An API gateway is a singular interface that handles all the incoming requests before redirecting to the internal servers. An API gateway typically provides the following functions:
- Routes the incoming traffic to the appropriate service hosted with the provider's data center/cloud. Provides a reverse proxy model to limit the exposure of various APIs and services hosted within the provider's data center/cloud.
- Filters all the incoming traffic from all kind of channels—web, mobile, and so on.
- Implements security mechanisms (such as OAuth) to authenticate and log the service usage.
- Provides ability to throttle and limit traffic to certain services.
- Transforms data between the service consumer and provider.
- Provides one or more APIs that map to an underlying service provider. For example, for different kind of consumers—mobile, web, paid...
