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IBM FileNet vs SharePoint comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 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 FileNet
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
100
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SharePoint
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
1st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
154
Ranking in other categories
Web Content Management (3rd), Corporate Portals (Enterprise Information Portals) (1st), Enterprise Intranet (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Enterprise Content Management category, the mindshare of IBM FileNet is 10.4%, up from 9.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SharePoint is 17.7%, down from 20.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Content Management
 

Featured Reviews

Emad Rizki - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates seamless integration for large enterprises with strong deployment capabilities
FileNet was scalable and could be implemented into big multinational organizations. However, it has become very expensive recently. Compared to low-code solutions such as Appian and outsystems, FileNet has gaps, mainly because it requires coding, which is not preferred by clients due to pricing concerns in Pakistan. We transitioned clients to cloud solutions, although FileNet has been strongly integrated with on-prem deployments.
Sanil Paul - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlined collaboration through seamless integration and customization
I have been an administrator for SharePoint and have used it as an end-user for document storage. Predominantly, I've been involved in administration SharePoint helps a lot since we've moved from using it directly to using it as a backend for Teams, which makes collaboration easier. It supports…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Gves us the ability to create an end-to-end [document] transaction."
"There is a high degree of usability with this solution. It is highly compatible with our clients' and customers' work environments, making it easy to deploy and implement."
"The beauty is the response time. It is very good nowadays within the platform."
"I would say the workflow is pretty good. Also, the flexibility of being able to create custom objects with a lot of domain-specific attributes that we follow."
"We are able to find the proper documents which are needed for business processes."
"The most valuable feature is access control."
"The product is robust and can process a lot of documents for enterprise content management."
"FileNet is highly scalable and suited for implementation in large multinational organizations."
"It is very stable."
"We can arrange all our documents on one platform and see the document's changes and edits."
"It has helped us with storing all the documents, which means that people are not going to intervene. There is a way of extracting knowledge within documentation and tracking it. There are knowledge assets for where documentation is stored, indexed and searchable through SharePoint."
"The access control is definitely a good feature. We also appreciate the improvements they've made to the online applications, where multiple users can work on the same documents simultaneously. Everything syncs automatically."
"Quantity and variety of partners with solution development ability on the platform."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is file sharing or information sharing."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to easily build intranet sites for communicating within teams, storing documentation, product information, pricing policies, updates on product infrastructure, and other related news."
"It allows for simultaneous users to be on it."
 

Cons

"I think the support could be better, and it could improve."
"I would like IBM to improve with each release, continue moving towards a continual, tighter integration, and build solutions that take advantage of all the different modules the platform has from one place."
"The most valuable features of IBM File Manager are workflow, content, and process capabilities."
"There is room for improvement in the scanning solution, Datacap. It's improving all the time. But since it's more an end-user software, the end-users are constantly improving their processes, and I believe that sometimes we're not catching up with their requirements."
"The initial setup is complex. It is complex because there are several pieces of software that have to be installed in the right order to make it work alright."
"During the initial setup, all the details and different technical things that we were trying to figure out became complex."
"I would like to have an offline DR deployment. If that is doable, then it would be a big win."
"I think it's to the point where there are probably too many features. Every software, as it matures and graduates, grows the list of features. What many of our customers express is that it's just too complicated. They're using maybe five or ten percent of the features but they're having to pay for 100 percent. There is room for improvement in terms of simplifying it."
"The integration with Outlook could be improved."
"Document management and the ability to easily integrate single sign-on (SSO) are areas for improvement in SharePoint."
"The way to change the version of the files in SharePoint should be improved. The method of synchronizing files from local to the cloud can also use improvement."
"The introduction of AI and automation with Copilot could be a beneficial improvement."
"The product could be improved in a lot of way. It is so frustrating to get things to work as advertised."
"It is too heavy. MS should not have paid foreign coders dollars per each row of code. They wasted the stability and reliability in the end."
"Annoyingly, many new Office 365 apps always end up being only US locale for the first year of their life. Microsoft needs to realise that most of their customers are not in the USA."
"​The support is the worst. It is bad when Microsoft support does not even know what to do and you have to tell them. Also, they take too long to solve a problem.​"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"FileNet is quite expensive, although Documentum is expensive too."
"For the medium scale or large scale, I would recommend FileNet. FileNet is free of licensing expenses, thus good for the money. It is not expensive, but worth for the money, especially for medium scale and large scale industries."
"FileNet is not cheap, but you absolutely get what you pay for. ​"
"The platform is inexpensive."
"The solution saves time and money. It helps us to be able to accomplish the goals of our business, as opposed to being tangled in the weeds of what we could do."
"The licensing cost of FileNet is comparable."
"The cost is about $40,000, plus yearly maintenance."
"We use extraction. Therefore, we can see 80 to 85 percent accuracy on data extraction. This reduces the manual indexing part, which is definitely a gain on performance efficiency."
"The pricing is competitive."
"As usual, Microsoft’s licensing structures don’t really seem to fit the needs of their products. This leads to always paying for a project you will never use fully or always be adding to."
"The replacement costs for it are cheaper if you use only SharePoint."
"Licensing can be by server or by seat."
"The cost is expensive, but worthwhile."
"Any extended support from Microsoft is expensive."
"The licensing model for SharePoint Online is based on per user, and it is monthly. The price of the solution overall is good."
"It is pretty reasonable. It is $5 per month per user. We have 12 users now, so it is about $60 per month."
report
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Comparison Review

it_user8925 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 23, 2013
Jive vs Sharepoint vs Drupal Commons
At Mediacurrent we often get requests to compare Drupal to other platforms used for intranet sites and social business platforms (like https://dev.twitter.com/ for example). This is often referred to as “Social Business Software”, which has grown in popularity in recent years. I decided to do a…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Insurance Company
9%
Government
13%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM FileNet?
The product is robust and can process a lot of documents for enterprise content management.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM FileNet?
It depends on the business partner providing the solution to the customer. We have an ESA contract with IBM which allows us to offer the solution at a competitive price, providing added value when ...
What needs improvement with IBM FileNet?
The setup process is very complex, and I would prefer if it were easier. A modern interface would also be an enhancement.
Would Alfresco give an organization more benefits in terms of cost, features & security as compared to Sharepoint?
Alfresco scores are high on all features of an ECM solution and tools. Back office processing, rated as 3.36 good. Business Process Application 3.55 Good to excellent. Document Management 4.12...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SharePoint?
I am not involved in the licensing, but Microsoft offers bundled pricing for Office, SharePoint, and Exchange, making it cost-effective.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
SharePoint 2007, SharePoint 2010
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Suncorp Group Limited, St. Vincent Health, Citigroup, SRCSD, and UK Dept for Work and Pensions.
Toyota, Aeroports de Paris, ASBBank Ltd., Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals, CambridgeshireConstabulary, D&M Group, NPL Construction Company, and The Regional Municipality of Niagara.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM FileNet vs. SharePoint and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
838,640 professionals have used our research since 2012.