Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

AWS Fargate vs Apache Spark comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

Apache Spark
Ranking in Compute Service
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Hadoop (1st), Java Frameworks (2nd)
AWS Fargate
Ranking in Compute Service
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Compute Service category, the mindshare of Apache Spark is 11.2%, up from 7.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Fargate is 16.7%, up from 15.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Compute Service
 

Featured Reviews

SurjitChoudhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers batch processing of data and in-memory processing in Spark greatly enhances performance
Spark supports real-time data processing through Spark Streaming. It allows for batch processing of data. If you have immediate data, like chat information, that needs to be processed in real-time, Spark Streaming is used. For data that can be evaluated later, batch processing with Apache Spark is suitable. Mostly, batch processing is utilized in our organization, but for streaming data processing, tools like Kafka are often integrated. In-memory processing in Spark greatly enhances performance, making it a hundred times faster than the previous MapReduce methods. This improvement is achieved through optimization techniques like caching, broadcasting, and partitioning, which help in optimizing queries for faster processing.
Subrata Mukherjee - PeerSpot reviewer
Boost demand response with cost-efficient serverless architecture
We are a venture builder company, and if we select AWS for our product. Our design is based on a serverless architecture model. ECS Fargate is the most convenient way in terms of scalability, integration, and cost control Thanks to the serverless model and easy integration features, a few…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product is useful for analytics."
"The memory processing engine is the solution's most valuable aspect. It processes everything extremely fast, and it's in the cluster itself. It acts as a memory engine and is very effective in processing data correctly."
"The most valuable feature of Apache Spark is its flexibility."
"The good performance. The nice graphical management console. The long list of ML algorithms."
"I like that it can handle multiple tasks parallelly. I also like the automation feature. JavaScript also helps with the parallel streaming of the library."
"It provides a scalable machine learning library."
"There's a lot of functionality."
"The main feature that we find valuable is that it is very fast."
"Fargate's integration with other AWS services is really good."
"The most valuable feature of AWS Fargate is its ability to run on demand without the constant run time of basic resources."
"Fargate itself is a stable product. We are quite satisfied with its performance."
"The most valuable feature of Fargate is that it's self-managed. You don't have to configure your own clusters or deploy any Kubernetes clusters. This simplifies the initial deployment and scaling process."
"By using a server's compute resources, one can observe the resource metrics. With AWS, one can determine when servers will be used based on CloudWatch results. For example, CloudWatch informs the application and service platform when the hit ratio has reached the threshold value."
"It allows for focusing on applications instead of managing infrastructure."
"The most valuable feature of AWS Fargate is its ease of use."
"We appreciate the simple use of containers within this solution, it makes managing the containers quick and easy."
 

Cons

"Apart from the restrictions that come with its in-memory implementation. It has been improved significantly up to version 3.0, which is currently in use."
"There could be enhancements in optimization techniques, as there are some limitations in this area that could be addressed to further refine Spark's performance."
"The main concern is the overhead of Java when distributed processing is not necessary."
"Stability in terms of API (things were difficult, when transitioning from RDD to DataFrames, then to DataSet)."
"From my perspective, the only thing that needs improvement is the interface, as it was not easily understandable."
"One limitation is that not all machine learning libraries and models support it."
"The setup I worked on was really complex."
"Include more machine learning algorithms and the ability to handle streaming of data versus micro batch processing."
"Service computing is not as straightforward compared to other computing services. It requires more effort to use effectively."
"The main area for improvement is the cost, which could be lowered to be more competitive with other major cloud providers."
"Sometimes, Fargate can be really hard to configure."
"AWS Fargate could improve the privileged mode containers. We had some problems and they were not able to run."
"We would like to see some improvement in the process documents that are provided with this product, particularly for auto-scaling and other configuration tools that are a bit complicated."
"I would like to see the older dashboard instead of the newer version. I don't like the new dashboard."
"If there are any options to manage containers, that would be good. That relates more to the cost point. For example, over the next three months, I'll be making a comparison between solutions like CAST AI and other software-as-a-service platforms that offer Kubernetes management with an emphasis on cost reduction."
"Challenges include higher costs for smaller clients, limited control over underlying infrastructure customization, and potential latencies during task startup."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Considering the product version used in my company, I feel that the tool is not costly since the product is available for free."
"It is quite expensive. In fact, it accounts for almost 50% of the cost of our entire project."
"Licensing costs can vary. For instance, when purchasing a virtual machine, you're asked if you want to take advantage of the hybrid benefit or if you prefer the license costs to be included upfront by the cloud service provider, such as Azure. If you choose the hybrid benefit, it indicates you already possess a license for the operating system and wish to avoid additional charges for that specific VM in Azure. This approach allows for a reduction in licensing costs, charging only for the service and associated resources."
"I did not pay anything when using the tool on cloud services, but I had to pay on the compute side. The tool is not expensive compared with the benefits it offers. I rate the price as an eight out of ten."
"It is an open-source solution, it is free of charge."
"The tool is an open-source product. If you're using the open-source Apache Spark, no fees are involved at any time. Charges only come into play when using it with other services like Databricks."
"They provide an open-source license for the on-premise version."
"Since we are using the Apache Spark version, not the data bricks version, it is an Apache license version, the support and resolution of the bug are actually late or delayed. The Apache license is free."
"I rate the price of AWS Fargate a four out of five."
"We would advise that this solution has a slightly-higher price point than others on the market. There is a free plan available for start-ups, but the free and lower range licensing models do not provide the full functionality."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Compute Service solutions are best for your needs.
816,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
5%
Financial Services Firm
29%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Apache Spark?
We use Spark to process data from different data sources.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Spark?
Compared to other solutions like Doc DB, Spark is more costly due to the need for extensive infrastructure. It requires significant investment in infrastructure, which can be expensive. While cloud...
What needs improvement with Apache Spark?
The main concern is the overhead of Java when distributed processing is not necessary. In such cases, operations can often be done on one node, making Spark's distributed mode unnecessary. Conseque...
What do you like most about AWS Fargate?
The most valuable feature of Fargate is that it's self-managed. You don't have to configure your own clusters or deploy any Kubernetes clusters. This simplifies the initial deployment and scaling p...
What needs improvement with AWS Fargate?
I would like to see enhanced faster application scaling and better integration with the elastic file system to unify storage volumes and improve the launch time of instances. It requires enhancemen...
What advice do you have for others considering AWS Fargate?
I recommend using AWS Fargate as it offers serverless computing capabilities with integration into load balancing, making it a good and beneficial solution. I'd rate the solution six out of ten.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA JPL, UC Berkeley AMPLab, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, UC Santa Cruz, TripAdvisor, Taboola, Agile Lab, Art.com, Baidu, Alibaba Taobao, EURECOM, Hitachi Solutions
Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Fargate vs. Apache Spark and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.
816,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.