Apache Kafka vs PubSub+ Platform comparison

Apache and Solace are both solutions in the Streaming Analytics category. Apache is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.1, while Solace is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.3. Additionally, 95% of Apache users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Solace users who would recommend it.

Apache Kafka

Read 81 Apache Kafka reviews

1,375 Views
1,070 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

PubSub+ Platform

Read 16 PubSub+ Platform reviews

2,039 Views
1,605 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Apache Kafka

PubSub+ Platform

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Apache Kafka and PubSub+ Platform based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Streaming Analytics solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Apache Kafka vs. PubSub+ Platform Report (Updated: October 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Apache Kafka vs. PubSub+ Platform

October 2024

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Categories and Ranking

Apache Kafka

Ranking in Streaming Analytics

7th

Average Rating

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

PubSub+ Platform

Ranking in Streaming Analytics

11th

Average Rating

8.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Message Queue (MQ) Software (7th), Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) (2nd), Event Monitoring (10th)

Featured Reviews

Amit Laddha

Vice President (Information and Product Management) at Tradebulls Securities (P) Limited

Sep 13, 2023

With valuable features like clustering and sharding, the product also offers good stability

If you are using the latest version of Apache Kafka in which the use of Zookeeper is not required, then it uses the KRaft protocol, which is built into Kafka broker. Since the use of Zookeeper is no longer required, I think the setup phase of dissolution is better than its previous versions. I rate the initial setup of the product somewhere between seven to eight out of ten. Apache Kafka's initial setup is very straightforward. The solution is deployed on an on-premises model. Apache Kafka was deployed in our company within a couple of days. Three people were involved in the deployment process of Apache Kafka.

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BhanuChidigam

Sofware Engineering Manager at Wells Fargo

Apr 20, 2023

Performs well, high availability, and helpful support

We are using PubSub+ Event Broker for specific application processing. We have used the solution In banking systems The speed of the throughout has been helpful for our organization. The valuable feature of PubSub+ Event Broker is the speed of processing, publishing, and consumption. The…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of Apache Kafka is Kafka Connect."

"The stream processing is a very valuable aspect of the solution for us."

"I have seen a return on investment with this solution."

"It is a stable solution...A lot of my experience indicates that Apache Kafka is scalable."

"The most valuable features of the solution revolve around areas like the latency part, where the tool offers very little latency and the sequencing part."

"Kafka can process messages in real-time, making it useful for applications that require near-instantaneous processing."

"The most valuable feature is the performance."

"valuable features relate to microservices architecture and working on KStream and KSQL DB as a microservices event bus."

More Apache Kafka pros

"We like the seamless flexibility in protocol exchange offering without writing a code."

"The way we can replicate information and send it to several subscribers is most valuable. It can be used for any kind of business where you've got multiple users who need information. Any company, such as LinkedIn, with a huge number of subscribers and any business, such as publishing, supermarket, airline, or shipping can use it."

"One of the main reasons for using PubSub+ is that it is a proper event manager that can handle events in a reactive way."

"The valuable feature of PubSub+ Event Broker is the speed of processing, publishing, and consumption."

"This solution reduces the latency to access changes in real-time and the effort required to onboard a new subscriber. It also reduces the maintenance of each of those interfaces because now the publisher and subscribers are decoupled. Event Broker handles all the communication and engagement. We can just push one update, then we don't have to know who is consuming it and what's happening to that publication downstream. It's all done by the broker, which is a huge benefit of using Event Broker."

"Some valuable features include reconnecting topics, placing queues, and direct connections to MongoDB. The platform provides a dashboard to monitor the status of messages, such as how many have been processed or delivered, which is helpful for tracking performance."

"The topic hierarchy is pretty flexible. Once you have the subject defined just about anybody who knows Java can come onboard. The APIs are all there."

"As of now, the most valuable aspects are the topic-based subscription and the fanout exchange that we are using."

More PubSub+ Platform pros

Cons

"The initial setup and deployment could be less complex."

"Kafka has a lot of monitors, but sometimes it's most important to just have a simple monitor."

"More adapters for connecting to different systems need to be available."

"In Apache Kafka, it is currently difficult to create a consumer."

"The solution could always add a few more features to enhance its usage."

"The third party is not very stable and sometimes you have problems with this component. There are some developments in newer versions and we're about to try them out, but I'm not sure if it closes the gap."

"If the graphical user interface was easier for the Kafka administration it would be much better. Right now, you need to use the program with the command-line interface. If the graphical user interface was easier, it could be a better product."

"The manageability should be improved. There are lots of things we need to manage and it should have a function that enables us to manage them all cohesively."

More Apache Kafka cons

"One of the areas of improvement would be if we could tell the story a bit better about what an event mesh does or why an event mesh is foundational to a large enterprise that has a wide diversity of applications that are homegrown and a small number off the shelf."

"We have requested to be able to get into the payload to do dynamic topic hierarchy building. A current workaround is using the message's header, where the business data can be put into this header and be used for a dynamic topic lookup. I want to see this in action when there are a couple of hundred cases live. E.g., how does it perform? From an administration perspective, is the ease of use there?"

"The licensing and the cost are the major pitfalls."

"It could be cheaper. It could also have easier usage. It is a brilliant product, but it is quite complex to use."

"A challenge we currently have is Solace's ability to integrate with single sign-on in our Active Directory and other single sign-on tools and platforms that any company would have. It's important for the platforms to work. Typically, they support only LDAP-based connectivity to our SQL Servers."

"The product should allow third-party agents to be installed. Currently, it is quite proprietary."

"We've pointed out some things with the DMR piece, the event mesh, in edge cases where we could see a problem. Something like 99 percent of users wouldn't ever see this problem, but it has to do with if you get multiple bad clients sending data over a WAN, for example. That could then impact other clients."

"For improvements, I would suggest increasing the max payload size to a limit of 100MB or more. The current max payload size is limited to 5MB."

More PubSub+ Platform cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is approximately $600,000 USD."

"It is open source software."

"This is an open-source solution and is free to use."

"We use the free version."

"The solution is open source."

"It's a premium product, so it is not price-effective for us."

"Apache Kafka is an open-source solution."

"The solution is open source; it's free to use."

More Apache Kafka pricing and cost advice

"I would rate the product's pricing a ten out of ten."

"It could be cheaper. Its licensing is on a yearly basis."

"We have been really happy with the product licensing rates. It has been free for us, up to a 100,000 transactions per second, and all we have to do is pay for support. Making their product available and accessible to us has not been a problem at all."

"Having a free version of the solution was a big, important part of our decision to go with it. This was the big driver for us to evaluate Solace. We started using it as the free version. When we felt comfortable with the free version, that is when we bought the enterprise version."

"The pricing and licensing were very transparent and well-communicated by our account manager."

"We are looking for something that will add value and fit for purpose. Freeware is good if you want to try something quickly without putting in much money. However, as far as our decision is concerned, I don't think it helps. At the end of the day, if we are convinced that a capability is required, we will ask for the funding. Then, when the funding is available, we will go for an enterprise solution only."

"The price of PubSub+ Event Broker is reasonable for the capability it offers. However, when compared to others solutions on the market it is expensive."

"The licensing is dependent on the volume that is flowing. If you go for their support services, it will cost some more money, but I think it is worth it, especially if you are just starting your journey."

More PubSub+ Platform pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

31%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

36%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What are the differences between Apache Kafka and IBM MQ?

Apache Kafka is open source and can be used for free. It has very good log management and has a way to store the data used for analytics. Apache Kafka is very good if you have a high number of user...

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What do you like most about Apache Kafka?

Apache Kafka is an open-source solution that can be used for messaging or event processing.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Kafka?

As for pricing, Kafka is open-source, so it's free to install and use.

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What do you like most about PubSub+ Event Broker?

The most valuable feature of PubSub+ Event Broker is the scaling integration. Prior to using the solution, it was done manually with a file, and it can be done instantly live.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PubSub+ Event Broker?

The price of the solution is expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with PubSub+ Event Broker?

The solution could be improved by enhancing the message pooling size for persistent messages to handle both small and large messages effectively. Additionally, providing a comprehensive dashboard t...

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Comparisons

Amazon SQS vs Apache Kafka

Compared 18% of the time

IBM MQ vs Apache Kafka

Compared 17% of the time

MuleSoft Anypoint Platform vs Apache Kafka

Compared 16% of the time

Red Hat AMQ vs Apache Kafka

Compared 13% of the time

VMware Tanzu Data Solutions vs Apache Kafka

Compared 5% of the time

More Apache Kafka Competitors

IBM MQ vs PubSub+ Platform

Compared 21% of the time

ActiveMQ vs PubSub+ Platform

Compared 12% of the time

Confluent vs PubSub+ Platform

Compared 7% of the time

VMware Tanzu Data Solutions vs PubSub+ Platform

Compared 6% of the time

Amazon EventBridge vs PubSub+ Platform

Compared 4% of the time

More PubSub+ Platform Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Apache Kafka

October 2024

Download Apache Kafka product report

Buyer's Guide

PubSub+ Platform

October 2024

Download PubSub+ Platform product report

Also Known As

No data available

PubSub+ Event Broker, PubSub+ Event Portal

Learn More

Apache

Solace

Overview

Apache Kafka is an open-source distributed streaming platform that serves as a central hub for handling real-time data streams. It allows efficient publishing, subscribing, and processing of data from various sources like applications, servers, and sensors.

Kafka's core benefits include high scalability for big data pipelines, fault tolerance ensuring continuous operation despite node failures, low latency for real-time applications, and decoupling of data producers from consumers.

Key features include topics for organizing data streams, producers for publishing data, consumers for subscribing to data, brokers for managing clusters, and connectors for easy integration with various data sources.

Large organizations use Kafka for real-time analytics, log aggregation, fraud detection, IoT data processing, and facilitating communication between microservices.

PubSub+ Platform supports real-time shipment tracking, IT event management in multiclouds, and connects legacy and cloud-native systems for application modernization. It's utilized for trading, streaming market data, and app-to-app messaging, enhancing event-driven architectures with reliable message queuing.

Organizations adopt PubSub+ to efficiently transport events across hybrid and cloud environments, managing audit trails and long processing tasks. The platform aids integration through dynamic data publication, event mesh capabilities, and WAN optimization. Features like seamless integration, protocol agnosticism, and flexible topic hierarchy enhance versatility. Solace Admin Utility simplifies configuration and management, while the event portal allows hybrid deployment.

What are the key features of PubSub+ Platform?

Dynamic Data Publication: Enables flexible and responsive data handling.
Event Mesh Capabilities: Facilitates efficient event transportation.
WAN Optimization: Enhances data transfer across networks.
Protocol Agnosticism: Supports a wide range of protocols for integration.
Flexible Topic Hierarchy: Allows detailed and organized data exchange.
Solace Admin Utility: Provides intuitive configuration and management.
Granular Topic Filtering: Offers precise data filtering options.
Guaranteed Messaging: Ensures reliable message delivery.

What benefits or ROI should users consider?

Seamless Integration: Reduces complexity in connecting systems.
Performance and Scaling: Supports high-load environments efficiently.
Asynchronous Messaging: Improves application performance.
Robust Support System: Provides guidance and problem resolution.

PubSub+ is implemented in industries requiring real-time data handling and integration between disparate systems. Financial institutions use it for trading and streaming market data, while logistics companies benefit from real-time shipment tracking. Enterprises apply it to modernize operations by connecting legacy systems with cloud-native applications, enhancing their architecture and ensuring data reliability across environments.

Sample Customers

Uber, Netflix, Activision, Spotify, Slack, Pinterest

FxPro, TP ICAP, Barclays, Airtel, American Express, Cobalt, Legal & General, LSE Group, Akuna Capital, Azure Information Technology, Brand.net, Canadian Securities Exchange, Core Transport Technologies, Crédit Agricole, Fluent Trade Technologies, Harris Corporation, Korea Exchange, Live E!, Mercuria Energy, Myspace, NYSE Technologies, Pico, RBC Capital Markets, Standard Chartered Bank, Unibet

Buyer's Guide

Apache Kafka vs. PubSub+ Platform

October 2024

Free Report: Apache Kafka vs. PubSub+ Platform

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