I almost rage-quit my own side project last month because I spent 14 hours fighting AWS API Gateway just to validate a single API key.
Actually, I didn't quit. I just got so unbelievably frustrated with the extortionate pricing and miserable UX of modern API tools that I rage-built my own Gateway in Go instead.
If you've ever built a public-facing API, you already know the nightmare. You write your core business logic in a weekend, and then hit a massive brick wall.
When you look at the existing solutions to protect your API, they are universally painful:
❌ AWS API Gateway: The pricing is extortionate if you actually get traffic. Plus, the AWS Console UX is a nightmare, and setting up simple API key validation requires digging through IAM roles and CloudWatch just to see basic logs.
❌ Kong / Tyk: Incredibly powerful, but completely enterprise-bloated. You need a PhD in Lua and YAML just to configure a basic route. It's massive overkill for 99% of projects.
❌ DIY (Express/FastAPI middleware): You end up re-inventing the wheel every single time. It's slow under heavy load, and building a UI to manage your users' API keys is a miserable distraction from building your actual product.
I got sick of choosing between "expensive," "bloated," or "DIY," so I built Relay.
Why you should switch to Relay
Relay is a lightweight, open-source API infrastructure layer. It sits right in front of your actual backend and handles all the annoying stuff automatically.
Here is why it actually beats the alternatives:
✅ Sub-millisecond latency: The core gateway is written purely in Go. It uses Goroutines to handle thousands of concurrent requests with almost zero overhead. It blows Node.js proxies out of the water.
✅ Instant API Keys & Auth: No writing database lookups in your app. Relay intercepts the request, validates the key in-memory, and forwards the clean request to your API.
✅ Built-in Redis Rate Limiting: Enforce sliding-window rate limits globally or per user without writing a single line of Redis logic yourself.
✅ A Gorgeous Control Plane: Instead of crying over AWS CloudWatch logs, Relay comes with a sleek Next.js dashboard. You can generate keys, revoke access, and see real-time analytics instantly.
Take it for a spin
Relay is completely open-source, but if you want to skip the deployment headache, I've got a fully managed cloud version you can use right away.
If you're building an API and don't want to deal with auth, rate limits, or AWS bills, you can start using Relay right now for free.
🔗 Start using Relay: https://relayapicloud.vercel.app/
🐙 GitHub Repo: https://github.com/mohitdebian/relay
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