Platform engineering is fast becoming a cornerstone of modern software development, yet it remains widely misunderstood.
Despite growing adoption across tech-driven organizations, persistent myths about what platform engineering truly involves are slowing its progress and obscuring its strategic value.
From conflating developer portals with comprehensive internal platforms to fears about added bureaucracy and security risks, misconceptions continue to shape how teams approach this evolving discipline.
A common source of confusion is the assumption that sleek developer portals represent the full scope of an internal developer platform (IDP).
“Developer portals are often mistaken for full internal developer platforms because they represent the most visible and interactive part of the developer experience,” says Derek Ashmore, application transformation principal at Asperitas.
He explains with their sleek interfaces, service catalogs and one-click templates, portals give the impression that everything is automated and seamless behind the scenes.
Bhargav Kota, senior vice president of product engineering at Xebia, offers a similar view, describing the portal as just a surface layer.
“A developer portal is the entry point for an IDP and is the unified interface to all the functionality the platform offers,” he says. “Think of the portal as the ‘storefront,’ and the platform as the ‘entire store + warehouse + supply chain’.”
Both agree that failing to distinguish between the portal and the deeper automation, orchestration, and governance layers beneath can mislead teams about their platform’s maturity.
Another enduring myth is that platform engineering slows down development by introducing unnecessary layers of process.
Ashmore challenges this idea directly, noting that belief isn’t uncommon, and it usually comes from a place of genuine frustration.
“However, it’s often a symptom of bad platform engineering, not platform engineering itself,” he says.
He argues a well-built platform reduces cognitive load and accelerates delivery by offering standardized, reusable components developers can trust.
Kota adds that the key to avoiding bureaucratic pitfalls lies in how the platform is designed and communicated.
“A well-designed and well-engineered platform reduces bureaucracy and significantly accelerates time-to-value,” he says, adding problems often arise when teams focus more on rigid tools than on fostering a collaborative ecosystem around the platform.
Security concerns also fuel skepticism about platform engineering, particularly fears that abstracting infrastructure from developers might obscure critical risks.
Both experts stress that abstraction, when done thoughtfully, strengthens security.
“Abstraction doesn’t have to mean ignorance — it should mean consistency,” Ashmore says. “A well-designed internal platform doesn’t hide security concerns from developers; it bakes security in by default.”
Kota explains good platforms integrate security visibly, with built-in scanning, secure defaults, and role-based access controls, all while giving developers transparency through logs and configuration views.
Martin Cízler, vice president of engineering at Make, says if platform engineering adds bureaucracy and slows down development cycles, it’s a sign of a misguided implementation that is detrimental to productivity.
“This might happen in organizations that implement the concept for the wrong reasons, often because of fear of missing out on a popular industry trend, or because of false hope that it’s a silver bullet that will solve your engineering problems,” he explains.
He says to bring a positive impact, platform engineers must treat other developers as their customers to maximize their productivity.
“The implementation will be different in different companies, there is no universal cookbook,” Cízler adds.
Perhaps the most damaging myth, according to the experts, is the notion that platform engineering is just “DevOps with a new name.”
“Platform engineering is fundamentally about people, processes, and culture and extends into development of business applications,” says Kota.
He argues that reducing it to a tool-focused discipline misses its broader potential to drive innovation and efficiency at scale.
Ashmore says he agrees, warning that this misconception can lead to underinvestment and misaligned priorities.
“If leaders think platform engineering is just a rebranded ops function, they’re likely to under-resource it, skip product management disciplines, or fail to align it with developer needs,” he says.
To cut through these myths, both suggest focusing on outcomes rather than tools.
Cízler says leaders need to create clarity around the objective problems they observe in their organizations, for example through an engineering strategy that is shared with every member of the organization.
“If team members identify with the diagnosis, they are more likely to buy into the proposed solutions,” he says.
He points out successful platform engineering teams are customer-oriented and they have a vested interest in making the team more productive.
They regularly communicate with other engineers through interviews and surveys and, ideally, have hands-on experience developing the actual product that the platform is looking to accelerate.
“While there is an abundance of productivity metrics to pick from, developer satisfaction is often an ignored but crucial indicator whether the IDP brings a true improvement,” Cízler says.