Router Customizations

Hive Router has two main ways to customize behavior: the Plugins and Coprocessors.

Both options can intercept requests and responses, apply changes, and integrate with rest of your architecture. The right choice depends on your performance needs, deployment model, and team requirements.

Plugins

Plugins runs inside the router process, are written in Rust and compiled into the router binary.

Use the Plugin System when:

• you need the lowest possible latency
• you need deep in-process integration with router internals
• your team is comfortable with Rust build and release workflows

Plugin-based customization is a strong fit for high-throughput environments where every microsecond matters and runtime network hops should be minimized.

Coprocessors

Coprocessors run as an external HTTP service called by Hive Router at configured lifecycle stages.

Use Coprocessors when:

• you want language-agnostic customization
• you want faster iteration without shipping a custom router binary
• you want to keep policy and transformation logic in a separate service