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IBM API Connect pros and cons

Vendor: IBM

4.0 out of 5

76 reviews
90% willing to recommend

2,664 followers

Pros & Cons summary

IBM API Connect enhances data protection through strong security and integrates seamlessly with various tools, supporting agile and CI/CD environments. Despite its scalability and collaboration features, users face challenges with instability and complex setup. Improved documentation and cloud integration are needed, alongside better pricing flexibility and smoother upgrades. Users find managing API traffic efficient, yet seek enhanced stability and deployment processes for better DevOps connectivity.

Buyer's Guide

Get pricing advice, tips, use cases and valuable features from real users of this product.

Prominent pros & cons

PROS

IBM API Connect provides robust security features, enhancing data protection strategies and offering end-to-end security.

It seamlessly integrates with other products, such as IBM Secure Gateway, enabling efficient operations.

API Connect offers efficient API management, allowing for quick creation, testing, and publishing of APIs.

Its scalability and stability support rapid deployment and ensure reliable performance.

The technical support provided by IBM is highly rated, ensuring effective assistance and collaboration.

CONS

IBM API Connect has a complex and challenging installation process, requiring significant expertise and knowledge for setup and deployment.

Users report performance issues and instability, particularly during integration and upgrading processes, which require substantial resources and labor.

The documentation and support for IBM API Connect need improvement, with users finding the existing help resources incomplete and navigation challenging.

There are scalability limitations due to its reliance on Kubernetes clusters, which are not on-the-fly scalable and require predefined configurations.

IBM API Connect is expensive compared to other open-source options, with the pricing model and licensing being areas of concern for users.

IBM API Connect Pros review quotes

MM

Group CEO at Mmusi Group

Mar 4, 2022

Scalable and stable API platform for creating and managing APIs.

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KA

Sales Director at Jordan Business Systems

Sep 29, 2022

What's best about IBM API Connect is the excellent administration. The development tool that builds the API is also very simple, and user-friendly, and it doesn't consume too much time. Another valuable feature in IBM API Connect is its good reporting feature, particularly for operations, but the most valuable feature of the solution for the customer is security. IBM API Connect provides a DMZ and a security gateway between the external and internal environment, so you can publish your API safely. IBM API Connect can also integrate with any tool or middleware that works on open standards without the need for development or coding, so integration with the solution is easier.

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KT

AIT Solution Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

Jul 16, 2019

The most valuable feature is the security we get from this solution. I know of a bank that uses it to ensure that everything is secure. The second feature I like is the retail environment, where we actually want to be able to provide as many suppliers and consumers with APIs as possible. If you are well-trained in the writing of RESTful API's, you can actually publish an API in a matter of minutes, test it, and publish it.

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IBM API Connect

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reviewer1680618

Consulting architect at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

Sep 30, 2021

API Connect's most valuable feature is its ability to act as a gateway. It's very easy to configure security and everything else in it. You don't have to kill yourself implementing custom configurations.

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reviewer1534368

Manager Integration Platform Engineering at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

Mar 25, 2021

The solution offers a pretty good SLA.

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AO

AdemolaOsindero

CEO at Lopworks Limited

Apr 1, 2020

Our version supports containerized integration. I can write APIs, which can be moved into a testing environment without needing a forklift. It can check if APIs are compliant before moving them into production.

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Shanmugasundaram Shanmuganathan

Solutions Architect at Synechron

Jan 15, 2024

It acts as a central gateway for both external APIs and underlying systems. It's basically a central middleware for hosting APIs to the internet and consuming APIs from internal systems. It provides central governance for any APIs going outside the network, ensuring security and a common contract for API definitions.

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reviewer1709634

Integration Architect at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

Nov 11, 2021

One of the most valuable features is that we can seamlessly and harmoniously expose our capabilities, from a security point of view.

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reviewer1411329

Lead Architect at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

Oct 11, 2020

Security is well organized and managed within the solution.

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MM

Director Software Development at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Jul 16, 2024

The solution's technical support team is good.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 64)

IBM API Connect Cons review quotes

MM

Group CEO at Mmusi Group

Mar 4, 2022

Support for this platform could still be improved. It also needs to have more levels of versatility. Its compatibility and integration with different platforms also need improvement.

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KA

Sales Director at Jordan Business Systems

Sep 29, 2022

The implementation of IBM API Connect is complex, as it's an enterprise solution with many components that require more than one person. It's not a single product that you work on, and this is an area for improvement, but normally, it's good. Having a more structured model for IBM API Connect support is also room for improvement that would help customers better.

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KT

AIT Solution Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

Jul 16, 2019

The new version is very unstable.

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IBM API Connect

Free Report: IBM API Connect Reviews and More

Learn what your peers think about IBM API Connect. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2025.

848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.

reviewer1680618

Consulting architect at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

Sep 30, 2021

One thing about API Connect that could be improved is the security schemes. There are so many security schemes, and from a product perspective, IBM could improve the user experience of the configuration security scheme.

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reviewer1534368

Manager Integration Platform Engineering at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

Mar 25, 2021

We've had some issues upgrading to the latest version of the solution.

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AO

AdemolaOsindero

CEO at Lopworks Limited

Apr 1, 2020

There are issues with upgrading in the cloud version. The cloud version is extremely buggy. We prefer to use the on-premise version.

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Shanmugasundaram Shanmuganathan

Solutions Architect at Synechron

Jan 15, 2024

While Azure API Management offers configurable scalability, IBM API Connect relies on Kubernetes clusters. This might seem manual and require defining cluster instances upfront, but it's completely customizable and not on-the-fly scaling. It's completely custom-driven, not on-the-fly scaling, which some may consider cumbersome.

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reviewer1709634

Integration Architect at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

Nov 11, 2021

Our main pain points are in these two areas: creating a better developer portal and improving stability in terms of synchronization and monetization.

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reviewer1411329

Lead Architect at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

Oct 11, 2020

Different versions of the same thing can mean unnecessary duplication.

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MM

Director Software Development at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Jul 16, 2024

The only downside where improvements are needed is probably on the licensing side.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 63)

Product Categories

Product Categories

Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS)

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Product Categories

Product Categories

Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS)

Popular Comparisons

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Microsoft Azure API Management vs IBM API Connect

Apigee vs IBM API Connect

Amazon API Gateway vs IBM API Connect

webMethods.io vs IBM API Connect

Kong Gateway Enterprise vs IBM API Connect

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WSO2 API Manager vs IBM API Connect

Layer7 API Management vs IBM API Connect

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