Envoy Gateway Has a Free API: Kubernetes-Native API Gateway Built on Envoy Proxy

Envoy Gateway is an open-source project for managing Envoy Proxy as a standalone or Kubernetes-native API gateway. It implements the Kubernetes Gateway API, providing a standardized way to expose services.

What Is Envoy Gateway?

Envoy Gateway simplifies Envoy Proxy configuration for API gateway use cases. Instead of writing complex Envoy configs, you use Kubernetes Gateway API resources (Gateway, HTTPRoute, GRPCRoute) that Envoy Gateway translates to Envoy configuration.

Key Features:

• Kubernetes Gateway API implementation
• Automatic TLS certificate management
• Rate limiting
• Authentication (JWT, OIDC, basic auth)
• Traffic splitting for canary deployments
• Request/response transformation
• Circuit breaking
• WebSocket and gRPC support

Installation

# Install via Helm
helm install eg oci://docker.io/envoyproxy/gateway-helm \
  --version v1.2.0 -n envoy-gateway-system --create-namespace

# Wait for ready
kubectl wait --timeout=5m -n envoy-gateway-system deployment/envoy-gateway \
  --for=condition=Available

Create a Gateway

# Gateway Class (created by Envoy Gateway)
apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: GatewayClass
metadata:
  name: eg
spec:
  controllerName: gateway.envoyproxy.io/gatewayclass-controller
---
# Gateway instance
apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Gateway
metadata:
  name: production
  namespace: default
spec:
  gatewayClassName: eg
  listeners:
    - name: http
      port: 80
      protocol: HTTP
    - name: https
      port: 443
      protocol: HTTPS
      tls:
        mode: Terminate
        certificateRefs:
          - name: tls-cert

Route Traffic

# Simple HTTP route
apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: HTTPRoute
metadata:
  name: api-routes
spec:
  parentRefs:
    - name: production
  hostnames:
    - "api.example.com"
  rules:
    - matches:
        - path:
            type: PathPrefix
            value: /v1/users
      backendRefs:
        - name: user-service
          port: 8080
    - matches:
        - path:
            type: PathPrefix
            value: /v1/orders
      backendRefs:
        - name: order-service
          port: 8080
---
# Canary deployment with traffic splitting
apiVersion: gateway.networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: HTTPRoute
metadata:
  name: canary-route
spec:
  parentRefs:
    - name: production
  rules:
    - backendRefs:
        - name: app-v1
          port: 8080
          weight: 90
        - name: app-v2
          port: 8080
          weight: 10

Rate Limiting

apiVersion: gateway.envoyproxy.io/v1alpha1
kind: BackendTrafficPolicy
metadata:
  name: rate-limit
spec:
  targetRefs:
    - group: gateway.networking.k8s.io
      kind: HTTPRoute
      name: api-routes
  rateLimit:
    type: Global
    global:
      rules:
        - clientSelectors:
            - headers:
                - name: x-api-key
                  type: Distinct
          limit:
            requests: 100
            unit: Minute

Programmatic Access

from kubernetes import client, config

config.load_kube_config()
custom = client.CustomObjectsApi()

# List all HTTPRoutes
routes = custom.list_namespaced_custom_object(
    group="gateway.networking.k8s.io",
    version="v1",
    namespace="default",
    plural="httproutes"
)
for route in routes["items"]:
    print(f"Route: {route['metadata']['name']}")
    for rule in route["spec"].get("rules", []):
        for backend in rule.get("backendRefs", []):
            print(f"  -> {backend['name']}:{backend['port']} (weight: {backend.get('weight', 1)})")

# List Gateways
gateways = custom.list_namespaced_custom_object(
    group="gateway.networking.k8s.io",
    version="v1",
    namespace="default",
    plural="gateways"
)
for gw in gateways["items"]:
    for listener in gw["spec"]["listeners"]:
        print(f"Gateway: {gw['metadata']['name']}, Listener: {listener['name']}:{listener['port']}")

Resources

• Envoy Gateway Docs
• Envoy Gateway GitHub — 1.5K+ stars
• Kubernetes Gateway API

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