Alternatives to Vercel AI Gateway
Vercel AI Gateway has 3 alternatives on this directory's rubric: Cloudflare AI Gateway, Portkey, Kong AI Gateway. Each entry below states one difference between it and Vercel AI Gateway, with the evidence and a source link. Vercel AI Gateway is operated by Vercel.
The 3 alternatives
Cloudflare AI Gateway
A proxy in front of model providers with free caching, rate limiting and analytics, optional Unified Billing, and from 3 Nov 2026 required authentication on new gateways.
Difference on protocols fronted: Cloudflare AI Gateway reads "model APIs; MCP goes through portals" (source, 4 November 2026); Vercel AI Gateway reads "model APIs" (source, 4 November 2026). MCP traffic is fronted by MCP server portals, a separate product.
Cloudflare AI Gateway profile, Cloudflare AI Gateway vs Vercel AI Gateway
Portkey
An AI gateway with an MCP Gateway that checks the caller, injects upstream credentials, provisions tools per user and logs every tool call; now sold as Prisma AIRS AI Gateway.
Difference on protocols fronted: Portkey reads "model APIs and MCP" (source, 4 November 2026); Vercel AI Gateway reads "model APIs" (source, 4 November 2026). MCP Gateway and Registry.
Kong AI Gateway
Kong's AI Gateway 2.x adds an AI MCP Server entity that turns existing APIs into MCP tools, OAuth2 auth strategies for tool calls, semantic caching and OpenTelemetry for MCP and A2A traffic.
Difference on protocols fronted: Kong AI Gateway reads "model APIs, MCP, A2A" (source, 4 November 2026); Vercel AI Gateway reads "model APIs" (source, 4 November 2026). OpenTelemetry covers all three.