Contributed by Composio.
An MCP gateway puts a shared access layer between AI agents and MCP servers. It routes tool calls and centralizes credentials, permissions, and activity logs.
It also differs from an API gateway, which is designed primarily for conventional HTTP or gRPC services, and an LLM gateway, which manages requests sent to model providers. An MCP gateway specifically understands and governs agent to tool communication over MCP.
“MCP gateway” is an architectural term, not a required role in the core MCP specification. It becomes particularly useful when an organization has multiple agents, users, or MCP servers and needs one place to manage security, credentials, policies, and observability.
Why MCP gateways are needed
Credential sprawl
Direct connections often distribute OAuth tokens, API keys, and service credentials across developer machines, agent configurations, and deployment environments. This makes secrets harder to rotate, revoke, and audit. It can also lead teams to reuse powerful service accounts because implementing per user authentication for every connection is inconvenient.
An MCP gateway centralizes credential handling. Agents authenticate with the gateway, which then selects or injects the appropriate upstream credentials. Sensitive credentials do not need to be exposed directly to every agent.
Granular permissions
Giving an agent access to an MCP server can unintentionally expose every tool that server offers. A support agent that only needs to read customer records might also get tools to update or delete them.
Prompt instructions such as “never delete a customer” are not reliable security controls. Enforce permissions outside the model, before the tool executes.
An MCP gateway can apply access policies at the user, agent, server, or individual tool level. For example:
- A research agent can search documents but cannot modify them.
- A support agent can read customer records but cannot issue refunds.
- A finance agent can prepare a payment but requires human approval to submit it.
- A development agent can read production logs but cannot change production infrastructure.
Centralized governance
The gateway replaces many independently managed connections with one controlled access layer:
Centralized MCP access
With a gateway
Agents → MCP gateway → Approved MCP servers
→ Scoped tools
→ Managed credentials
→ Audit logsThis gives security and platform teams one place to manage authentication, permissions, approvals, rate limits, and audit records. It also gives developers a consistent endpoint through which agents can discover and call approved tools.
An MCP gateway therefore becomes valuable when MCP expands beyond a local prototype. It reduces connection and credential sprawl while ensuring that every agent receives only the capabilities it actually needs.
Why we created this list
The MCP gateway market is expanding quickly, but the available products are not easy to compare. The term “MCP gateway” now covers everything from hosted integration platforms and enterprise security layers to open source proxies and local container runtimes.
These products solve different versions of the same underlying problem. Some help agents connect to hundreds of external applications, while others focus on access control, credential management, observability, or secure MCP server execution. A gateway designed for individual developers may therefore be unsuitable for a large enterprise and vice versa.
How we compared MCP gateways
This comparison covers the following areas:
- Hosting and deployment model
- Managed integrations and custom server support
- OAuth and credential management
- Permissions for users, agents, and individual tools
- Approval workflows and security guardrails
- Logging, monitoring, and audit trails
- MCP protocol and transport compatibility
- Private network connectivity
- Developer experience and operational complexity
Best MCP gateways at a glance
The products in this list represent six different approaches to MCP gateway infrastructure:
| MCP gateway | Deployment model | Best for | Main differentiator | Important limitation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Composio | Managed cloud, customer VPC, or fully self hosted | Agents that use business applications | Combines a gateway with managed authentication, hosted integrations, tool discovery, and execution across 1500+ apps | Most valuable when using Composio’s managed tool ecosystem. |
| Cloudflare MCP Server Portals | Managed cloud | Zero Trust access and data protection | Aggregates servers behind one endpoint with identity policies, per user OAuth, tool curation, logging, DLP, and context optimization. | Supports remote HTTP servers; stdio only servers must first be exposed through HTTP. |
| Portkey MCP Gateway | Managed cloud | Vendor neutral MCP governance | Centralizes credentials, access policies, tool provisioning, rate limits, guardrails, approvals, and audit logs. | Introduces dependency on a commercial control layer. |
| Kong MCP Gateway | Managed or hybrid | Existing enterprise API platforms | Governs MCP, model, and agent traffic using authentication, traffic policies, access controls, and OpenTelemetry observability. | Broader and operationally heavier than a dedicated MCP only gateway. |
| IBM ContextForge | Open source and self hosted | Customizable enterprise deployments | Provides an extensible gateway and registry with identity propagation, plugins, guardrails, multiple protocols, and Kubernetes support. | Requires the organization to deploy, secure, and maintain it. |
| Docker MCP Gateway | Local or self hosted | Development environments and coding agents | Runs MCP servers in isolated containers with profiles, secret controls, network restrictions, and selective tool exposure. | Does not provide the same organization wide governance as an enterprise managed platform. |
These gateways are not direct substitutes. The right choice depends on whether the priority is ready made integrations, enterprise identity, security inspection, centralized governance, infrastructure control, or local execution.
Best enterprise MCP gateway platforms
1. Composio MCP gateway: Best overall MCP gateway with managed integrations
Composio combines an MCP gateway with managed authentication and tool execution across more than 1,500 application toolkits. It’s more than a proxy to internal MCP servers. Composio is well suited to agents that need to work with services such as Gmail, Slack, GitHub, Salesforce, and Notion without requiring developers to build and maintain every integration.
Composio uses per user Sessions that scope tool access, authentication, connected accounts, and execution state. Each Session can provide a hosted MCP endpoint for compatible clients. Its authentication layer supports OAuth 2.0, API keys, bearer tokens, and Basic authentication, with automatic token refresh for managed OAuth connections. Learn about Composio Sessions and managed authentication.
Key capabilities include:
- Managed application integrations and OAuth
- Restrictions for toolkits and individual tools
- Dynamic tool discovery to reduce context usage
- SAML/OIDC SSO with Okta and Microsoft Entra ID, plus SCIM provisioning
- Execution logs and SIEM export
- Support for custom remote MCP servers
- Composio Cloud, customer VPC, and fully self hosted deployments
There are some limitations. Sessions can discover the full toolkit catalog by default, so production deployments should configure explicit tool and toolkit restrictions.
Composio offers Free, usage based Pro, and custom Enterprise plans. View current pricing.
Choose Composio if: you need a gateway that also handles integrations, per user credentials, and tool execution. It is particularly suitable for multi user agents that must connect to many SaaS applications, manage OAuth at scale, and enforce scoped access without maintaining each integration internally
2. Cloudflare MCP Server Portals: Best for Zero Trust security
Cloudflare MCP Server Portals place multiple remote MCP servers behind a single managed endpoint. They are a strong choice for organizations already using Cloudflare Access and wanting identity based access policies, per user OAuth, activity logging, and data loss prevention.
Cloudflare supports current and earlier Streamable HTTP MCP clients, while upstream servers can use Streamable HTTP or legacy SSE. Users authenticate through Cloudflare Access, and autonomous agents can connect using service tokens.
Key capabilities include:
- One endpoint for multiple MCP servers
- Identity based Access policies
- Per user or shared upstream credentials
- Tool and prompt allowlists
- Tool aliases and description overrides
- Tool call logging and analytics
- Optional routing through Cloudflare Gateway for DLP inspection
- Context optimization and Code Mode for large tool catalogs
- Dashboard, API, and Terraform management
Cloudflare is primarily a security and aggregation layer, it does not provide Composio style managed application implementations. Organizations must supply compatible remote MCP servers.
Important limitations include the lack of direct stdio support; local servers must first be exposed over HTTP. Tools and prompts are available by default when a server is added, so administrators should configure explicit allowlists. Each portal supports up to 80 servers under the default Cloudflare account limits.
Choose Cloudflare if: you already use Cloudflare Zero Trust or need centralized MCP access with identity policies, logging, DLP, and remote server aggregation. It is less suitable when you need ready made SaaS integrations or native support for local stdio servers.
3. Portkey MCP Gateway: Best for vendor neutral governance
Portkey MCP Gateway is a managed proxy and control layer for external, internal, and public MCP servers. It is well suited to organizations that already operate MCP servers but want centralized authentication, credential management, access control, and observability.
Portkey separates authentication into two layers. Agents authenticate to Portkey using API keys, OAuth 2.1, or an external identity provider. Portkey then authenticates to upstream MCP servers using per user OAuth, client credentials, or custom headers. Upstream credentials remain hidden from the agent. See Portkey’s MCP authentication architecture.
Key capabilities include:
- Central MCP server registry
- Managed OAuth and token refresh
- External identity provider integration
- Authorization at workspace and server level
- Tool, prompt, and resource provisioning
- User identity and request header forwarding
- Automatic tool call logging
- Integration with Portkey’s wider AI Gateway
- Managed and self hosted deployment options
Portkey’s MCP Registry lets administrators disable individual capabilities at the organization or workspace level.
Internal servers must support MCP over Streamable HTTP and be reachable by the gateway; stdio servers need to be exposed through HTTP first. Portkey records tool parameters and full responses by default, so organizations handling sensitive data should review log access and retention settings. Review Portkey’s MCP observability behavior.
Choose Portkey if: you want a vendor neutral control layer for MCP servers and may also use Portkey to govern model traffic. It is less compelling if you need a large catalog of vendor maintained application integrations rather than governance for servers you already operate.
4. Kong AI Gateway: Best for existing Kong API platform teams
Kong AI allows organizations to secure, govern, and observe MCP traffic using the same infrastructure they use for conventional APIs, models, and agents.
Kong can proxy existing MCP servers, convert REST APIs into MCP tools, and aggregate tools from multiple sources behind one endpoint. Authentication supports API keys and OpenID Connect, while ACLs can restrict access at both the server and individual tool level.
Key capabilities include:
- Existing MCP server proxying
- REST to MCP conversion
- Multi server tool aggregation
- API key and OpenID Connect authentication
- ACLs for servers and individual tools
- Rate limiting and traffic transformation
- MCP session management
- Logging and OpenTelemetry metrics
- Central MCP server catalog
Kong’s current AI Gateway architecture uses a Konnect managed control plane with customer operated data planes. Organizations can also configure MCP capabilities on premises using Kong Gateway plugins, although the on premises model differs and does not support every Konnect capability.
One limitation is that LLM specific policies, such as prompt guards and model routing, do not apply to MCP calls. Kong treats MCP traffic as API level traffic, so standard authentication, ACL, rate limiting, transformation, and logging policies apply instead.
Choose Kong if: your organization already uses Kong or wants to govern MCP traffic alongside APIs, models, and agents. It may be too operationally heavy for teams that only need a lightweight MCP proxy.
5. IBM ContextForge: Best open source enterprise gateway
IBM ContextForge is an Apache licensed, self hosted gateway, registry, and proxy for MCP servers, A2A agents, and REST/gRPC APIs. It is best suited to organizations that want to control their infrastructure and customize the gateway’s authentication, policies, and integrations.
ContextForge can federate multiple servers and compose selected tools, resources, and prompts into virtual MCP servers. It also supports converting conventional REST and gRPC services into MCP compatible tools.
Key capabilities include:
- MCP server aggregation and federation
- Virtual servers with curated tools, prompts, and resources
- Translation from REST and gRPC to MCP
- Streamable HTTP, SSE, WebSocket, and stdio transports
- JWT, OIDC, SSO, and custom authentication
- Team based RBAC and token scoping
- Extensible policy and guardrail plugins
- OpenTelemetry tracing and Prometheus metrics
- Docker, Podman, Kubernetes, OpenShift, and cloud deployment
ContextForge uses a two layer permission model: token scopes determine which resources a user can see, while RBAC determines which actions they can perform. Review its RBAC documentation and observability options.
The main trade off is operational responsibility. Organizations must configure authentication, secrets, databases, caching, network controls, upgrades, and high availability. Protocol support varies by release. Support for the stateless protocol is described as preview work in the ContextForge roadmap.
Choose IBM ContextForge if: you need an extensible open source gateway that can run in your own infrastructure. Teams wanting a fully managed service with built in SaaS integrations may prefer Composio or another hosted platform. Explore ContextForge deployment options.
6. Docker MCP Gateway: Best for secure local execution
Docker MCP Gateway is an open source gateway that runs MCP servers in isolated containers and exposes them to AI clients through a centralized connection. It is particularly useful for developers and coding agents that need reproducible server environments without running MCP packages directly on the host.
The gateway manages server startup, routing, credentials, and lifecycle. Servers can be organized into profiles for different projects, while Docker’s catalog provides more than 300 packaged and verified MCP servers. Custom catalogs can include private server images and be shared through OCI compatible registries.
Key capabilities include:
- Isolated container execution
- Restricted CPU, memory, network, and filesystem access
- Profile based server and tool selection
- Local and remote MCP server support
- Centralized secrets and OAuth handling
- Tool call logging and tracing
- Signed images, provenance, and SBOM metadata
- Docker Desktop and standalone Docker Engine support
- Shareable profiles and custom catalogs
Docker applies secure runtime defaults: containerized servers receive limited resources and no host filesystem access unless explicitly granted. Credentials are stored inside the Docker Desktop VM rather than passed directly to every server. Review Docker MCP Toolkit security and its security FAQ.
The main limitation is enterprise governance. Organisation wide Cedar policies for server registration, tool calls, resources, prompts, and approvals are part of Docker AI Governance, which is currently invite only. These policies only govern traffic passing through Docker’s gateway; direct MCP connections require separate network controls.
Choose Docker if: you want to run MCP servers locally or on your own Docker infrastructure with strong container isolation. It is less suitable for teams seeking a fully managed cloud gateway with built in SaaS integrations and enterprise identity management.
How to choose the right MCP gateway
Do you need managed integrations or only gateway infrastructure?
- Managed integrations: Composio
- Existing MCP servers: Cloudflare, Portkey, or Kong
Where must the gateway run?
- Fully managed cloud: Composio, Cloudflare, Portkey
- Customer managed data plane: Kong
- Fully self hosted: Composio Enterprise, IBM ContextForge, Docker
How important is enterprise identity and governance?
- Zero Trust and DLP: Cloudflare
- MCP and LLM governance together: Portkey or Kong
- Customizable open source policies: IBM ContextForge
Do you need local MCP servers?
- Containerized local execution: Docker
- Protocol translation and federation: IBM ContextForge
- Cloud gateways generally require HTTP accessible servers
What level of operational responsibility can you accept?
- Minimal infrastructure management: Composio, Cloudflare, Portkey
- Hybrid management: Kong
- Full infrastructure ownership: IBM ContextForge or Docker
What should you test before choosing?
- Per user OAuth
- Tool level authorization
- Human approval support
- Protocol and transport compatibility
- Credential storage
- Log contents and retention
- Private network connectivity
- Pricing at expected tool call volume
Conclusion
The best MCP gateway depends on your infrastructure, security requirements, and operating model. Composio is the strong choice for managed integrations and per user authentication; Cloudflare for Zero Trust and DLP; Portkey for vendor neutral governance; Kong for established API platforms; IBM ContextForge for open source control; and Docker for isolated local execution.
Before choosing, test authentication, tool level permissions, protocol compatibility, logging, private connectivity, and cost at your expected scale. The right gateway should simplify integrations while ensuring every agent can access only the tools and data it needs.