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ActiveBatch by Redwood vs AutoSys Workload Automation comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

JAMS
Sponsored
Ranking in Workload Automation
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
ActiveBatch by Redwood
Ranking in Workload Automation
14th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
Process Automation (22nd), Managed File Transfer (MFT) (14th)
AutoSys Workload Automation
Ranking in Workload Automation
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
84
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Workload Automation category, the mindshare of JAMS is 3.0%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ActiveBatch by Redwood is 3.1%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AutoSys Workload Automation is 7.0%, down from 12.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Workload Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
JAMS3.0%
AutoSys Workload Automation7.0%
ActiveBatch by Redwood3.1%
Other86.9%
Workload Automation
 

Featured Reviews

LV
Principal Data Base And Infrastructure Engineer at a outsourcing company with 501-1,000 employees
Automation has replaced nightly monitoring and delivers reliable, unified job scheduling
We have really enjoyed working with JAMS in terms of notifications, alerts, and streamlining. There used to be a process with Automate, which is another product from Fortra, but even before that, the other division of the company that we were merging with had a tool that was built in-house called a file handler or file distributor. It was an in-house developed tool, but it was not as streamlined or as efficient as JAMS is. We literally had to have a dedicated nighttime person monitoring. Although we are 24/7, the divisions of the company that we were using JAMS for have been small scale. While we have automated it, we have streamlined it in such a way that notifications go out and alerts go out, but if there is anything, then we get paged and alerted, and if anything needs to happen at midnight, we can wake up. On the other hand, with the tool I mentioned, the file handler and distributor, we used to have a dedicated nighttime person that had to be sitting and monitoring it to see when a file arrived, whether it met the conditions, and then execute the next particular job. By using JAMS, we have gained a lot more efficiencies in terms of all of those to streamline it, and there is no necessary need for having an overnight engineer just keeping an eye on all of this.
AS
Application Administrator Lead at Bluestem
Manages thousands of jobs daily and reduces downtime through secondary node support
The current feedback I receive from my end users regarding ActiveBatch by Redwood highlights issues with the tabs or panes during job modification. When the next user monitors it, they need to close the pane or job and reopen it to see the changes reflected. If the end user makes an update, it will not be visible unless they start from the beginning again. Implementing a refresh button would be helpful for real-time updates when the end user needs to see changes immediately. We currently face issues with the web console of ActiveBatch by Redwood. When users operate through an RDP session, every user has their own ActiveBatch by Redwood application. However, on the web console, users encounter daily activity issues where the job instances do not appear or update correctly, and they cannot view the latest logs. This issue is only present on the web console, as the application itself works without any problems. ActiveBatch by Redwood can be improved by adding more features, as we are not currently handling cloud-based applications like S3 buckets and Azure. Connecting to these cloud platforms would be a helpful enhancement.
PK
Assistant VP at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Experience significant automation with robust integration and user-friendly interfaces
There are areas of AutoSys Workload Automation that have room for improvement. They are implementing good enhancements in the R24 release. The web UI needs some improvement. Cloud integrations are limited to 25 or 30 configurable plugins and integrations to the cloud. They can improve in that area. They have separate tools, not AutoSys Workload Automation, such as Atomic and other SaaS-based solutions that can run inside the cloud. AutoSys Workload Automation can be configured in the cloud, but it requires a substantial number of VMs depending on the load. For on-premises deployment, it is a very good solution. They need to increase their footprint in the cloud and improve the web UI. They are making excellent progress in the R24 release.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"JAMS has improved my organization by taking a myriad of manual processes and allowing us to automate them."
"The feature or capability to import a job is most valuable. We can import an existing job from different platforms, and all the configurations get migrated as well without modifying the code, job schedule, etc."
"The most valuable feature is the easily accessible data in the database because we run a lot of SQL scripting against the database."
"The interface is good, and it's very easy to define and create jobs. If a job is not running or there is an error, the solution will send an email. That's all very good and very useful."
"What my team needs are tools to reliably execute all the jobs, minimize the risks, and support high-availability, and JAMS does the job."
"It's a full-featured job scheduling tool. The part that I liked the best was the support team. This tool was new, and we were all learning it and setting up the different jobs that were complex in nature. Their support team was very responsive in helping us out through the setup and resolving the issues. They have been incredibly awesome."
"I appreciate JAMS for its readily available templates that allow me to create and deliver stand-up presentations within minutes quickly."
"JAMS is easier to use and cheaper than our previous solution. The installation is more straightforward, and JAMS has a graphical user interface, so it's more accessible."
"The most valuable feature is its stability. We've only had very minor issues and generally they have happened because someone has applied a patch on a Windows operating system and it has caused some grief. We've actually been able to resolve those issues quite quickly with ActiveBatch. In all the time that I've had use of ActiveBatch, it hasn't failed completely once. Uptime is almost 100 percent."
"ActiveBatch can automate predictable, repeatable processes very well. There is no real trick to what ActiveBatch does. ActiveBatch does exactly what you would expect a scheduling piece of software to do. It does it in a timely manner and does it with very little outside interference and fanfare. It runs when it is supposed to, and I don't have to jump through a bunch of hoops to double check it."
"The automation feature is a very valuable feature as the associates do not have to worry about performing repetitive tasks (i.e. endpoint security scans on a daily basis) that would take several hours to complete on a daily basis."
"ActiveBatch provides summary reports and logs for further analysis and improvements in monitoring servers, which is very handy."
"Using ActiveBatch I have learned that the potential for reducing costs using an automation tool is huge, and that when the business becomes aware of it they really embrace the product."
"ActiveBatch's Self-Service Portal allows our business units to run and monitor their own workloads. They can simply run and review the logs, but they can't modify them. It increases their productivity because they are able to take care of things on their own. It saves us time from having to rerun the scripts, because the business units can just go ahead and log in and and rerun it themselves."
"ActiveBatch has reduced work by providing automated workflows across several different applications."
"Approximately ~20 hours of manual effort have been reduced to ~5 hours with the help of ActiveBatch."
"The really nice thing is that, as the business grows, we're not seeing the infrastructure grow."
"It streamlines processing really well, so we're able to cut down on our processing times."
"The most valuable features of AutoSys Workload Automation are the file transfer protocol and file watcher, the solution has a user-friendly user interface, it is very simple to use, you have a scope of all your jobs, and it lets you monitor everything in these jobs."
"AutoSys Workload Automation is a stable solution."
"There are certain batch jobs that need to run on a regular basis in order for our customers to receive reports and updates, and CA-7 provides that for us."
"The flexibility of being able to schedule the timing and frequency of different automation scripts makes it easier for us to meet our customers’ business requirements."
"We use it for a number of our clients, and so far, we have had great success with it because it works constantly and is pretty seamless, so you do not have to open up many support tickets."
"The most valuable feature of AutoSys Workload Automation is batch processing."
 

Cons

"With no programming experience, I find JAMS code-driven automation challenging due to the required PowerShell scripting."
"There could be a better simulation for banning the termination. You have to simulate every one of the processes in order to have an idea for better planning. This kind of simulation is broken and needs improvement."
"The tabs in the JAMS file transfer could be clearer. It would help us demonstrate to our client that JAMS not only automates jobs but also does fast transfers, and it's an alternative that supports and filters different kinds of platforms. Filtering file transfers will be highly beneficial to them."
"All my machines at work are Macs. JAMS client is a Windows-based thing."
"I would enhance the compatibility feature of JAMS because sometimes when the server is under high load, it does not inform us and we cannot get answers."
"JAMS has built-in reporting. I've never really used it. I tried using it a few years ago and I couldn't figure it out. It was wonky. It could be improved upon."
"The search capability needs to be improved because when we try to search for a job, it's hard to do."
"It is important to receive notifications if a charged job fails and SQL is halted. JAMS does not provide halted notifications by default, which is a critical feature that needs to be added."
"Some of the advanced features in the user interface are a bit confusing even after referring to the documents."
"The interface is not that user-friendly and is a little tough to navigate."
"We haven't explored the cloud aspect of the solution because it's very costly."
"I believe ActiveBatch by Redwood could be improved because the UI could be modernized."
"The help center and documentation are not that helpful."
"The monitoring dashboard could have been more user-friendly so that in the monitoring dashboard itself we can see the total number of jobs created in the system and how many were currently active/scheduled/chained."
"A nice thing to have would be the ability to comfortably pass variables from one job to another."
"They have some crucial design flaws within the console that still need to be worked out because it is not working exactly how we hoped to see it, e.g., just some minor things where when you hit the save button, then all of a sudden all your job's library items collapse. Then, in order to continue on with your testing, you have to open those back up. I have taken that to them, and they are like, "Yep. We know about it. We know we have some enhancements that need to be taken care of. We have more developers now." They are working towards taking the minor things that annoy us, resolving them, and getting them fixed."
"Upgrades to the GUI interface would be probably one of the biggest things they could do to improve."
"I am not sure whether it is our limitation or a tool limitation because we haven't yet explored it, but whenever we look for different types of reporting, we have some limitations in getting those."
"Analytics seems to be a problem, so a couple of stars deducted for that, but it's probably one of the easiest tools that I manage."
"A couple of key features would be really being able to support a scheduler that, instead of a centralized scheduler, maybe a distributed one, so where a scheduler doesn't come down; not everything stops all at one time and so on."
"Initial setup is complex. It requires technical skills in various flavors of distributed/enterprise H/W, S/W, databases to implement, configure and develop high-availability options."
"We have to escalate through channels to get to somebody who knows what's going on."
"Deploying those solutions and integrating with them was a little challenge at this point of time."
"Some of the reports are either a bit hard to understand or don’t give you what you might expect to see."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of JAMS has not been an issue for us, as it has allowed us to save time."
"Our licensing is pretty cheap because we have a state solution. So, we pay only $1,000 a year."
"All licensing models are a little overpriced, but JAMS offers a good value, especially given their support response times and ability to handle unforeseen issues like the SFTP transfers. I hope to find more use cases to get a better bang for our buck."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"Definitely check how many single processes you want to run and count them as jobs. That is how you would work out your pricing on JAMS. For example, if you're running a number of commands and you can put them all into one script and run that script, you can count that as one job."
"There are no additional costs other than the license for Fortra's JAMS which is affordable."
"The product is reasonably priced, and we don't have any add-ons."
"It's expensive, to be honest, but it does the job."
"I don't think we've ever had a problem with the pricing or licensing. Even the maintenance fees are very much in line. They are not excessive. I think for the support that you get, you get a good value for your money. It's the best value on the market."
"It allows for lower operational overhead."
"I like ActiveBatch Workload Automation's licensing model because they're not holding you down on an agentless model or agent model, where every server needs to have an agent. That's the main selling point of the solution and I hope they stay that way."
"The pricing was fair. There are additional costs for the plugins. We have the standard licensing fees for different pieces, then we have the plugins which were add-ons. However, we expected that."
"The price was fairly in line with other automation tools. I don't think it's exorbitantly expensive, relatively speaking."
"Currently, we are paying approximately $7,000 yearly, which includes support."
"ActiveBatch is currently redesigning themselves. In the past, they were a low cost solution for automation. They had a nice tool that was very inexpensive. With their five-year plan, they will be more enhancement-driven, so they're trying to improve their software, customer service, and the way that their customers get information from them. In doing that, they're raising the price of their base system. They changed from one pricing model to another, which has caused some friction between ActiveBatch and us. We're working through that right now with them. That's one of the reasons why we're why we were evaluating other software packages."
"If you compare ActiveBatch licensing to Control-M, you're looking at $50,000 as opposed to millions."
"I certainly think the pricing is worth the value."
"There is an annual license to use AutoSys Workload Automation."
"CA pricing has been a problem, and not looked upon favorably here at all."
"The price of this solution is reasonable and there is an annual license required."
"I don't have information on the exact licensing cost of AutoSys Workload Automation because that's managed by the tools and financing teams. For agents, it's close to $4,00, but for the server setup, it's usually a one-time license initially, and it's AMC which is paid every year and comes close to $8,000 to $10,000."
"We paid to use the solution monthly."
"Validate how many agents you need beforehand."
"People need to pay attention to how they use their ESP agents on the distributed platform. That's where some of the cost comes in, based on how many you need or how many you use."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Construction Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Performing Arts
7%
Financial Services Firm
39%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
5%
Retailer
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise48
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise79
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for JAMS?
I believe the pricing and licensing were fair. I was not here when that process took place and do not know exactly, b...
What needs improvement with JAMS?
When it comes to improvements for JAMS, I think upgrading and migrating some of the current processes could benefit f...
What is your primary use case for JAMS?
Our main use case for JAMS is to automate our data pump backups for our PeopleSoft Oracle system, as well as run a my...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ActiveBatch Workload Automation?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for ActiveBatch by Redwood has been great; we recently renewed ...
What needs improvement with ActiveBatch Workload Automation?
I believe ActiveBatch by Redwood could be improved because the UI could be modernized.
What is your primary use case for ActiveBatch Workload Automation?
My main use case for ActiveBatch by Redwood is file processing. I use ActiveBatch by Redwood for file processing for ...
How does Control-M compare with AutoSys Workload Automation?
Control-M acts as a single, centralized interface for monitoring and managing all batch processes, which is helpful b...
What needs improvement with AutoSys Workload Automation?
There are areas of AutoSys Workload Automation that have room for improvement. They are implementing good enhancement...
 

Also Known As

No data available
ActiveBatch
CA Workload Automation, CA Workload Automation AE
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Teradata, Arconic, General Dynamics, Yum!, CVS Health, Comcast, Ghiradelli, & Boston’s Children’s Hospital
Informatica, D&H, ACES, PrimeSource, Sub-Zero Group, SThree, Lamar Advertising, Subway, Xcel Energy, Ignite Technologies, Whataburger, Jyske Bank, Omaha Children's Hospital
Gaumont, Mercantil do Brasil, CCEE, Hanwha Life
Find out what your peers are saying about ActiveBatch by Redwood vs. AutoSys Workload Automation and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
895,151 professionals have used our research since 2012.