16 years of experience with DataPower

Rating: 9 out of 10

January 2, 2026

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It has been used to address integration scenarios, security enhancements, and also for specific transformations in JSON format. This includes multiprotocol contexts such as MQ, HTTPS, and ephemeral SFTP.

Pros

Security
Integration protocols and services
Scalability
Policy enforcement
SLA monitoring
AAA
Transformation policies

Cons

API security
WAF improvements
Security improvements
REST support
Kafka support and event streaming

Likelihood to Recommend

Modern API Gateways have improved by adding stronger security, faster performance, better scalability. They are no longer just “traffic routers” but full-featured platforms that protect, monitor, and optimize APIs.

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology (5001-10,000 employees)

Vetted Review

16 years of experience

Best Enterprise Security Gateway for B2B Integrations

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

April 19, 2019

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We have been working on WebSphere DataPower Gateway for quite a long time now. In our project, we mostly use it as :

1) A Security Gateway
2) Make external API calls to clients outside the Intranet
3) Transformation of the complete message (or few elements of it)
4) Conversion of one message format into another(SOAP, JSON, MQ... )
4) Orchestration of different service results in into a single result

The Edge Security provided by DataPower including different Security mechanisms like AAA, SAML, and Kerberos is invaluable to the overall architecture and integration of the platform with other internal and external clients.

Pros

The foremost thing that we use DataPower is for implementing top-notch level security in different projects. We use it as a security gateway when some internal client or external client wants to make a call to any of our APIs. The basic security implementation which we do for the projects is SSL which can get more and more advanced based on the requirements of the project. Some clients want to implement OAuth, some want to implement SAML, and some are happy with a 2-way SSL handshake.
Another big advantage of DataPower is that it supports all the major industry message formats. It especially has an inbuilt component called the Multi-Protocol Gateway which comes installed in the box itself. It's the best thing if you want to convert an XML to JSON or vice-versa. It does all those conversions at wire-speed doesn't matter the volume of those transactions. We also use it with MQ while interacting with Mainframes and legacy systems. It supports all MQ properties and gives us the flexibility to change the message as well if required.
We have used DataPower in integration with ServiceNow as well to raise incidents and trigger emails to respective clients by writing custom scripts which continuously runs on the DataPower logs. As soon as they see any particular error for the services which are being monitored, they send an SNMP trap to ServiceNow with the error message and an incident is raised.

Cons

The old interface is being really missed by our team as the new WebUI interface is not that intuitive or easy to work with. It takes a lot of time to load. There should be an inbuilt wizard for creating a Rest service as well like there is for an XML based service.
IBM support is very knowledgeable but it's not that easy to reach them. They don't release the fix patches very soon which also becomes a big issue in certain situations where critical projects are involved.
Lastly, DataPower has its steep learning curve and it requires time and effort on your end to gain full control and make the most of the advanced features which it offers. Finding the right resource in the market is not that easy.

Likelihood to Recommend

WebSphere DataPower Gateway is really beneficial if you are trying to integrate two or more systems. It provides you with comfort and peace of mind by creating a DMZ zone for the services which are going out of the intranet to hit external clients APIs. It is greatly recommended if you have a very high volume service or API which is being used by a majority of clients because it has a dedicated physical box present which takes care of memory, CPU and all such stuff. So, all your transactions happen at wire-speed.

Verified User

Team Lead in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

Nothing better on the edge than DataPower

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

February 26, 2018

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

DataPower is used on the edge as a security device. It is used across the organisation and managed by the integration competency. DataPower is used to securely allow the sharing of data with external parties including cloud systems.

Pros

The most obvious thing that DataPower does exceptionally well is security. All the built-in supported security capabilities allow us to isolate most security tasks to DataPower and as a result "protect" down steam services/systems to have to deal with security.
DataPower is very good at protocol conversion and as it is usually used on the edge allows you to narrow down the protocols used between the companies public and private networks.
The appliance concept makes maintenance, recovery and, management so much simpler.

Cons

The fact that once an appliance reaches end-of-life it becomes a doorstop. A company made a big investment and knowing that in 5 to 9 years you will be left with nothing makes the deal not so appealing.

Likelihood to Recommend

On the edge this appliance is one of the best, if it's not the best. When it comes to complex any-to-any transformations and/or orchestrations there are much better tools for the job.

Amanda Erlank

Integration Architect in Information Technology at Woolworths (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

5 years of experience

View profile

Best Enterprise Security Gateway for B2B Integrations

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

April 19, 2019

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We have been working on WebSphere DataPower Gateway for quite a long time now. In our project, we mostly use it as :

1) A Security Gateway
2) Make external API calls to clients outside the Intranet
3) Transformation of the complete message (or few elements of it)
4) Conversion of one message format into another(SOAP, JSON, MQ... )
4) Orchestration of different service results in into a single result

Pros

The foremost thing that we use DataPower is for implementing top-notch level security in different projects. We use it as a security gateway when some internal client or external client wants to make a call to any of our APIs. The basic security implementation which we do for the projects is SSL which can get more and more advanced based on the requirements of the project. Some clients want to implement OAuth, some want to implement SAML, and some are happy with a 2-way SSL handshake.
Another big advantage of DataPower is that it supports all the major industry message formats. It especially has an inbuilt component called the Multi-Protocol Gateway which comes installed in the box itself. It's the best thing if you want to convert an XML to JSON or vice-versa. It does all those conversions at wire-speed doesn't matter the volume of those transactions. We also use it with MQ while interacting with Mainframes and legacy systems. It supports all MQ properties and gives us the flexibility to change the message as well if required.
We have used DataPower in integration with ServiceNow as well to raise incidents and trigger emails to respective clients by writing custom scripts which continuously runs on the DataPower logs. As soon as they see any particular error for the services which are being monitored, they send an SNMP trap to ServiceNow with the error message and an incident is raised.

Cons

The old interface is being really missed by our team as the new WebUI interface is not that intuitive or easy to work with. It takes a lot of time to load. There should be an inbuilt wizard for creating a Rest service as well like there is for an XML based service.
IBM support is very knowledgeable but it's not that easy to reach them. They don't release the fix patches very soon which also becomes a big issue in certain situations where critical projects are involved.
Lastly, DataPower has its steep learning curve and it requires time and effort on your end to gain full control and make the most of the advanced features which it offers. Finding the right resource in the market is not that easy.

Likelihood to Recommend

Verified User

Team Lead in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

IBM DataPower Gateway

Reviews

16 years of experience with DataPower

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend

Best Enterprise Security Gateway for B2B Integrations

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend

Nothing better on the edge than DataPower

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend

Reviews

16 years of experience with DataPower

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend

Best Enterprise Security Gateway for B2B Integrations

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend

Nothing better on the edge than DataPower

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Recommend