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Bonita vs IBM BPM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

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

Bonita
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
30th
Ranking in Process Automation
28th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Design (18th)
IBM BPM
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
5th
Ranking in Process Automation
8th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
113
Ranking in other categories
Application Infrastructure (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Business Process Management (BPM) category, the mindshare of Bonita is 1.8%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM BPM is 4.0%, down from 7.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Management (BPM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM BPM4.0%
Bonita1.8%
Other94.2%
Business Process Management (BPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Paparao Nadipineni - PeerSpot reviewer
Architect at Evoke
A simple and lightweight college course automation system with third-party integrations
The initial setup is straightforward and can be completed with the environment within an hour. First, take the latest from the git repository and check the git code to the monitor studio and a bar file, a deployable Bonita archive file. Then, take that process to the Bonita server, running at runtime on another server. Finally, deploy and enable it by selecting the proper organization.
Ateeq Rehman - PeerSpot reviewer
Unit Head System Implementor at Allied Bank Limited
Automation platforms streamline processes and offer flexibility, but AI integration and version upgrades pose challenges
In the technology world, there is always room for improvement. Technologies evolve day by day, especially with the emergence of artificial intelligence and generative AI models. Although IBM BPM is a substantial product, adopting and integrating new technologies quickly is not easy due to the migration and upgrade paths involved. Every time new versions are released, we face business and production challenges that make rapid adoption challenging. The main concern bothering me today regarding IBM BPM is the integration of AI components.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Our lead generation system involves both automated and human tasks. By centralizing the workflow to our internal Bonita BPM system, we have improved the conversion rate (leads to customers) and lowered the number of leads dropped."
"Compared to other products on the market, Bonita presents a pretty acceptable level of robustness."
"The solution is easy to use."
"It is more than helpful, it is worth the effort of learning to better our company."
"The most valuable features of Bonita are the connectors, detailed documentation, and web applications."
"We use the on-premises deployment model and the Bonita Community Edition of the solution."
"It is a great product that is powerful in developing applications."
"Bonita is user-friendly."
"The performance is fine."
"I have had the opportunity to work with various organizations that can be categorized as medium to large scale and was able to successfully deliver process optimization and system integrations that helped the customer increase their ROI and improve their process performance many times over."
"The most valuable feature of IBM BPM is the low code design, and ease of maintenance, and additionally, the integration is good and easy to do."
"Helped our organization move from paper work to automated work."
"We use it for automating certain processes which previously took a lot of time for agents to set up different products for customers, and this has now mostly been automated."
"Automating the whole workflow process to give our data steward the ability to take actions rapidly, and making sure we have all the data synced within the different platforms that we are using."
"We like that it does not require a lot of hours to train our people."
"This is one of the best tools to support the business and the way we work, and the numerous processes we need to implement."
 

Cons

"That said, creating custom connectors for 3rd party applications and APIs is still a challenging task."
"So Bonita is easy to use but it seems to be missing some powerful features that competing products have."
"The support is mandatory to access all features (Subscription), maybe they can have a different business model."
"Scalability of the Bonita BPM Community version is low."
"It is missing some important features that other products have."
"We are struggling a bit with integrations."
"I have run into a lot of problems because there is not enough documentation."
"Bonita must add a rule engine. We are a 360-degree partner of Bonita. We can integrate with any kind of rule engine. We have a dashboard related to engine performance, but getting a configurable dashboard for the Buildium or transactional data will add value."
"The integration could be improved."
"We thought there might have been a little more discussion early on about, "Hey, if you're doing this, set it up this way," or some best practices or some guidance that we didn't get."
"Some of the features are not enough for my business. We need to build custom user management for the many end users affected by BPM."
"The coaches and the user interface are the areas that can be improved a lot. It is good in terms of data processing, but the UI, scripting, and coaches are not very user-friendly and developer-friendly. Performance is always an issue. The scripting and the pattern that it uses are very tedious for new developers to understand, and it takes time to master it in depth. When comparing IBM BPM with IBM APN, a lot of things are provided out of the box in IBM APN. We don't have to write code or a Java connector to make a functionality work. It would be very helpful and time-saving for developers if IBM BPM is improved in this area to provide many functionalities or drag-and-drop options so that the developers don't have to write the code."
"Performance in the development environment space. I know that they have been taking it off the desktop version and putting on the web, and it is not 100% yet."
"The stability varies because it involves a lot of other components like databases, so sometimes if something goes wrong there, it can't recover from the fatal errors."
"Although IBM BPM is a substantial product, adopting and integrating new technologies quickly is not easy due to the migration and upgrade paths involved."
"There is a lot of room for improvement of the dashboards."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"have installed the image of Bonita BPM on Amazon AWS and there is just one option to use and pay for."
"The product is not cheaper, not costlier; it is reasonable. Bonita’s license is very flexible, with options to meet the needs of different customers and clients. Previously, it was less flexible, but now, many different licensing options are available."
"We are using the Community Version, which can be used free of charge."
"I am using the free version of Bonita."
"Price to service ratio with Bonita BPM is good."
"The price is fair for what we are using the solution for."
"You pay an annual fee and can have an unlimited number of processes and users."
"The Enterprise edition is very expensive."
"The pricing is quite high, I would rate it two out of five."
"IBM BPM cannot be considered a cheaply priced product. IBM BPM is a really expensive product compared to other companies. One needs to opt for the perpetual licensing model offered by IBM."
"IBM could improve the price. It is far too expensive."
"When considering the features of the solution the price is expensive compared to competitors."
"It has a low cost to implement. You'll get your money back in the same year that you complete the project."
"Price wise, IBM BPM is cheaper than other similar solutions and has excellent pricing."
"It is pricey."
"It should provide more flexibility to connect with external systems, and there should be in-built services that can be used to integrate with other systems quickly."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
6%
Computer Software Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise72
 

Questions from the Community

How does Bonita compare with Camunda Platform?
One of the things we like best about Bonita is that you can create without coding - it is a low-code platform. With Bonita, you can build the entire mechanism using the GUI, it’s that simple. You c...
Which is better, IBM BPM or IBM Business Automation Workflow?
We researched both IBM solutions and in the end, we chose Business Automation Workflow. IBM BPM has a good user interface and the BPM coach is a helpful tool. The API is very useful in providing en...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM BPM?
Once it is installed, maintaining it is not a big issue.
What needs improvement with IBM BPM?
There are negative aspects, such as IBM BPM being quite heavy and not lightweight, and the licensing cost is higher, which has caused some companies to shift away. IBM BPM is complicated to install...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Bonita BPM
WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

With more than 1000 customers in 75 countries, and its ecosystem of more than 120,000 members, Bonitasoft is the largest provider of open-source Business Process Management, Low-code and Digital Transformation software worldwide.
Barclays, EmeriCon, Banca Popolare di Milano, CST Consulting, KeyBank, KPMG, Prolifics, Sandhata Technologies Ltd., State of Alaska, Humana S.A., Saperion, esciris, Banco Espirito Santo
Find out what your peers are saying about Bonita vs. IBM BPM and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
896,692 professionals have used our research since 2012.