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IBM BPM vs Oracle BPEL 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

IBM BPM
Ranking in Process Automation
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
111
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (5th), Application Infrastructure (8th)
Oracle BPEL
Ranking in Process Automation
25th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Process Automation category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 7.2%, down from 10.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle BPEL is 0.6%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Process Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Muhammad Kamran - PeerSpot reviewer
Has efficient processes and intuitive workflow with many valuable features
You will have access to make any needed changes. Additionally, the review will be published on PeerSpot.com in written or audio format, available to other people. You can stay anonymous if you wish. Notifications and the use of the review are subject to PeerSpot's terms of use, which you can find at PeerSpot.com/TOS. I would give the solution an overall rating of ten out of ten points.
PN
A highly scalable solution that provides various features for the execution of business processes
I'm a consultant. I do architecting, designing, and development. I have used two versions, 1.1 and 2.0. I’m unsure about the prices because I oversee the development and implementation. I'll highly recommend the product depending on an organization’s requirements. As someone who has worked with BPEL for 13 years, I highly recommend the product for an on-premise or hybrid integration. Multiple products or alternate solutions have come into the integration domain. However, the product has been in the industry from SOA 11g to SOA 12c and OIC. Though there are multiple competitors, the product has been here for a long time and has been helping multiple customers improve their business. Overall, I rate the solution a nine or nine and a half out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"With the tester coach wherein you can interact with the interface while you're designing the process."
"The solution is more customizable than IBM FileNet."
"I like the APIs and the BPM coach is a good tool. But if I had to pick one, it would be the API."
"It provides a very robust environment to build an integration framework or workflow patterns that we have. A lot of changes or modifications have been made to this solution over the past few years. The features that they have added this time have helped developers like us to work on the developmental environment and leverage all the capabilities of the tool. This is what I like about this solution."
"IBM's deployment box is one huge black box. We can create all the services with our own code or without a codebase, however, we have a huge amount of space with practically no limitation."
"There are two or three valuable features, like BPM."
"The platform's most valuable features are its process automation capabilities and its ability to provide a comprehensive view of business operations."
"It's a solid product. It covers most of the pain points for clients."
"The most valuable feature is the support for human tasks."
"The solution is very seamless and fast."
"The product has everything we need."
"What I find the most valuable about Oracle BPEL is that it saves me time."
 

Cons

"Initial setup is very complex. Too many steps need to be done at the database and server levels, and complex configurations. From what I see, a lot of these steps can be and should be automated."
"User Interface components could be further refined to enhance and extend customizations dictated by end clients."
"I would like to see a lot more case studies."
"Better integration with other products in the automation suite."
"I would like to see the front-end support improved because it should be fully integrated and supported."
"IBM BPM needs to have a better and modified interface."
"It is a rather thick stack because you have to have WebSphere skills, IBM BPM skills, and an understanding of how the product runs on WebSphere. A lot of this will start to get a lot easier as they put it in containers, which will allow the platform to manage itself in some regards."
"It needs more customization. We like to customize the screens to show more things related to our company."
"The solution's integration with SAP should be seamless because some formats are not accepted in SAP but are accepted in Oracle BPEL."
"They need to have support for new protocols like GraphQL and possibly some out-of-the-box adapters for SAP and other big systems."
"Some user-defined functions for transformation must be added to the next release of the solution."
"In the next release, I would like to see REST improved and new technologies for microservices. I'd like to see more containers for separating containers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It gives us a good return on investment."
"It's expensive. All software is always extremely high. The manufacturing cost that we have compared to the selling cost, it's not like you're building a house or building a car. But putting that aside, considering that it's expensive, it's a lot of money. If you compare it with some of the other alternatives in the market, it's a similar price. For instance, if you compare it with Pegasystems, it's a similar price."
"IBM could improve the price. It is far too expensive."
"It has a low cost to implement. You'll get your money back in the same year that you complete the project."
"When considering the features of the solution the price is expensive compared to competitors."
"It may be cheaper for organizations to pay for the Viewer licenses that are immediately up and running in the cloud, rather than paying for someone to administer publishing to an intranet."
"The cloud and license of the subscription model for IBM BPM can be complex. There are a lot of alternatives to choose from."
"I give the pricing an eight out of ten."
"The solution's pricing is moderate and not expensive."
"The product is moderately priced."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
31%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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 Oracle BPEL?
They need to have support for new protocols like GraphQL and possibly some out-of-the-box adapters for SAP and other big systems. It should be better if the SAP adapter were included in the bundle.
What is your primary use case for Oracle BPEL?
We primarily use Oracle BPEL for process automation. It is used for workflows for documents, data transfers, and other processes implemented for our customers.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
BPEL Process Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
Nacional Monte de Piedad IAP, Bimbo S.A. de C.V., Intelligent Pathways, DVZ Datenverarbeitungszentrum Mecklenburg-Vorpommern GmbH, Arqiva
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM BPM vs. Oracle BPEL and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.