OpenAPI 2.0 extensions in API Gateway
API Gateway accepts a set of Google-specific extensions to the OpenAPI specification that configure the behaviors of the gateway. This page describes custom Google- specific extensions to the OpenAPI specification 2.0 used to configure API Gateway behaviors such as backend routing, authentication, and API management features.
Although the examples given are in YAML format, JSON is also supported.
Naming convention
Google OpenAPI extensions have names that begin with the x-google-
prefix.
x-google-allow
x-google-allow: [configured | all]
This extension is used at the top level of an OpenAPI specification to indicate what URL paths should be allowed through API Gateway.
Possible values are configured
and all
.
The default value is configured
, which means that only the API methods that
you have listed in your OpenAPI specification are served through
API Gateway.
When all
is used, unconfigured calls —with or without an API key or user
authentication—pass through API Gateway to your API.
API Gateway processes calls to your API in a case-sensitive manner.
For example, API Gateway considers /widgets
and /Widgets
as
different API methods.
When all
is used, you need to take extra care in two areas:
- Any API key or authentication rules.
- The backend path routing in your service.
As a best practice, we recommend that you configure your API to use case-sensitive
path routing. By using case-sensitive routing, your API returns
an HTTP status code of 404
when the method requested in the URL doesn't
match the API method name listed in your OpenAPI specification. Note
that web application frameworks such as Node.js Express have a setting to
enable or disable case-sensitive routing. The default behavior depends on the
framework that you are using. We recommend that you review the settings in
your framework to make sure that case-sensitive routing is enabled. This
recommendation agrees with the OpenAPI Specification v2.0
that says: "All field names in the specification are case sensitive."
Example
Assume that:
-
x-google-allowis set toall. - The API method
widgetsis listed in your OpenAPI specification but notWidgets. - You have configured your OpenAPI specification to require an API key.
Because widgets
is listed in your OpenAPI specification, API Gateway
blocks the following request because it doesn't have an API key:
https://my-project-id.appspot.com/widgets
Because Widgets
isn't listed in your OpenAPI specification, API Gateway
passes the following request through to your service without an API key:
https://my-project-id.appspot.com/Widgets/
If your API uses case-sensitive routing (and you haven't routed calls
to "Widgets" to any code), your API backend returns a 404
. If, however, you
are using case-insensitive routing, your API backend routes this call to
"widgets."
Different languages and frameworks have different methods for controlling case sensitivity and routing. Consult the documentation for your framework for details.
x-google-backend
The x-google-backend
extension specifies how to route requests
to remote backends. The extension can be specified at the top
level, the operation level, or both levels of an OpenAPI specification.
The x-google-backend
extension can also configure other settings for remote backends,
such as authentication and timeouts. All these configurations
can be applied on a per-operation basis.
The x-google-backend
extension contains the following fields:
address
address: URL
Required. The URL of the target backend.
The address's scheme must be either http
or https
.
When routing to remote backends (Serverless), the address should be set and the
scheme portion should be https
.
jwt_audience | disable_auth
Only one of these two properties should be set.
If an operation uses x-google-backend
but does not specify either jwt_audience
or disable_auth
, API Gateway will automatically
default the jwt_audience
to match the address
.
If address
is not set, API Gateway will automatically set disable_auth
to true
.
jwt_audience
jwt_audience: string
Optional. The JWT audience specified when API Gateway obtains an instance ID token , which is then used when making the target backend request.
When configuring API Gateway for Serverless, the remote backend should be
secured to only allow traffic from API Gateway. API Gateway will
attach an instance ID token to the Authorization
header when proxying requests.
The instance ID token represents the runtime service account that was used to
deploy API Gateway. The remote backend can then verify the request is from
API Gateway based on this attached token.
For example, a remote backend deployed on Cloud Run can use Identity and Access Management (IAM) to:
- Restrict unauthenticated invocations by revoking
roles/run.invokerfrom the specialallUsersprincipal. - Allow only API Gateway to invoke the backend by granting the
roles/run.invokerrole to the API Gateway runtime service account.
By default, API Gateway will create the instance ID token with a
JWT audience that matches the address
field. Manually specifying jwt_audience
is only required when the target backend uses JWT-based
authentication and the expected audience is different than the value specified
in the address
field.
For remote backends deployed on App Engine or with Identity-Aware Proxy (IAP), you must override the
JWT audience. App Engine and IAP use their OAuth client ID as the expected audience.
When this feature is enabled, API Gateway will mutate headers in requests.
If a request has the Authorization
header already set, API Gateway will:
- Copy the original value to a new header
X-Forwarded-Authorization. - Override the
Authorizationheader with the instance ID token.
Therefore, if an API client sets the Authorization
header, a backend running
behind API Gateway should use the X-Forwarded-Authorization
header to
retrieve the entire JWT. The backend mustverify the JWT in this header, as API Gateway won't perform
verification when authentication methods
are not configured.
For configuration examples, see Creating an API config .
disable_auth
disable_auth: bool
Optional. This property determines whether API Gateway should prevent obtaining an instance ID token and prevent attaching it to the request.
When configuring your target backend, you may not want to use IAP or IAM to authenticate requests from API Gateway if either of these conditions apply:
- The backend should allow unauthenticated invocations.
- The backend requires the original
Authorizationheader from the API client and cannot useX-Forwarded-Authorization(described in thejwt_audiencesection).
In this case, set this field to true
.
path_translation
path_translation: [ APPEND_PATH_TO_ADDRESS
| CONSTANT_ADDRESS
]
Optional. Sets the path translation strategy used by API Gateway when proxying requests to the target backend.
For more details on path translation, see the Understand path translation section.
When x-google-backend
is used at the top level of the OpenAPI
specification, path_translation
defaults to APPEND_PATH_TO_ADDRESS
, and when x-google-backend
is used at the operation level of the OpenAPI specification, path_translation
defaults to CONSTANT_ADDRESS
. If the address
field is
missing, path_translation
will remain unspecified and it won't occur.
deadline
deadline: double
Optional. The number of seconds to wait for a full response from a request.
Responses that take longer than the configured deadline will time out.
The default deadline is 15.0
seconds.
Non-positive values won't be honored. API Gateway will automatically use the default value in these cases.
The deadline cannot be disabled, but it can be set to a high number
— for example, 600
seconds (the maximum deadline).
protocol
protocol: [ http/1.1
| h2
]
Optional. The protocol used for sending a request to the backend.
The supported values are http/1.1
and h2
.
The default value is http/1.1
for HTTP and HTTPS backends.
For secure HTTP backends (https://) that support HTTP/2,
set this field to h2
for improved performance. This is the recommended option
for Google Cloud Serverless backends.
Understand path translation
As API Gateway handles requests, it will take the original request path and translate it prior to making a request to the target backend. Exactly how this translation occurs depends on which path translation strategy you are using. There are two path translation strategies:
-
APPEND_PATH_TO_ADDRESS: The target backend request path is computed by appending the original request path to theaddressURL of thex-google-backendextension. -
CONSTANT_ADDRESS: The target request path is constant, as defined by theaddressURL of thex-google-backendextension. If the corresponding OpenAPI path contains parameters, the parameter name and its value become query parameters.
Examples:
-
APPEND_PATH_TO_ADDRESS-
address: https://my-project-id.appspot.com/ BASE_PATH - With OpenAPI path parameters
- OpenAPI path:
/hello/{name} - Request path:
/hello/world - Target request URL:
https://my-project-id.appspot.com/ BASE_PATH /hello/world
- OpenAPI path:
- Without OpenAPI path parameters
- OpenAPI path:
/hello - Request path:
/hello - Target request URL:
https://my-project-id.appspot.com/ BASE_PATH /hello
- OpenAPI path:
-
-
CONSTANT_ADDRESS-
address:https://us-central1-my-project-id.cloudfunctions.net/helloGET - With OpenAPI path parameters
- OpenAPI path:
/hello/{name} - Request path:
/hello/world - Target request URL:
https://us-central1-my-project-id.cloudfunctions.net/helloGET?name=world
- OpenAPI path:
- Without OpenAPI path parameters
- OpenAPI path:
/hello - Request path:
/hello - Target request URL:
https://us-central1-my-project-id.cloudfunctions.net/helloGET
- OpenAPI path:
-
x-google-endpoints
This section describes the uses of the x-google-endpoints
extension.
Configure API Gateway to allow CORS requests
If your API is called from a web application on a different origin, your API must support Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) . See Adding CORS support to API Gateway for information on configuring API Gateway to support CORS.
If you need to implement custom CORS support in your backend code, set allowCors: True
so that API Gateway passes all CORS requests through to
your backend code:
x-google-endpoints: - name: " API_NAME .endpoints. PROJECT_ID .cloud.goog" allowCors: True
Add the x-google-endpoints
extension at the top level of your OpenAPI document
(not indented or nested), for example:
swagger: "2.0" host: "my-cool-api.endpoints.my-project-id.cloud.goog" x-google-endpoints: - name: "my-cool-api.endpoints.my-project-id.cloud.goog" allowCors: True
x-google-issuer
x-google-issuer: URI
| EMAIL_ADDRESS
This extension is used in the OpenAPI securityDefinitions
section to specify
the issuer of a credential. Values can take the form of a hostname or email
address.
x-google-jwks_uri
x-google-jwks_uri: URI
URI of the provider's public key set to validate the signature of the JSON Web Token.
The x-google-jwks_uri
(OpenAPI 2.0) or jwksUri
(OpenAPI 3.x) field is
required.
API Gateway supports two asymmetric public key formats defined
by this OpenAPI extension:
- JWK set format
.
For example:
OpenAPI 2.0
x-google-jwks_uri: "https:// YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME . YOUR_AUTH_PROVIDER_URL /.well-known/jwks.json"
OpenAPI 3.x
jwksUri: "https:// YOUR_ACCOUNT_NAME . YOUR_AUTH_PROVIDER_URL /.well-known/jwks.json"
- X509
. For example:
OpenAPI 2.0
x-google-jwks_uri: "https://www.googleapis.com/service_accounts/v1/metadata/x509/securetoken@system.gserviceaccount.com"
OpenAPI 3.x
jwksUri: "https://www.googleapis.com/service_accounts/v1/metadata/x509/securetoken@system.gserviceaccount.com"
If you are using a symmetric key format, set the x-google-jwks_uri
(OpenAPI 2.0) or jwksUri
(OpenAPI 3.x) to
the URI of a file that contains the base64url-encoded key string.
x-google-jwt-locations
By default, a JWT is passed either in the Authorization
header (prefixed by "Bearer "
), X-Goog-Iap-Jwt-Assertion
header, or in the access_token
query parameter.
Alternatively, use the x-google-jwt-locations
extension in the OpenAPI securityDefinitions section to provide the customized locations from where to extract the JWT token.
The x-google-jwt-locations
extension accepts a list of JWT locations. Each JWT location contains the following fields:
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
header/query
|
Required. The name for the header containing the JWT, or the name for the query parameter containing the JWT. |
value_prefix
|
Optional. For header only. When the value_prefix
is set, its value must match the prefix of the header value containing the JWT. |
For example:
x-google-jwt-locations:
# Expect header "Authorization": "MyBearerToken <TOKEN>" -
header: "Authorization"
value_prefix: "MyBearerToken "
# expect header "jwt-header-foo": "jwt-prefix-foo<TOKEN>" -
header: "jwt-header-foo"
value_prefix: "jwt-prefix-foo"
# expect header "jwt-header-bar": "<TOKEN>" -
header: "jwt-header-bar"
# expect query parameter "jwt_query_bar=<TOKEN>" -
query: "jwt_query_bar"
If you want to support only a subset of the default JWT locations, list them out explicitly in the x-google-jwt-locations
extension. For example, to include support for only the Authorization
header with the "Bearer "
prefix:
x-google-jwt-locations:
# Support the default header "Authorization": "Bearer <TOKEN>" -
header: "Authorization"
value_prefix: "Bearer "
x-google-audiences
x-google-audiences: STRING
This extension is used in the OpenAPI securityDefinitions
section to provide
a list of audiences that JWT aud
field should match during JWT authentication.
This extension accepts a single string with values separated by a comma. Spaces
aren't allowed between the audiences. When it is not specified, JWT aud
field
should match the host
field in the OpenAPI document.
securityDefinitions:
google_id_token:
type: oauth2
authorizationUrl: ""
flow: implicit
x-google-issuer: "https://accounts.google.com"
x-google-jwks_uri: "https://www.googleapis.com/oauth2/v1/certs"
x-google-audiences: "848149964201.apps.googleusercontent.com,841077041629.apps.googleusercontent.com"
x-google-management
The x-google-management
extension controls different aspects of API
management and contains the fields described in this section.
metrics
You use metrics
in conjunction with quota
and x-google-quota
to configure a quota for your API. A quota lets you control the rate at
which applications can call the methods in your API. For example:
x-google-management:
metrics:
- name: read-requests
displayName: Read requests
valueType: INT64
metricKind: DELTA
The metrics
field contains a list with the following key-value pairs:
Optional, but recommended. The text displayed to identify the metric on the Quotas tab on the Endpoints > Services page in the Google Cloud console. This text is also displayed to consumers of your API on the Quotas pages under IAM & admin and APIs & Services . The display name must be a maximum of 40 characters.
For readability purposes, the unit from the associated quota limit is automatically appended to the display name in the Google Cloud console. For example, if you specify "Read requests" for the display name, then "Read requests per minute per project" is displayed in the Google Cloud console. If not specified, "unlabeled quota" is displayed to the consumers of your API on the Quotas pages under IAM & admin and APIs & Services .
To maintain consistency with the display names of Google services listed on the Quotas page that consumers of your API see, we recommend the following for the display name:
- Use "Requests" when you have only one metric.
- When you have multiple metrics, each should describe the type of request and contain the word "requests" (for example "Read requests" or "Write requests").
- Use "quota units" instead of "requests" when any of the costs associated with the metric is greater than 1.
quota
You specify the quota
limit for a
defined metric in the quota
section. For example:
quota
:
limits
:
-
name
:
read
-
requests
-
limit
metric
:
read
-
requests
unit
:
1
/min/
{
project
}
values
:
STANDARD
:
5000
The quota.limits
field contains a list with the following key:value pairs:
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| name | Required. Name of the limit, which must be unique within the service The name can contain lower and upper case letters, numbers and `-` (the dash character), and it must have a maximum length of 64 characters. |
| metric | Required. The name of the metric this limit applies to. This name must match the text specified in the name of a metric. If the specified text doesn't match a metric name, you get an error when you deploy your OpenAPI document. |
| unit | Required. The unit of the limit. Only "1/min/{project}" is
supported, which means that the limit is enforced per-project and the usage
is reset every minute. |
| values | Required. The limit for the metric. You must specify this as a key:value
pair, in the following format:STANDARD: YOUR-LIMIT-FOR-THE-METRIC
YOUR-LIMIT-FOR-THE-METRIC
with an integer
value that is the maximum number of requests allowed for the specified unit
(which is only per-minute, per-project). For example:values: STANDARD: 5000 |
x-google-quota
The x-google-quota
extension is used in the OpenAPI paths
section to
associate a method in your API with a metric. Methods that don't have x-google-quota
defined don't have quota limits applied to them. For example:
x-google-quota:
metricCosts:
read-requests: 1
The x-google-quota
extension contains the following item:
" YOUR-METRIC-NAME
": METRIC-COST
.-
" YOUR-METRIC-NAME ":The text for" YOUR-METRIC-NAME "must match a defined metric name. -
METRIC-COST :An integer value that defines the cost for each request. When a request is made, the associated metric is incremented by the specified cost. The cost allows methods to consume at different rates from the same metric. For example, if a metric has a quota limit of 1000 and a cost of 1, the calling application can make 1000 requests per minute before going over the limit. With a cost of 2 for the same metric, a calling application can make only 500 requests per minute before going over the limit.
Quota examples
The following example shows adding a metric and limit for read requests and write requests.
x-google-management:
metrics:
# Define a metric for read requests. -
name: "read-requests"
displayName: "Read requests"
valueType: INT64
metricKind: DELTA
# Define a metric for write requests. -
name: "write-requests"
displayName: "Write requests"
valueType: INT64
metricKind: DELTA
quota:
limits:
# Rate limit for read requests. -
name: "read-requests-limit"
metric: "read-requests"
unit: "1/min/{project}"
values:
STANDARD: 5000
# Rate limit for write requests. -
name: "write-request-limit"
metric: "write-requests"
unit: "1/min/{project}"
values:
STANDARD: 5000
paths:
"/echo":
post:
description: "Echo back a given message."
operationId: "echo"
produces: -
"application/json"
responses:
200:
description: "Echo"
schema:
$ref: "#/definitions/echoMessage"
parameters: -
description: "Message to echo"
in: body
name: message
required: true
schema:
$ref: "#/definitions/echoMessage"
x-google-quota:
metricCosts:
read-requests: 1
security: -
api_key: []
x-google-api-name
When your service contains only one API, the API name is the same as the
API Gateway service name. (API Gateway uses the name
you specify in the host
field of your OpenAPI document as the name of your
service.) When your service contains more than one API, you specify the API
names by adding the x-google-api-name
extension to your OpenAPI document. The x-google-api-name
extension lets you explicitly name individual APIs and
establish independent versioning for each API.
For example, you can configure a service named api.example.com
with two APIs, producer
and consumer
, with the OpenAPI document fragments shown here:
-
Producer API in
producer.yaml:swagger: 2.0 host: api.example.com x-google-api-name: producer info: version: 1.0.3
-
Consumer API in
consumer.yaml:swagger: 2.0 host: api.example.com x-google-api-name: consumer info: version: 1.1.0
You can deploy the two OpenAPI documents jointly with:
gcloud api-gateway api-configs create API_CONFIG_ID \ --api = my-api \ --openapi-spec = "producer.yaml,consumer.yaml" \ --project = my-project-id

