Hive Router

The open-source GraphQL Federation router written in Rust. Serve your supergraph with native performance.

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Benchmark figures are from our open Federation gateway benchmark on a 4 vCPU Azure VM with 50 virtual users. Rerun it yourself: every gateway, query and subgraph is in the repository.

Why Hive Router

Everything a production federation router needs, in one binary, with no license tiers.

Built in Rust, no garbage collection
Arena allocation, zero-copy JSON and no garbage collector. Latency stays flat under load.
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Full Apollo Federation compatibility
Point it at your existing supergraph. Every release is checked against our open Federation audit, including @defer, @stream and progressive overrides.
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Observability built in
OpenTelemetry traces, Prometheus metrics, structured logs and health probes. Send them to Hive Console, Grafana, Datadog or any compatible backend.
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Security at the edge of your graph
JWT authentication, authorization directives, demand control, persisted documents, CSRF and CORS protection. One YAML file configures all of it.
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Federated subscriptions
Real-time data over Server-Sent Events, WebSockets or multipart HTTP. Entities are resolved across subgraphs for subscription events too.
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Works with any registry
Load the supergraph from a file, Hive Console or Apollo GraphOS and reload it on change. Hive Console is optional.
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From zero to a running supergraph in three steps

No runtime to install, nothing to compile. Bring a supergraph schema and the router serves it on port 4000, with a GraphQL IDE included.

Full getting started guide
  1. 1

    Install

    Downloads the binary for Linux or macOS. For containers, pull ghcr.io/graphql-hive/router.

    curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/graphql-hive/router/main/install.sh | sh
  2. 2

    Point it at your supergraph

    This is the whole config for a local file. Hive Console and Apollo GraphOS work as sources too.

    supergraph:
  source: file
  path: ./supergraph.graphql
  3. 3

    Run it

    Serves your supergraph on port 4000.

    ./hive_router

Federation-Compatible Gateway Benchmarks

See the results of our open-source audit for Apollo Federation Gateways.

Learn how Hive Router performs against other gateways in terms of correctness and compliance with the Apollo Federation specification

Learn about our audit and methodology
GatewayName and variantCompatibilityPass rate of test casesTest CasesAll available test casesTest SuitesTest cases grouped by feature
Hive Router
100.00% 199 46
Hot Chocolate Fusion
100.00% 199 46
Hive Gateway
98.99% 197 2 45 1
Hive Gateway (Rust QP)
98.49% 196 3 44 2
Apollo Router
97.49% 194 5 43 3
Apollo Gateway
96.98% 193 6 42 4
Cosmo Router
91.96% 183 16 37 9
Grafbase Gateway
90.45% 180 19 39 7
Passed tests
Failed tests
Perfect compatibility
75% and higher
Less than 75%

Make it yours

Extend the router, lock down what runs through it and keep your subgraphs safe.

  • Rust Plugin System

    Plugins written in Rust and compiled into the router, with hooks into the HTTP, GraphQL, query planning and execution stages.

    Documentation

  • Coprocessors

    External HTTP services in any language. The router calls them at the same stages, no Rust required.

    Documentation

  • Persisted Documents

    Only run operations registered in Hive Console, a file or your own storage. Everything else is rejected before planning.

    Documentation

  • Demand Control

    Reject operations over a cost, depth or alias budget before they run, so one expensive query cannot take your subgraphs down.

    Documentation

Explore Hive 360° GraphQL Ecosystem to reach full potential

Learn more

Frequently Asked Questions

Hive Router or Hive Gateway, which one should I pick?

Both are open source and actively maintained. Hive Router is written in Rust for high throughput and low resource usage. Hive Gateway is written in TypeScript and runs on Node.js and other (serverless) JavaScript runtimes. Gateway provides more flexibility for teams that are already familiar with TypeScript. Both can serve a supergraph from a local file or a schema registry, such as Hive Console.

Can I replace Apollo Router without changing my subgraphs?

Yes. Hive Router consumes a standard Apollo Federation supergraph, so you keep your subgraphs and your composition pipeline and only swap the binary, while re-using your existing supergraph from a local file or even GraphOS. See the compatibility overview for the directives and features covered, and the getting started guide.

Does Hive Router support GraphQL subscriptions?

Yes. Federated subscriptions are built in, over Server-Sent Events, WebSockets or multipart HTTP. The protocol between the router and each subgraph can be configured individually. Read more.

How do I extend the router?

There are two ways to extend Hive Router. Plugins are written in Rust and compiled into the router. Coprocessors are external HTTP services in any language that the router calls. Both support hooking into the HTTP, GraphQL, query planning and execution stages of a request.

How does Hive Router integrate with my monitoring stack?

It emits OpenTelemetry traces and Prometheus metrics, which you can send to Hive Console or any compatible backend, such as Datadog or Grafana, alongside structured logs, health and readiness probes. Furthermore, schema usage metrics can be sent to a schema registry such as Hive Console or GraphOS. Read more.

Do I need Hive Console to use Hive Router?

No. Hive Router is a standalone binary that can load a supergraph file and other sources such as Hive Console or Apollo GraphOS. Using Hive Console is fully optional and provides additional features such as a place to manage your supergraph, publish persisted documents and collect metrics. Read more.

Are all Hive Router features open source?

Yes. Hive Router is MIT licensed. Every feature ships in the same binary, with no license tiers. Read more.

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