We're facing skyrocketing costs with our API management, particularly with our Apigee licenses, AWS data transfer fees, a vendor for DDoS protection, and three team members dedicating 30% of their time just to keep everything running smoothly. We manage around 200 APIs for both internal teams and external partners, and while the traffic isn't massive, with about 500 million calls a month, it's still significant. I've considered switching to AWS API Gateway, but the per-request pricing seems to be even higher for our usage, and Azure APIM has similar drawbacks. I'm looking for suggestions on how to reduce these costs without compromising reliability or features. Has anyone successfully lowered their API management costs? Are there alternatives that can handle high volumes more economically?
3 Answers
You might want to rethink what you mean by '200 APIs.' Are those distinct services or just their endpoints? Also, DDoS protection can be critical, even when working with trusted partners, since issues can arise unexpectedly. It's worth considering alternatives like Apache APISIX or Kong API Gateway. They might be more cost-effective for your needs, though you'll still have to manage them and factor in hosting costs. They don't typically offer the same level of features as managed solutions but could work depending on your specific use case.
It really depends on how you use your APIs. If you're looking for a full-featured management layer for things like authentication and rate limiting, you might stick with APIM solutions. For us, we route all our APIs through Azure App Gateway, managing most functions at the service level. We only spend about 600 AUD a month on that, and with 90 million calls monthly, it keeps costs down without sacrificing performance. Define what 'expensive' means for your situation, too; we spend about 1.2 million a year on Azure overall, but the gateways are a small part of that.
I'm no API expert, but for one of our apps using REST APIs, we made the shift to GraphQL and noted some cost reductions, even though our scale was smaller than yours. It might not suit everyone, but for us, it helped with efficiency. AWS AppSync is a decent managed service for GraphQL if you're considering that route.
That's a solid point! Balancing between what features you need and keeping costs in check is essential. Sometimes you have to pay a bit more upfront for a service that's more streamlined in the long run.