution. Kong Enterprise has a number of attributes that make it a very effective program. Kong is a simple program to navigate. It is a next generation API platform that defies expectations. Although newer does not always equal easier to use, in this case, Kong pleasantly surprises. It is both simple to use and simple to scale up. However, Kong does not easily integrate with other solutions. This can be troublesome for organizations that run multiple solutions at once. Conclusion The Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is an expensive solution which can be valuable if you can afford it. Kong Enterprise is a more cutting-edge solution. It has a lower cost, but at the same time has drawbacks which have to be carefully considered.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The route limiting feature is very valuable.""In our buying companies' perspective, it was easier to use compared to other platforms. The markets were pretty familiar with the solutions.""I like everything about it. It provides the security we need.""We use the solution for load-balancing, caching, and rate-limiting APIs.""This is a solid intrusion prevention system that combines a firewall and antivirus in a single solution.""The solution provides good performance.""The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it seamlessly supports a vast number of tools.""Kong Enterprise comes with some ready plug-ins, which is very good for the customers."

More Kong Gateway Enterprise Pros →

"The ESB, the enterprise service bus is what we primarily use. In addition to that, the API management. These are the two tools which we have been using extensively. The enterprise platform.""It is a good management tool for controlling purposes.""I believe the API connectivity within the cloud marketplace is most valuable.""The stability overall has been pretty great.""The most valuable features are API development and API management.""We use it heavily because Azure offers better pricing than its competitors.""Anypoint is very capable in terms of scalability.""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."

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Cons
"Kong Enterprise can improve the customization to be able to do the integration properly.""Because it is open-source, it should be less expensive than others.""The tool needs improvement in UX.""It becomes difficult if you try to scale it up to multiple clusters.""The product's price is an area of concern where improvements are required.""Understanding the configurations and knowing what needs to be done can be a bit difficult initially.""The solution should include policy features that are available in other solutions like MuleSoft API manager but missing in Kong Enterprise.""Kong Enterprise fails to provide live tracing of the APIs, which is possible nowadays."

More Kong Gateway Enterprise Cons →

"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.""It is not a very scalable solution.""The solution is missing a monetization module.""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.""Migrating any existing middleware platform to Mulesoft is difficult because of the transformation, conversion and integration involved. Better tools are needed to achieve quicker time to market.""MuleSoft has advanced features but is slower.""When compared to other integration technologies, it is slightly higher.""Not many stand-out features."

More MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "The licensing fees are paid yearly."
  • "The price is really reasonable compared to that of alternative solutions."
  • "There are many factors that influence the price of Kong Enterprise, such as scale, licenses, and usage."
  • "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."
  • "Kong Enterprise's pricing is at par compared to the other technologies."
  • "Kong Enterprise is cheaper than Apigee. I rate its pricing as four out of ten."
  • "Kong Enterprise's pricing is reasonable for our company size."
  • More Kong Gateway Enterprise Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "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 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."
  • "The pricing is very expensive, although you get a lot of power from the product."
  • "When it comes to determining price, the pre-sales team interacts with the customer's primary integration team and the price is negotiated based on the specific usage of the system."
  • "The licensing model is based on how many cores are used. It is a very simple licensing scheme."
  • "Anypoint is the most expensive solution on the market, as far as I know, though it's also the most capable."
  • "Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
  • "The price of Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is very high."
  • More MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer: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 one… more »
    Top Answer: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… more »
    Top Answer:Kong Enterprise needs to improve its pricing, which starts at hundreds of thousands of dollars. Pricing should be based on API usage rather than monthly. It should improve its documentation as well.
    Top Answer:I have found that Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is the best integration tool out there for API management. It is easy to implement and learn; it provides several options for deployment, (including… more »
    Top Answer:The most valuable features of the solution for securing APIs stem from the tool's ability to allow users to deploy policies.
    Ranking
    6th
    out of 64 in API Management
    Views
    13,943
    Comparisons
    10,542
    Reviews
    12
    Average Words per Review
    417
    Rating
    7.8
    4th
    out of 64 in API Management
    Views
    17,313
    Comparisons
    13,997
    Reviews
    28
    Average Words per Review
    437
    Rating
    8.3
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Anypoint API Manager
    Learn More
    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.

    Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is the portion of the Anypoint Platform that is used for the designing, building, managing, and publishing of APIs. Anypoint Platform uses Mule as its core runtime engine.

    Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is an extremely versatile solution. It offers users the ability to deploy their APIs in a number of different settings. You can use API Manager on a public cloud, a private cloud, or a hybrid. Additionally, users can use the solution to manage their deployments with ease. A few clicks are all you need to alter your deployment.

    Benefits of Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager

    Some of the benefits of using Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager include:

    • The ability to deploy APIs and integrations in the location of your choice. Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager enables users to deploy APIs on their own servers or on the cloud via Mulesoft’s cloud service. It also allows users to change the deployment location with only a few clicks.
    • The ability to automatically protect your APIs with cutting-edge security software and protocols. Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager’s security software can automatically detect attacks against your APIs. This triggers an escalation of security protocols that push the attack to the perimeter of the system. The solution then proceeds to seal up any vulnerabilities. Mulesoft uses machine learning in order to adapt to any new threat that emerges.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager is a highly effective piece of software whose purpose is to enable users to design, build, manage, and publish APIs. It stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Two major ones are the ease with which users can connect it to their applications and the high level of value that its support offers. It provides users with the ability to easily connect this solution with whatever program they need to join it with. Users can create connections without having to write code. It offers different types of support which ensure that users have a high level of understanding about the product and how to use it.

    PeerSpot user Tolulope A., a technical lead specializing in integration and middleware at a financial services firm, notes the ease with which users can connect Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager to their applications. He writes, “One good thing about MuleSoft is that they have a lot of connectors to those back-end applications. We don't really need to write code to be able to connect to a database or to connect with SAP. You just need credentials and the connectivity details. Most of the development of what we do is just drag and drop. They're able to connect with applications using standard connectors that are provided by ESB, by MuleSoft.”

    The CEO & Co-Founder at a computer retailer notes the value of Mulesoft’s supporting documentation. They write, “The documentation is great; it is always up-to-date and well-presented. If any details are missing, then there is a blog available that contains a lot of details. There are also channels on YouTube to help you better understand the solution and what some of the processes look like.”

    Sample Customers
    Cargill, Zillow, Ferrari, WeWork, Healthcare.gov, Yahoo! Japan, Giphy, SkyScanner
    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
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm40%
    Computer Software Company27%
    Comms Service Provider13%
    Insurance Company13%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm21%
    Computer Software Company14%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Insurance Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company36%
    Financial Services Firm18%
    Manufacturing Company12%
    Computer Retailer9%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm17%
    Computer Software Company15%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Insurance Company7%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business30%
    Large Enterprise70%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business17%
    Midsize Enterprise13%
    Large Enterprise70%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business27%
    Midsize Enterprise8%
    Large Enterprise65%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business16%
    Midsize Enterprise11%
    Large Enterprise73%
    Buyer's Guide
    Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Kong Gateway Enterprise vs. MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    767,847 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Kong Gateway Enterprise is ranked 6th in API Management with 18 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.

    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.