Ambassador Edge Stack vs KrakenD API Gateway
Ambassador Edge Stack
landing.gravitee.io
KrakenD API Gateway
krakend.ioSide by side
| Figure | Ambassador Edge Stack | KrakenD API Gateway |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | — | Free |
| Free plan | — | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | — |
| Windows | — | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| Linux | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | — |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 0 | 2 |
| Spec score · API Gateway Software | 7.9 (#9) | 7.8 (#13) |
| Spec score · API Security & Management Platforms | 7.9 (#4) | 7.6 (#7) |
| Authentication | It supports incoming request authentication through a custom authentication service, OAuth/OpenID Connect, or JWT. | Listed authentication options include JWT, OAuth2, OpenID Connect, client credentials, and mTLS. |
| Deployment | The product can be installed manually or with Helm. | KrakenD is self-hosted and available through Docker and Kubernetes, cloud marketplace virtual machines, Linux packages, and Linux generic binaries. |
| Founded | 2015 | 2016 |
| Headquarters | Denver, Colorado, United States | Barcelona, Spain |
| Support | Gravitee says Ambassador customers can keep using the same support channels and teams, with ongoing improvements planned. | Community support resources include Google Groups, GitHub issue reporting, and Gophers Slack; Enterprise offers direct vendor support and SLAs. |
| Traffic management | It supports canary deployments in which developers control the share of production traffic routed to a service version. | Traffic controls include rate limiting, circuit breaking, IP filtering, bot detection, and load balancing. |
Plans
KrakenD API Gateway
- Community EditionFree
- Enterprise EditionPriced on request
In their own words
Ambassador Edge Stack
Ambassador Edge Stack has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.
KrakenD API Gateway
KrakenD API Gateway is a stateless, distributed gateway for connecting, securing, aggregating, and transforming APIs and AI workloads. It can combine data from multiple services into one response shaped for client needs. Traffic controls include rate limiting, circuit breaking, IP filtering, bot detection, and load balancing. Connectivity includes REST, RabbitMQ, SNS, SQS, Kafka, GraphQL, gRPC, SOAP, and Lambda; listed protocols also include HTTP, WebSockets, AMQP, and NATS. Authentication options include JWT, OAuth2, OpenID Connect, client credentials, API keys, Basic Authentication, and mTLS. KrakenD is self-hosted, with deployment choices including Docker, Kubernetes, cloud marketplace virtual machines, and Linux packages or binaries. The maker says the development Docker image can be used on Windows, Mac, or Linux, and KrakenD runs natively on Linux and Mac OS. Community Edition costs nothing and includes unlimited requests, APIs, and AI workloads. AI Gateway and AI security are Enterprise features.