Higress
What it is
Open-source cloud-native API gateway built on Istio and Envoy, extended with Wasm plugins (Go, Rust, JS). The README describes AI gateway functions: unified access to mainstream LLM providers, observability, multi-model load balancing, token rate limiting and caching, plus hosting of MCP servers; an openapi-to-mcp tool converts OpenAPI specs into remote MCP servers.
Maker and licence
Started inside Alibaba (per the README) and now a CNCF Sandbox project. Licence: Apache-2.0 (GitHub). Repo github.com/higress-group/higress (alibaba/higress redirects there): 9,500 stars and latest release v2.2.5 (2026-10-04) on 2026-10-08. A commercial Alibaba Cloud AI Gateway is listed as the managed edition. See Alibaba.
Position
API gateway with MCP and LLM gateway (also usable as Kubernetes ingress and microservice gateway).
Capabilities
LLM provider routing; MCP gateway for tool-call governance with MCP proxying and translation; an MCP market on the project site; WAF and authentication plugins; service discovery from Nacos, Consul and similar registries.
MCP spec support
The project site news item mentions support for the “MCP 2026-07-28” revision; I did not open the underlying docs.
Maturity
CNCF Sandbox status (README and site, 2026-10-08).
Fit and limits (opinion)
Fits teams already on Envoy/Istio or in the Alibaba ecosystem wanting plugins in Wasm; the plugin model is more work than a purpose-built agent proxy.
Pricing
Open source; commercial edition priced via Alibaba Cloud (link the vendor page).
Self-learning
Related
- agentgateway, Portkey, Arcade MCP gateway, OmniRoute, MCP security with a gateway, Model Context Protocol
Sources
- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/higress-group/higress/main/README.md (2026-10-08)
- https://higress.ai/en/ (2026-10-08)
- GitHub API for higress-group/higress (licence, stars, release) (2026-10-08)
Open items
- MCP revision support is taken from a site news item, not verified in docs.