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IBM BPM vs Oracle SOA Suite comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 2025

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 Application Infrastructure
8th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
111
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (8th), Process Automation (6th)
Oracle SOA Suite
Ranking in Application Infrastructure
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
SOA Governance (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Application Infrastructure category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 3.2%, up from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle SOA Suite is 3.9%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Infrastructure
 

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.
MANOHAR SADDALA - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless integration with multiple systems
I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten. It's not much more dynamic, not as dynamic as you may think, like seeing it in the cloud. In order to use it, you need to have the download servers and then scale up your systems. Oracle SOA Suites serves as a middle layer between applications. For example, let's say you have SAP, and we have Salesforce or Oracle ERP system. Users connect to those systems and perform certain activities or transactions on the applications. Now, if any data needs to be synchronized or any integration needs to happen between these applications, we use the Oracle SOA Suite. It acts as the bridge between the applications, not between the users. It's like having endpoints between the applications. Currently, we have 20 endpoints; 20 systems are connected to it, which is great. Oracle SOA Suite is being used daily. We are using it to its maximum potential.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"IBM BPM is easy to deploy."
"I would say that I like its GUI designer the best."
"Automation is the most valuable feature of IBM BPM."
"We made the transformation to agile. Altogether with BPM, it is the total package."
"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."
"It is a stale solution."
"By automating several tasks, we have already reduced a lot of work for the business."
"Technical support is pleasant to work with and always available."
"Valuable features include web service development and cloud connectivity."
"What I like best about Oracle SOA Suite is Oracle support. I also like the tool features, especially the integration feature."
"Valuable features include connectors and BAM."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the option to design, and the development can happen at the same time."
"The most valuable features for us are the APIs, which we commonly use, as well as the scheduling capabilities and file transfers."
"Conceptually, how it integrates a lot of essential enterprise process components. That's the most valuable."
"I would rate my experience with the initial setup an eight out of ten, where one is difficult, and ten is easy."
"The integration with various products."
 

Cons

"We are a government organization, and we are the largest government power sector in India. We generate around 30% of power in India. Therefore, our processes are quite complex. Although IBM BPM is a low-code or no-code software, if you want to have extremely complex workflows, just the business process diagrams are not helpful in creating those workflows. While implementing complex workflows, only the process flow diagrams did not help us. We had to write a lot of Java scripts and Java queries to achieve what we wanted. Its integration capabilities with the SAP environment have to be improved. At present, we are only talking at the web services environment level. Its price also needs to be improved. It is currently expensive. Previously, Active Directory required a heterogeneous environment, but now they want a homogeneous environment. We had onboarded employees through Microsoft Active Directory, and now I have to implement Microsoft AD only from the cloud for my vendors."
"The initial setup process is complex for basic users."
"IBM BPM can improve the dashboards and reports. It only has two dashboards, and reporting is very difficult to build."
"Stability wavers. We have some opportunities for improvement in this space, especially as we approach our target volume of a million transactions a day. It is tough, because it is not necessarily the product. It is more around the platform and infrastructure to support it, so the connectivity to the database, web sessions, and reverse proxies in front of that."
"We still have a couple of issues that we are working on right now with stability. Mostly on the configuration side of the tool, and it has been about a month that we have been working to stabilize the platform.​"
"IBM BPM's price could be improved."
"If you want to use IBM BPM, you will have to invest a lot of money for licenses and you need to learn that there are limitations in developing applications. You cannot create anything you want."
"The product is extremely complex to use and administrate."
"Decrease the number of internal resources which the product uses."
"I would like to see divided containers more separately as a microservice."
"The technical support is good, we have premier support which costs extra."
"An area for improvement in Oracle SOA Suite is the cost. It could be lower."
"An important area that can be improved is the product's data monitoring. When we use the solution for interfacing or end-to-end data monitoring, we want to know exactly where the data is going and exactly where it is failing, or where there is an issue."
"SOA"
"The Maven integration in JDeveloper is very basic and might be enhanced to allow the proper use of Maven."
"The web services need to be more robust."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cloud and license of the subscription model for IBM BPM can be complex. There are a lot of alternatives to choose from."
"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."
"I rate the solution's pricing a four out of ten."
"​We have definitely seen ROI. When we first kicked it off, we said it had to pay for itself within three years, and it did."
"I wish it was less expensive. I don't know why their pricing model is so high for a piece of software that could benefit so many. It just seems to me that they could have a lower cost, maybe with fewer features or whatever, but it should be possible to do a lower cost workflow software that uses the same interface and underlying engine but does not cost so much that you have to be a Fortune 50 company to buy it. It is annoying to me. There are a lot of solutions that IBM has that are really powerful but nobody can afford them. They know their business, but I still feel that there are a lot of customers who would benefit from this sort of thing. I don't know what this elitism is all about. I am sure they have people doing the money numbers, but it seems like you can make a lot more money by selling it to way more people for a little bit less."
"Its price is on the higher side, and it can be improved. Its licensing is on a yearly basis. There are no additional costs."
"Licensing is managed by the client, but we know it is yearly. Camunda is relatively cheaper. There is not much difference in pricing of IBM and PEGA. For large licensing, there are discounts as well."
"It has a low cost to implement. You'll get your money back in the same year that you complete the project."
"The product is moderately priced."
"This product is WebLogic based, hence it can be both resource hungry as well as expensive from a licensing point of view."
"Based on my knowledge, Oracle SOA Suite doesn't have user-based licensing. It has a system-based licensing model, so you pay for whole systems. Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution, so it's a four out of ten for me."
"It is necessary to evaluate the requirement regarding the platform usage and what the main operation area of the platform will be."
"Oracle pricing is expensive. Support is based on your license. AWS is much better than Oracle in this regard."
"The pricing is not very high as compared to its competitors."
"Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
31%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 do you like most about Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution's XSLT or XSL Transformation feature was very useful.
What needs improvement with Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution’s initial setup is complex and could be improved. A big challenge for Oracle SOA Suite is that you don't get too many technical resources.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
SOA Suite
 

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
7-Eleven, Arcor SAIC, Banca Transilvania, Eaton Corporation, Emdeon, Ferrovial, Griffith University, National Instruments, Pella Corporation, Vodafone Group Plc,
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM BPM vs. Oracle SOA Suite and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
850,671 professionals have used our research since 2012.