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The Problem
What Happens When You Skip API Management?
You've built a backend service. It works perfectly internally. But now you need to expose it to external clients, partners, or a mobile app. Suddenly you're staring at a wall of hard questions.
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Who can access my API?
Managing auth manually is painful and error-prone.
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How do I stop abuse?
A single bad actor could take down your backend.
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How do I track usage?
Without visibility, debugging is guesswork.
You could build all of this yourself auth middleware, rate limiters, dashboards, access logs. Or you could use Gravitee.
The Answer
So, What Exactly Is Gravitee?
Gravitee is an open-source API Management (APIM) platform a smart gateway that sits between your clients and your backend services. Every request passes through it. Gravitee decides what gets through, logs what happened, and applies your rules all in real time.
Think of it as a bouncer, a traffic cop, and a monitoring system all in one. It's not just a reverse proxy it's the entire access control layer for your APIs.
How It Fits In
📱 Client App
→
⚡ Gravitee Gateway
→
💻 Your Backend
Auth • Rate Limiting • Policies • Analytics — all enforced at the gateway
Key Features
What Makes It Stand Out?
A lot of tools can forward HTTP requests. Gravitee goes much further it's a complete API lifecycle platform built for teams who take their APIs seriously.
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Multi-Protocol
REST, GraphQL, WebSockets, Kafka, MQTT — one platform handles them all.
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Flexible Auth
API Key, OAuth2, JWT, or open access. You pick the right level per API.
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Policy Engine
Rate limiting, IP filtering, caching, transformations — applied per request.
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Developer Portal
Self-service hub for devs to discover APIs, subscribe, and manage credentials.
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Real-time Analytics
See who's calling what, how often, and where things are failing — live.
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Open Source
Self-host on your own infra, or use the managed cloud version.
Core Concepts
The Mental Model 3 Things to Know
Gravitee revolves around three building blocks. Once you understand these, everything else clicks into place.
Bottom Line
Gravitee turns raw backend services into managed, secure, observable APIs. It handles authentication, rate limiting, analytics, and developer access so your team focuses on building features, not infrastructure.
In a world where APIs are the product, having a solid API management layer isn't optional. It's the foundation.
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Coming Soon · Part 2
Ready to Take It Further?
Part 2 will walk through creating your first API, setting up plans, deploying, and making your first authenticated request step by step.
Coming Soon…
Official docs at documentation.gravitee.io
