Portkey vs Kong AI Gateway
Product engineer: Kong suits teams that already run Kong for APIs. Developer-platform lead: Portkey publishes prices (49 USD a month Production); Kong's overview page does not. Agent builder: Portkey's per-user tool provisioning maps well to agents acting for many users.
The sourced difference
Portkey's MCP Gateway provisions tools per user and logs each call with parameters; Kong turns existing APIs into MCP tools and applies OAuth2 strategies, with OpenTelemetry across AI, MCP and A2A. (Portkey: Portkey MCP Gateway docs, read 5 November 2026; Kong AI Gateway: Kong AI Gateway docs, read 5 November 2026)
Verdicts by reader
| Reader | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Product engineer | Kong suits teams that already run Kong for APIs. |
| Developer-platform lead | Portkey publishes prices (49 USD a month Production); Kong's overview page does not. |
| Agent builder | Portkey's per-user tool provisioning maps well to agents acting for many users. |
Side by side on the rubric
| Dimension | Portkey | Kong AI Gateway |
|---|---|---|
| Protocols fronted | model APIs and MCP | model APIs, MCP, A2A |
| Auth passthrough | credential injection | OAuth2 auth strategies |
| Caching | simple cache, 1-day TTL on Developer | semantic cache |
| Pricing | free / 49 USD / custom | not published on the docs page |
| Observability | per tool call logs | OpenTelemetry, Konnect dashboards, audit logs |
Evidence for every cell is on the profiles: Portkey and Kong AI Gateway.