What is an AI gateway? LLM routing, proxies and marketplaces
Understand AI gateways, LLM routing and model marketplaces. Compare TokenRex, OpenRouter, LiteLLM and Portkey by documented role, model selection and billing responsibility.
Documented gateway roles compared
| Product | Role | Model selection | Billing responsibility |
|---|---|---|---|
| TokenRex | Hosted LLM marketplace with unified API access | Caller supplies an exact enabled model ID; automatic failover is not advertised | TokenRex prepaid INR wallet; live model usage rates |
| OpenRouter | Hosted multi-model API | Documented provider order, allow/deny lists, sorting and model fallbacks | Review OpenRouter's current account and pricing terms; no static competitor price quoted |
| LiteLLM | Library and configurable proxy/router | Documented deployment load balancing, retries, cooldowns and fallbacks | Provider/deployment credentials and operating costs must be planned separately |
| Portkey | Configurable AI gateway | Documented fallbacks and conditional routing; verify the chosen configuration | Review current gateway plan and model-provider costs separately |
Roles summarized from the linked first-party documentation, reviewed October 22, 2026. Not an exhaustive feature matrix or a measured performance ranking.
The short answer
An AI gateway is an intermediary between an application and model services. Depending on the product, it may translate API formats, authenticate requests, route traffic, meter usage or apply operational policies. A gateway name alone does not establish support for fallbacks, caching or every provider endpoint.
TokenRex is an LLM marketplace by Asirex Labs, offering unified API access to enabled AI models with usage-based pricing. Your application sends an exact model ID; TokenRex handles access, wallet charges and usage recording for the supported interface.
Gateway, router, proxy and marketplace are different roles
A proxy forwards a request. A gateway adds a managed entry point and policies. A router chooses among deployments or models according to explicit rules. A marketplace makes models discoverable and purchasable through a common account. One product may perform several roles, but the terms are not interchangeable guarantees.
A useful evaluation starts with the problem: do you need one paid account for several models, or do you already have provider credentials and need a configurable traffic layer? Compare those responsibilities before comparing per-token prices.
How explicit model selection works on TokenRex
Select an enabled short ID from Models & Pricing, send it with messages to the OpenAI-compatible Chat Completions endpoint and inspect the response and recorded usage. Claude also has an Anthropic-format Messages route. Google-native generateContent and a public Responses endpoint are not assumed interfaces; built-in web search is available on GPT, Claude and Gemini chat models when a request turns it on.
Choosing a smaller model for easy tasks can be an application policy. It is not a claim that TokenRex automatically classifies prompts or silently selects a cheaper model. No automatic model failover, cheapest-provider search or semantic answer cache is advertised here.
Cost, latency and reliability trade-offs
Price routing considers current rates; latency routing considers observed service times; load balancing distributes traffic; fallback routing makes another attempt when an eligible failure occurs. OpenRouter, LiteLLM and Portkey document different controls for these operations in the linked sources.
Switching models can change quality, tool behavior, token usage and data handling. A fallback is not merely a free retry. Define acceptable replacement models, maximum attempts and cost limits in your application, and never replay a consequential tool action without checking its outcome.
Evaluate a gateway with a representative workload
Use the same test inputs and expected output criteria across products. Check exact model identity, message formats, tools, stream handling, response quality and recorded usage. A successful HTTP response alone is not proof that an agent, vision input or native SDK feature works.
Measure complete tasks rather than a single cheap prompt. Include growing history, reasoning output, additional requests and your own external services. Review terms and privacy policies for each service and provider instead of inferring retention or compliance from the gateway label.
India billing and international access
TokenRex uses a prepaid INR wallet and Razorpay checkout with a ₹1 minimum. Prices display in USD by default; a signed-in display-currency choice does not change INR settlement. The billing conversion is ₹96 per dollar and no GST surcharge is added.
These are billing differences, not claims of India-only hosting or lower latency. Payment-method availability depends on the configured checkout and eligibility. Start with a small confirmed payment and request before budgeting production usage.
Search and AI discovery: what the evidence actually says
Google states that standard SEO practices apply to AI Overviews and AI Mode, with no additional special optimization requirement. Accessible content, meaningful internal links, accurate page identity and useful answers matter; no schema or keywords tag guarantees selection.
Bing's AI Performance reporting describes citations and cited URLs in supported AI experiences, not a promise of answer placement. A public sitemap and crawler access make discovery possible, but neither llms.txt nor robots permissions force a service to crawl, index or cite a page.
Sources
Questions
- Does TokenRex automatically route to the cheapest model?
- No such feature is advertised. Your application selects an exact enabled model ID and can implement its own explicit selection policy.
- Can I replace every provider-native endpoint with a gateway?
- No. Compatibility is endpoint- and model-specific. Check the supported interface, especially Responses, hosted tools, native media uploads and agent-specific protocols.
- Will these pages guarantee Google or Bing AI citations?
- No. Crawling, indexing, ranking and AI citations are separate choices made by each service.