Development
API Gateway
What an API gateway is and why it matters
Definition
An API gateway is a server-side component that serves as the single entry point for API requests from clients, routing them to the appropriate backend services. It handles cross-cutting concerns like authentication, authorization, rate limiting, request/response transformation, caching, and monitoring - centralizing logic that would otherwise be duplicated across every service.
How it works
Without an API gateway, every client (web app, mobile app, third-party integration) communicates directly with each backend service. This means every service must independently handle authentication, rate limiting, CORS, and request logging. An API gateway centralizes these concerns in one place, reducing duplication and making security policies easier to enforce.
Modern API gateways do more than simple routing. They can transform requests (converting a single client request into multiple backend calls), aggregate responses (combining data from multiple services into one response), enforce rate limits per client or API key, and provide analytics on API usage patterns. Kong, AWS API Gateway, and Nginx are common choices.
For AI applications, API gateways add a critical layer of control. You can rate-limit AI inference endpoints to prevent cost spikes, route requests to different model versions for A/B testing, and cache common responses to reduce inference costs. The gateway becomes the operational control plane for your AI features.
How 1Raft uses API Gateway
We implement API gateways in every multi-service architecture we build. In a SaaS project, the API gateway handles JWT authentication, tenant-based routing, and per-plan rate limiting. For AI products, we route inference requests through the gateway to enforce cost limits and enable traffic-based model switching. We typically use Kong or AWS API Gateway depending on the client's infrastructure.
Related terms
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Microservices is an architecture pattern where a software application is built as a collection of small, independent services that communicate over APIs. Each service handles a specific business capability and can be developed, deployed, and scaled independently.
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GraphQL
GraphQL is a query language for APIs that lets the client specify exactly which data it needs. Instead of multiple REST endpoints returning fixed data shapes, a single GraphQL endpoint returns precisely the fields the client requests.
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WebSocket
WebSocket is a communication protocol that enables persistent, two-way communication between a client and server over a single connection. Unlike HTTP where the client must initiate every exchange, WebSocket allows the server to push data to the client in real time.
Related services
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