New Features in Apache APISIX 2.11.0: LDAP Authentication, Observability Plugins, Azure Functions, and WASM Support

Apache APISIX 2.11.0 is the first feature‑rich release after the 2.10.0 LTS version, adding new plugins and broader ecosystem support.

New Feature – LDAP Authentication Plugin

The ldap-auth plugin enables integration of LDAP accounts with APISIX consumers. Example configuration creates a consumer user01 and binds it to route 1, allowing LDAP credential verification.

curl http://127.0.0.1:9080/apisix/admin/consumers -H 'X-API-KEY: edd1c9f034335f136f87ad84b625c8f1' -X PUT -d '{
    "username": "user01",
    "plugins": {
        "ldap-auth": {
            "user_dn": "cn=user01,ou=users,dc=example,dc=org"
        }
    }
}'

curl http://127.0.0.1:9080/apisix/admin/routes/1 -H 'X-API-KEY: edd1c9f034335f136f87ad84b625c8f1' -X PUT -d '{
    "methods": ["GET"],
    "uri": "/hello",
    "plugins": {
        "ldap-auth": {
            "base_dn": "ou=users,dc=example,dc=org",
            "ldap_uri": "localhost:1389",
            "uid": "cn"
        }
    },
    "upstream": {
        "type": "roundrobin",
        "nodes": {
            "127.0.0.1:1980": 1
        }
    }
}'

When accessing route 1, the request is authenticated against LDAP using the bound user01 credentials.

$ curl -i -uuser01:password1 http://127.0.0.1:9080/hello
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
...
hello, world

Observability Enhancements

Two new plugins allow APISIX to report metrics and logs to external monitoring services:

datadog – sends metrics to Datadog.

skywalking-logger – sends access logs to Apache SkyWalking.

Example configuration for the Datadog plugin:

curl http://127.0.0.1:9080/apisix/admin/routes/1 -H 'X-API-KEY: edd1c9f034335f136f87ad84b625c8f1' -X PUT -d '{
    "plugins": {"datadog": {}},
    "upstream": {"type": "roundrobin", "nodes": {"127.0.0.1:1980": 1}},
    "uri": "/hello"
}'

Example configuration for the SkyWalking logger plugin:

curl http://127.0.0.1:9080/apisix/admin/routes/1 -H 'X-API-KEY: edd1c9f034335f136f87ad84b625c8f1' -X PUT -d '{
    "plugins": {"skywalking-logger": {"endpoint_addr": "http://127.0.0.1:12800"}},
    "upstream": {"type": "roundrobin", "nodes": {"127.0.0.1:1980": 1}},
    "uri": "/hello"
}'

Azure Functions Integration

The new azure-functions plugin lets APISIX forward HTTP requests to Azure Function‑as‑a‑Service endpoints. The following example binds the route /azure_HttpTrigger to a specific Azure Function URI.

curl http://127.0.0.1:9080/apisix/admin/routes/1 -H 'X-API-KEY: edd1c9f034335f136f87ad84b625c8f1' -X PUT -d '{
    "plugins": {"azure-functions": {"function_uri": "http://test-apisix.azurewebsites.net/api/HttpTrigger", "authorization": {"apikey": "
"}}},
    "uri": "/azure_HttpTrigger"
}'

Accessing this route triggers the Azure Function, with optional authentication, rate‑limiting, or other plugins applied.

WASM Support

APISIX now offers early support for WebAssembly (WASM) plugins via the Proxy WASM SDK, allowing developers to write plugins in languages other than Lua. A sample fault-injection WASM plugin is provided, and WASM plugins can be applied at both route and global levels.

More technical details are available at https://apisix.apache.org/zh/blog/2021/11/19/apisix-supports-wasm.

Other Plugin Improvements

limit‑req/conn/count plugins now accept a set of variables as the limiting key.

proxy‑cache introduces an in‑memory backend.

For a complete list of changes, see the release ChangeLog.

Download

Latest version 2.11.0 can be obtained from the official Apache APISIX website (source code or binary packages).

About Apache APISIX

Apache APISIX is a dynamic, real‑time, high‑performance open‑source API gateway that provides load balancing, dynamic upstreams, canary releases, service circuit breaking, authentication, observability, and more, helping enterprises manage API and microservice traffic securely.