# Portkey alternatives: what AI models name instead, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition. 129 of the 252 answers in the 1 category where Portkey holds a standing named it neither first nor as an alternative; these are the first choices those answers made. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/vendors/portkey/alternatives/

## Named instead, most often (every category and segment added)

- LiteLLM: 25
- Bifrost: 11
- OpenRouter: 10
- Cloudflare AI Gateway: 6
- Helicone: 3
- Apache APISIX: 2

## LLM gateways and observability

**Small business**: 36 of 84 answers did not name Portkey (Portkey is #2 of 7 at 28%).

- LiteLLM: first choice in 8 of those 36
- OpenRouter: first choice in 8 of those 36
- Cloudflare AI Gateway: first choice in 4 of those 36
- Bifrost: first choice in 1 of those 36
- FreeLLMAPI: first choice in 1 of those 36
- Helicone: first choice in 1 of those 36
- LiteLLM self-hosted OSS: first choice in 1 of those 36
- Vercel AI Gateway: first choice in 1 of those 36

**Mid-market**: 46 of 84 answers did not name Portkey (Portkey is #2 of 8 at 31%).

- LiteLLM: first choice in 11 of those 46
- Bifrost: first choice in 2 of those 46
- Cloudflare AI Gateway: first choice in 2 of those 46
- Helicone: first choice in 2 of those 46
- OpenRouter: first choice in 2 of those 46
- Portkey AI Gateway: first choice in 2 of those 46
- Apache APISIX: first choice in 1 of those 46
- Gateway-LLM: first choice in 1 of those 46

**Enterprise**: 47 of 84 answers did not name Portkey (Portkey is #1 of 8 at 26%).

- Bifrost: first choice in 8 of those 47
- LiteLLM: first choice in 6 of those 47
- Kong AI Gateway: first choice in 2 of those 47
- LLM Gateway: first choice in 2 of those 47
- Tetrate Agent Router Enterprise: first choice in 2 of those 47
- Apache APISIX: first choice in 1 of those 47
- Arize AX: first choice in 1 of those 47
- Azure API Management AI Gateway: first choice in 1 of those 47

Published under CC BY 4.0. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.