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Overview

In brief:
Gateways coordinate. Orchestrators compute.
Together, they form the backbone of the Livepeer AI video pipeline.
RoleFunctionPerforms GPU Work?External-Facing?
GatewayJob intake, pricing, routing, capability match❌ No✅ Yes
OrchestratorGPU compute, inference, transcoding, BYOC✅ Yes❌ No

Gateway Responsibilities

Gateways act as the front door to the network:
  • Receive jobs from applications
  • Determine required model, pipeline, or GPU
  • Select the best orchestrator based on performance and pricing
  • Route the workload with low latency
  • Return results to the client
  • Publish marketplace offerings (models, pipelines, cost per frame, etc.)
Gateways provide service intelligence, not compute.

Orchestrator Responsibilities

Orchestrators are GPU operators who run:
  • Real-time AI inference
  • Daydream / ComfyStream pipelines
  • BYOC containers
  • Traditional transcoding
They provide:
  • GPU horsepower
  • Model execution
  • Deterministic and verifiable output
  • Performance guarantees
They do not expose external APIs directly—Gateways handle that.
Last modified on February 18, 2026