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

IBM DataPower Gateway vs TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 3, 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 DataPower Gateway
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Application Infrastructure (9th), SOA Application Gateways (1st), API Management (12th)
TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) category, the mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 5.9%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus is 3.9%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
 

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts
While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.
Mustofa Yonus - PeerSpot reviewer
A robust product that needs to improve the functionality it offers related to API lifecycle management
Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a six to seven out of ten. My company consists of around 7000 employees, and we use the solution as an integrated service in around 300 to 400 systems, both internally and externally, making it a huge number. Our company uses the solution every minute and every second, and we can't function without it.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the security appliance, it's very secure."
"The product's most valuable features are AAA policies and security features."
"I like the API Gateway feature."
"The product is stable...The product is scalable."
"You don't have to have a separate DMC proxy because DataPower Gateway is an appliance and will take care of a lot of security features. These include data validations, encryption, as well as XML or any type of scripting or security threats that are present."
"The API Connect gateway service and the SQL injection feature is good."
"Its initial setup was straightforward."
"It can look for the various security threats, productions, payload scanning, and perform routing based on the content type."
"It is easy to develop. It has a very wide range of features. The older versions are very stable, and there are no issues with the product."
"The technology is really easy to learn."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that the performance is robust."
"TIBCO has the platform in terms of speed and ease of use."
"The solution is very stable."
"The product’s most valuable feature is stability."
"The most attractive and beneficial feature is the ease of development."
"The GUI and IDE features of this solution are easy to work with and to develop. We find application management easy using this solution. It is a stable product"
 

Cons

"Some pre-packaged connectors for integration with various applications, such as SaaS offerings, would be a useful addition."
"The product should be more adapted to the DevOps process."
"The initial setup isn't so easy, you need who has experience working with the solution to help."
"The DCDR process should be less complex."
"The components that they include in the product that are, in fact, a WTX, really need to be removed from the product because they tend to fail."
"The IBM community does not have much engagement from the IT community in Saudi Arabia and developers for this solution are difficult to find."
"DataPower isn't the most user-friendly tool. It is not an easy tool to use. Some things could use better wizards to guide you through processes."
"Its support services could be better."
"If TIBCO could be able to sort the size of their base image in the Container edition, it would be really marvelous. Right now it's around 299 MB. We'd really want it to reduce to a few MBs."
"The solution is very expensive when you use multiple components, it would b better if this could be reduced."
"The intermediate version that we are using has stability issues. These stability issues should be resolved, but it seems like TIBCO is not focusing on resolving these issues. The resolution timelines are quite high even for high-priority incidents. Its price should be lower. Its licensing cost is considerably high as compared to other ESBs."
"The stability of their latest version is not on par with their classic version 5.X."
"In the next release, there should be improvements made to the API manager."
"We'd like to see improvements in product support."
"In the configuration, where we need to customize, it takes more time that we expect it to, ideally."
"Migration to cloud solutions or products should be made convenient, transparent, and easily understandable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive in comparison to other products."
"It's expensive when you compare it with others."
"The cost is very high and requires all five components in the API management solution."
"Most customers' use case budgets are not inlined with the price of IBM DataPower Gateway. It is too expensive."
"The cost of this product varies from customer to customer and the relationship with IBM, including how many offerings from IBM are already being used."
"The appliance is a bit on the expensive side for the workloads that are not too high."
"The total cost of IBM DataPower Gateway would depend on the configuration, but in my experience, it can amount to 60,000 Euros per box, even for the virtual version. Usually, customers need high availability and a non-production environment, so the total price for IBM DataPower Gateway can be quite a lot. It can be 200,000 Euros or a similar figure."
"The tool's initial costing is expensive for small banks and financial institutions."
"When it comes to cost, TIBCO is much more competitive than a product like Pega."
"Price-wise, I would say that the product is expensive."
"The price is on the higher side. For the same price, if I go to the previous version, I would have got a lot more capacity with similar kinds of features."
"The biggest issue disadvantage of TIBCO is that it is expensive."
"Its licensing cost is considerably high as compared to other ESBs."
"The licensing cost is a challenge for quite a few customers."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) solutions are best for your needs.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
29%
Insurance Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Retailer
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?
The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?
I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...
What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?
The DCDR process should be less complex. AI should improve developer efficiency and effort. Whenever I am writing code, it should give recommendations automatically by incorporating AI so I can wri...
What do you like most about TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus?
The most valuable feature of the solution is that the performance is robust.
What needs improvement with TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus?
I don't like the product's API management platform, as it doesn't offer users enough functionality to help with API lifecycle management, making it a product that is way behind its competitors. The...
 

Also Known As

WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower
ActiveMatrix Service Bus
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RBL Bank, Availity
Colonial Life, CTBC Bank, New World Mobility, QUALCOMM, Swisscom Mobile, T-Mobile USA, Tata Teleservices, Telecom Italia
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DataPower Gateway vs. TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.