Kong Identity [introduced](https://konghq.com/blog/product-releases/kong-identity-principals-govern-every-api-event-and-application-identity)introduced the Principal: a centrally defined authenticating entity, shared across gateways, carrying first-class metadata. With this release, principals reach AI Gateway.
Until now, AI Gateway plugins identified callers only by Consumer–a gateway-local concept that couldn't carry organization-wide identity. Now, AI Gateway is principal-aware: rate limiting, analytics and cost attribution, and model and route access control can all key on the authenticated principal instead of only the Consumer.
This matters more in the agentic era than it ever did for APIs. When the caller is an agent acting on behalf of a user, a team, or another system, "who is making this call" is the single most important governance dimension you have for cost showback, for access decisions, and for the audit trail. Principal awareness lets you answer that question consistently, using the same identity definitions across your entire Kong footprint.
The capability is entirely additive and off by default: existing Consumer-based configurations continue to work unchanged, and you adopt principals where and when they add value.