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AWS Step Functions vs Automation Anywhere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.2
Automation Anywhere delivers high ROI with quick cost recovery, boosting efficiency and productivity in data-heavy, repetitive tasks.
Sentiment score
9.5
AWS Step Functions reduce development time and costs, enhance scalability and reliability, streamline workflows, and improve ROI.
In terms of cost, we participated in projects achieving two to three million dollars in annual savings.
As a return on investment, we have achieved a 250% ROI in six to nine months, and sometimes it increases up to 380% percent.
Automation Anywhere has helped us save money.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.1
Automation Anywhere's support is knowledgeable and effective despite occasional delays, with valued account managers and praised community resources.
Sentiment score
6.6
AWS Step Functions support is generally effective, especially for enterprise users, though experiences can vary for smaller organizations.
Whenever we need help, we can reach out to them, and they help us out.
We also have dedicated account managers and technical experts to solve our problems related to Automation Anywhere.
We just have to raise a ticket, after which we receive a call, email, or ping from the Automation Anywhere team.
I use enterprise support, which is excellent, providing responses within fifteen minutes.
The speed of reply and the content of their responses usually solve the problems that arise.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Automation Anywhere is scalable and flexible, suitable for large organizations, though budget considerations and infrastructure are necessary.
Sentiment score
7.6
AWS Step Functions is scalable and adaptable, efficiently handling high demand and diverse business needs for various users.
For Windows-based applications, it provides UI interface automation, which enhances its scalability.
Automation Anywhere is highly scalable for both horizontal and vertical expansions.
I would rate it a nine out of ten for scalability.
They can handle multiple simultaneous requests effectively.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.1
Automation Anywhere offers generally stable performance, though users occasionally face issues, particularly during updates and transitions.
Sentiment score
8.5
AWS Step Functions offers strong stability and reliability, ensuring uptime with contingency plans and integration of third-party services.
With the latest applications, there are no significant issues like freezing or crashing.
The platform runs smoothly, and the deployment process is user-friendly in both UAT and production environments.
It usually does not lag or crash.
If one zone fails, others handle the demand, ensuring high availability.
 

Room For Improvement

Automation Anywhere requires improvements in user-friendliness, stability, integration, support services, pricing, and accessibility for better user experience.
AWS Step Functions needs better data handling, integration, pricing clarity, and dynamic coding to improve performance and usability.
It is better to write a Python script instead of using Automation Anywhere's package when dealing with Excel because it is buggy and tends to break.
Making the product more lightweight by reducing its dependency on infrastructure could greatly help in the long run.
It would be beneficial if the platform provided options for power developers to integrate seamlessly with languages like Java or C#, allowing them to write their own scripts and code.
There is room for improvement in terms of integration with other products.
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise buyers view Automation Anywhere as more expensive, suiting large organizations needing comprehensive features and flexible pricing.
AWS Step Functions pricing is complex and variable, with mixed reviews on cost-effectiveness and integration benefits.
It is more cost-efficient compared to all other RPA platforms.
Automation Anywhere costs are aligned with UiPath and Blue Prism, which are also expensive.
It is not cheap, with costs ranging between 700 to 800 dollars per month.
Pricing for Step Functions is very cheap.
The cost is average, provided it is configured correctly.
 

Valuable Features

Automation Anywhere excels with user-friendly interfaces, AI tools, and cloud support, enhancing efficiency and productivity for non-technical users.
AWS Step Functions simplify pipeline creation with integration, visualization, automation, and advanced workflows, enhancing application development and execution.
I can set it up to provide users with a form to fill in all required information, and then the bot operates based on those specifications.
For example, the email module has been enhanced over the years to support all the latest authentication technologies. That is very important as we move away from username and password and embrace multi-factor authentication.
Automation Anywhere has undergone drastic changes over the past five years, transitioning from version 10 to A360, including desktop-based and cloud-based options.
AWS Step Functions offers advanced workflows that save time and enhance efficiency by reducing delays and ensuring consistent orchestration among various services.
Step Functions provide seamless integration with AWS services, which enhances the speed of application development.
It was particularly valuable for its integration capabilities, allowing for execution of scripts and data migration.
 

Categories and Ranking

Automation Anywhere
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
556
Ranking in other categories
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (2nd), Process Mining (1st), Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) (3rd), Agentic Automation (2nd)
AWS Step Functions
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
12th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Workload Automation (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Business Process Management (BPM) category, the mindshare of Automation Anywhere is 0.1%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Step Functions is 2.3%, down from 3.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Management (BPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Vatsal Mehta - PeerSpot reviewer
Accommodates diverse use cases and effectively meets customer requirements
AI agents need further improvements. AI agent technology in agentic process automation is still evolving. We have only scratched the surface, and there are many potential use cases yet to be explored. As technology advances, I believe it will enable us to implement more comprehensive automation solutions. Document Automation has issues related to speed. When I compare Document Automation with IQ Bot, IQ Bot is faster than Document Automation. My understanding is that they are still evolving Document Automation, and this issue of slowness will be resolved in the upcoming .35 version, so we are good with that. They are working on signature identification and validations for handwritten documents. Currently, we are able to extract data out of scanned but digital images, but there is still scope for improvement for handwritten documents.
Carlos Alberto Marangon - PeerSpot reviewer
Automate complex workflows with seamless AWS integration
Step Functions provide seamless integration with AWS services, which enhances the speed of application development. The JSON app launched recently allows us to define data execution more easily. The Standard Workflows feature includes error replay capabilities, which are crucial for efficient error management. The Amazon State Language (ASL) in JSON format facilitates workflow automation and accelerates the deployment of Step Functions.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
31%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It depends on your use case. Is it simply to automate a couple of processes? Is it to augment a human team? AA is very good in certain situations but lacks in others. For me, it's more the team tha...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
From my experience using AA tool, it depends on the applications that you want to automate, because there some applications that AA has limitations for, such as the Oracle. For web-based applicatio...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It is a highly preferred RPA tool. You can check my Automation Anywhere Review to know more.
What do you like most about Amazon Step Functions?
The integration capability is easy, whereas building state machines is tricky.
What is your primary use case for Amazon Step Functions?
I use Step Functions for orchestrating several application workflows. Specifically, I often use Step Functions to automate processes requiring multiple steps and for application orchestration. I fo...
What advice do you have for others considering Amazon Step Functions?
Overall, I would rate AWS Step Functions at least nine out of ten. The technology is robust, but improving the payload size could enhance the product's utility further.
 

Also Known As

Automation Anywhere, Testing Anywhere, Automation Anywhere Enterprise
Amazon Step Functions, Step Functions
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Google, Linkedin, Cisco, Juniper Networks, DellEMC, Comcast, Mastercard, Quest Diagnostics
Alpha Apps, The Guardian, SGK, Bigfinite
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Step Functions vs. Automation Anywhere and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,253 professionals have used our research since 2012.