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IBM DataPower Gateway vs Layer7 API Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

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

IBM DataPower Gateway
Ranking in API Management
8th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) (4th), Application Infrastructure (6th), SOA Application Gateways (1st)
Layer7 API Management
Ranking in API Management
11th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
111
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 3.8%, up from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Layer7 API Management is 3.0%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts
While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.
Ronald D'Souza - PeerSpot reviewer
Has great drag-and-drop features and it requires minimal coding
I have mainly implemented using Layer 7 API Management. Some of the major challenges we were able to meet with a quick release to market methodology. Some of the tasks which we achieved for our customers were: 1. Translation service from SOAP to REST and vice versa. 2. API service to DB (Oracle, MySQL, MSSQL, Snowflake, SAP HANA) -- Created Swagger APIs that were able to perform CRUD operation to the backend API mentioned above and provided routes to query and get data. 3. Integration with Payment gateway service providers to perform (transaction on behalf of the customer with third-party payment gateway service providers white labeled with our APIs ) -- Followed TMF standards for payment gateway integration with the Telcom world. 4. Orchestration of the API. Build multiple microservers and provided orchestration based on route, path, and data in the request and perform actions that would be communicated with multiple APIs and provide a single consolidated response. 5. Provided API-driven security (Oauth 2.0, JWT, SAML, Basic, and a variety of means) to access the API giving the developer the freedom to concentrate only on application/service/microservice and let the gateway handle the threat. 6. Seamless Mutual Authentication allowed good segregation between APIs in the DMZ and internal network.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like the API Gateway feature."
"You don't have to have a separate DMC proxy because DataPower Gateway is an appliance and will take care of a lot of security features. These include data validations, encryption, as well as XML or any type of scripting or security threats that are present."
"Support for PCA and non-PCA services is valuable."
"It is very easy to set up and configure, even for users with no prior experience."
"My company has a good impression of IBM DataPower Gateway. What I like about it is that because it's an appliance, it's a turnkey solution that's very fast and out of the box. Compared to other gateways, I also like that IBM DataPower Gateway is function-rich. For example, for one of the projects, there was a need for specific transformation and security features available in IBM DataPower Gateway out of the box, so my team just needed to configure the appliance. There was no need for separate development, and I found it quite neat. Another valuable feature of IBM DataPower Gateway is that it's easy to integrate with other products."
"What I like most is the stability."
"The product is stable...The product is scalable."
"The solution is stable."
"Compared to other vendors, this product is much faster in coming up with new features, which is good."
"It is flexible in how it creates custom policies and uses builds with impressive methods."
"The scalability has been good. We haven't had to scale up a whole lot, even with all the extra transactions we're running through it. We're in the area of about 2 and 1/2 million OAuth tokens issued per hour, and it's performing fine with that."
"API Enhanced Portal 4.1 looks very promising. API Gateway policy manager for writing policies is excellent. It is the best in the industry for policy writing."
"It's a comprehensive tool that allows us to perform all the necessary tasks in one place."
"The mobile access gateway (MAG) is tremendous."
"The administration interface (Policy Manager) is very easy to understand and use."
"It has its own language, which make it possible to design and implement the complete flow using existing services and databases, and to create and aggregate fine-and coarse-grained APIs."
 

Cons

"DataPower isn't the most user-friendly tool. It is not an easy tool to use. Some things could use better wizards to guide you through processes."
"IBM DataPower Gateway is quite big for smaller organizations, looking at different types of clients who are virtually assisted in this, I would say it's not really a good product for smaller firms."
"The solution requires a lot of training manuals in order to get to know it better and to be able to use it effectively."
"For the workloads that are not too high, appliance is a little bit expensive."
"Its support services could be better."
"The user interface or the application development perspective and customization of the tool could be a little better."
"Traceability could be improved, especially for business operations. The traceability of the transactions could be an improvement point for DataPower to work on. It would be better if they provided JSON support. JSON protocol data has changed format. It started performing internal transformation to JSONx. This might be an additional complexity."
"The product should be more adapted to the DevOps process."
"One specific feature that we need is the ability to authenticate directly to the server with API data. It's not complex nowadays. This is a feature that we need and CA doesn't have it."
"I would like to be able to see the publisher role be able to be organized within organizations, so somebody within that role can only manipulate their particular policies."
"If they had different levels of support available then it would be easier to justify the costs."
"​The initial setup was very complex."
"The interface should be improved."
"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."
"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."
"The solution should prioritize ease of use and align with the growing trend of cloud-native environments."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The total cost of IBM DataPower Gateway would depend on the configuration, but in my experience, it can amount to 60,000 Euros per box, even for the virtual version. Usually, customers need high availability and a non-production environment, so the total price for IBM DataPower Gateway can be quite a lot. It can be 200,000 Euros or a similar figure."
"The solution is expensive in comparison to other products."
"The solution has a return on investment but is a little expensive."
"The product is expensive."
"Most customers' use case budgets are not inlined with the price of IBM DataPower Gateway. It is too expensive."
"This product is a bit expensive as IBM products are costly assets. However, for enterprise customers it is a worthwhile investment."
"The licensing cost is very expensive."
"The tool's initial costing is expensive for small banks and financial institutions."
"This solution is a bit more expensive than competitors."
"If you do a TCO of more than five years, then you will see a big jump in costs for some vendors."
"The price of Layer7 API Management is reasonable compared to Apigee."
"It has a reasonable pricing model by instance."
"APIs can be developed to provide security. We can show them in one single pane of glass, such as the CA API Management API Developer Portal. It is there that we can provide the monetization for their APIs and what is happening on third-party applications, like Paytm or BookMyShow."
"CA has great pricing for gateways, so negotiate with your sales team."
"Purchase 4.0 now and wait until they flush out the 4.1 problems."
"At the time we bought the product it was a perpetual users license and there has been no need for additional licensing fees."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
30%
Insurance Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?
The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?
I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...
What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?
The DCDR process should be less complex. AI should improve developer efficiency and effort. Whenever I am writing code, it should give recommendations automatically by incorporating AI so I can wri...
What needs improvement with Layer7 API Management?
Layer7 API Management could be improved in its logging and alert mechanisms. Furthermore, although cloud deployment has been introduced, I am not familiar with all recent updates. In previous versi...
 

Also Known As

WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower
CA API Management, CA Live API Creator, Espresso Logic, CA API Gateway
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RBL Bank, Availity
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
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.