Is it recommended to use Azure API Management Service for exposing APIs

Question

I am planning to expose an API to an external customer. The API is very simple and could be exposed via Azure Functions. The scale is extremely low (number of users is less than 10).

Are there any downsides of exposing the API directly from Azure Functions instead of a using an API management layer? Is API Management Service recommended for this implementation?

Answer 1

Azure API Management offers additional capabilities out of the box primarily for rate limiting, security and caching.

As long as you've met the security requirements for your API in your code in Azure Functions then the risk is simply your API being overused or attacked. APIM's rate limiting capability would stop the traffic from reaching your API. The other consequence of Azure Functions receiving too much traffic is that on the consumption plan your bill will be directly affected.

API Management does generally feature in reference architectures when exposing API's for the reasons mentioned.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/api-management/api-management-features