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MuleSoft API Manager vs WSO2 API Manager 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

MuleSoft API Manager
Ranking in API Management
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
WSO2 API Manager
Ranking in API Management
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of MuleSoft API Manager is 5.1%, down from 8.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WSO2 API Manager is 4.7%, up from 4.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Q&A Highlights

it_user1257666 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 30, 2020
 

Featured Reviews

Dipanjan_Nandi - PeerSpot reviewer
Valuable testing stubs and policy enforcement with room for better security and cost management
From an API management perspective, MuleSoft's API Manager is not as powerful as some other tools available. Features like monetization and advanced security, which are present in Apigee, are missing. I also want the API Manager to be used as a separate product apart from MuleSoft's other integration solutions. Additionally, the licensing cost is high, and many clients are looking to switch due to this.
VishalSingh14 - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to deploy APIs and easy to manage CORS configuration
I have used WSO2 Store and WSO2 API Manager at the architecture level. I worked on two versions, namely WSO2 API Manager 2.6.0 and 5.7.0. I have also worked with WSO2 Identity Server versions 5.7 and 5.11. There are certain things that Apigee handles better than WSO2 API Manager. The user interface of WSO2 API Manager is much easier than that of Apigee. The scope of flexibility was much greater in Apigee. In WSO2 API Manager, we had little flexibility and were restricted to a specific software or tool. On the other hand, we had the scope of customization in Apigee.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The MuleSoft Exchange and the Experience Hub stand out as the most valuable features."
"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."
"Anypoint API Manager's most valuable feature is its connectors."
"The most valuable features are API development and API management."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"We can use both on-premises and cloud setups."
"Mulesoft Anypoint API Manager's most valuable aspect is it has plenty of features."
"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 most beneficial feature of WSO2 API Manager is its capability to use Swagger to define and then populate the API."
"This solution is a little bit faster, easier to use, and has better integration than the other solutions I have experienced."
"WSO2 API Manager provides OAuth2 token capabilities that our customers use to interact, onboard new customers, and provide approvals whenever a customer is onboarded."
"It is a scalable solution because it can be scaled horizontally and vertically."
"The solution is open-source."
"WSO2 API Manager has a user-friendly model."
"The solution is stable."
"As far as I am aware this solution is the first API Publisher that allows you to create and publish API and to manage the API lifecycle."
 

Cons

"The cost for using MuleSoft is approximately $500,000 USD per year. It includes various subscriptions like the signature success plan and platinum subscriptions, making it a costly infrastructure."
"When discussing potential enhancements overall, it primarily involves making it more user-friendly and lowering the pricing. There are several aspects that could benefit from improvement, or perhaps a few other areas to consider."
"When compared to other integration technologies, it is slightly higher."
"The setup process could be simpler."
"The tool needs to improve customization and interface."
"The initial setup, if you go back three or three and a half years, definitely, for us, was complex."
"The most important thing that should be improved is that it is too heavy."
"Not many stand-out features."
"API Manager is not easy to scale because some of its components lack scalability. It's a difficult point. Especially because companies are so cloud-based these days, microservice scalability is a major thing."
"For fresh graduates and engineers, the setup process can be very difficult."
"We had some problems with the reverse proxy not being able to invoke fully qualified domain names, so we have to build some custom scripts to solve this issue."
"WSO2 API Manager could improve by adding external API security features, which is one area where there is room for enhancement. Internally, API security is strong, and all other necessary features are already available. It has a solid marketplace, supports both Docker and standalone setups, and offers great enterprise integration. The developer portal has greatly improved the user experience, making it simple and user-friendly wherever we’ve implemented it. Overall, it’s not as complicated as other API gateways."
"The professional support and licensing aspects of WSO have been a challenge."
"The product hasn’t been updated for some time."
"The pricing models offered by WSO2 API Manager could be more flexible and should offer different options so that more people can access them."
"Integration is an area that needs to be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I want MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager to be cheaper because when you scale up, it becomes very costly. Price-wise, I'd give it a seven out of ten."
"The pricing is very expensive, although you get a lot of power from the product."
"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."
"The product is expensive."
"MuleSoft Anypoint API Manager is an expensive solution."
"The product is highly priced compared to other advanced software. It is affordable only for tier-one customers."
"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."
"I think that it is pretty expensive."
"I am using the free version."
"It is costly, around ten thousand per year, per instance"
"WSO2 API Manager is quite an expensive tool. I rate the product's pricing a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one is low and ten is high."
"WSO2 API Manager is a costly solution, and its pricing is not competitive enough compared to other products."
"We use the open-source version — the free version."
"WSO2 API Manager is a low-cost solution. It is one of the most affordable solutions."
"The challenge is the increasing pricing, which has led some customers to consider alternatives, like using Spring Boot solutions instead. The rising costs, especially as cores and usage increase, have been a concern, prompting some to migrate to other products."
"We have not opted for the paid version of WSO2 but we have implemented the free and open source WSO2 software to a great extent and it is working as per our expectation."
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Answers from the Community

it_user1257666 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 30, 2020
Mar 30, 2020
I think the main difference is that WSO2 is open source and you can free download to use it in your on premises platform. But if you are willing to pay for a fully developed product, Mulesoft will provide better support in your full development of API cycle. You may consider their local support for further evaluation. I think the level of support offered by the product vendor is a key considera...
See 2 answers
SK
Jan 2, 2020
We have evaluated WS02, APIGEE, MuleSoft in the past and based on our selection criteria all three scored pretty close with APIGEE with overall high score with a very small difference. However, based on the key driver each one has an advantage such as WS02 on licensing, APIGEE on performance throughput and MuleSoft on robust integration platform. For more information please reach out to me at ksrinivas@techwave.net
reviewer1314810 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 30, 2020
I think the main difference is that WSO2 is open source and you can free download to use it in your on premises platform. But if you are willing to pay for a fully developed product, Mulesoft will provide better support in your full development of API cycle. You may consider their local support for further evaluation. I think the level of support offered by the product vendor is a key consideration for your choice.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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 software, it is easy to install and upgrade. While there are different things that ...
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 to implement and learn; it provides several options for deployment, (including ...
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 policies.
What do you like most about WSO2 API Manager?
It is possible to scale up and scale down with the solution...I can say that I have not seen any issues related to scalability.
What needs improvement with WSO2 API Manager?
One area for improvement is monitoring. Dashboards for application monitoring of the APIs would be beneficial, allowing us to check for faulty APIs.
What is your primary use case for WSO2 API Manager?
We use WSO2 API Manager for our microservices and our APIs, both internally and externally.
 

Also Known As

Anypoint API Manager
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
1. eBay 2. StubHub 3. Cisco 4. Verizon 5. T-Mobile 6. Vodafone 7. Orange 8. BT Group 9. Telstra 10. Deutsche Telekom 11. Swisscom 12. AT&T 13. Sprint 14. Telefonica 15. O2 16. British Airways 17. Lufthansa 18. Emirates 19. Qatar Airways 20. Etihad Airways 21. Air France 22. KLM 23. American Express 24. Visa 25. Mastercard 26. PayPal 27. Western Union 28. Citibank 29. HSBC 30. Barclays 31. Santander 32. Goldman Sachs
Find out what your peers are saying about MuleSoft API Manager vs. WSO2 API Manager and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.