Kong Inc. today announced a big update to its popular application programming interface connectivity platform, delivering big improvements in both latency and throughput, resulting in faster speeds and higher capacity for users.

Kong Enterprise 2.7 is a connectivity platform that connects APIs and microservices natively across and within clouds, Kubernetes, data centers and more using intelligent automation.

APIs are the preferred method of exposing data and services when building microservices-based apps in software containers that can be extended across different computing environments. They’re used to connect different services, making it possible, for example, to book a flight using an app and have that reservation appear automatically in Google Calendar.

With today’s update, Kong is claiming a 25% performance increase for API connections. It said tests by GigaOm show Kong Enterprise 2.7 is capable of 52,250 transactions per second with a 100% success rate, up from 40,625 TPS with the previous edition of its platform. Notably, Kong said, that’s also 2,886% faster than Google LLC’s Apigee X API management service.

Kong said latency is an important consideration for application developers because every millisecond dropped leads to a reduction in conversion rates and consequently, a drop in sales. By reducing latency, applications become faster, allowing companies to deliver superior experiences for their customers.

In addition to the performance increases, Kong Enterprise 2.7 delivers improvements including simplified management capabilities and streamlined workflows to maximize API operations and increase developer productivity, Kong said.

For instance, developers can now use Kong to create groups or tiers of API consumers and apply different traffic policies. That should make it simpler for developers to manage traffic flow among hundreds or even thousands of APIs and microservices, Kong said. It’s also now possible to create actions and automated workflows based on events in Kong, so if a certain type of error code is returned, a Slack message can be sent to the appropriate developer to look into it.

Finally, Kong is introducing a new OpenID Connect configuration wizard to simplify the process of initial setup with its platform.

Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. told SiliconANGLE that APIs are essential for modern application connectivity, so enterprises need powerful platforms to manage them. “It’s good to see Kong making progress here in the area of performance,” he said. “That makes APIs easier to use, improving the customer and employee experience with any application.”

“Kong is focused on delivering the technology innovations that matter to our customers,” said Kong Vice President of Product Reza Shafii. “That means API connectivity solutions that are highly performant, offer better security and more automation, and provide the ability for customers to work seamlessly across platforms and software architectures.”

Image: Kong