IBM Spectrum Protect vs Oracle Data Guard comparison

IBM and Oracle are both solutions in the Backup and Recovery category. IBM is ranked #16 with an average rating of 7.1, while Oracle is ranked #15 with an average rating of 9.3. IBM holds a 2.2% mindshare in BRS, compared to Oracle’s 0.9% mindshare. Additionally, 86% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Oracle users who would recommend it.

IBM Spectrum Protect

Read 149 IBM Spectrum Protect reviews

3,808 Views
2,925 Comparison Views

86% willing to recommend

Oracle Data Guard

Read 31 Oracle Data Guard reviews

1,822 Views
1,206 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

IBM Spectrum Protect

Oracle Data Guard

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

IBM Spectrum Protect and Oracle Data Guard are leading products in data protection and disaster recovery. IBM Spectrum Protect has an edge in pricing, while Oracle Data Guard stands out for its advanced features, making it worth its higher cost for some users.

Features: IBM Spectrum Protect offers comprehensive data backup, recovery capabilities, and strong pricing. Oracle Data Guard provides high availability, data replication, and advanced features for maintaining data continuity.

Room for Improvement: IBM Spectrum Protect could benefit from a simpler installation process, more cloud service integrations, and better documentation. Oracle Data Guard could improve with a less complex management interface, more user-friendly documentation, and simplified deployment procedures.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM Spectrum Protect is noted for its straightforward deployment and strong customer service. Oracle Data Guard has a steeper learning curve during deployment but is backed by quality support, compensating for its deployment challenges.

Pricing and ROI: IBM Spectrum Protect is valued for its cost-effectiveness and provides a faster ROI. Oracle Data Guard, while more expensive, offers significant ROI through its robust feature set for enterprises needing high-availability solutions.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Oracle Data Guard Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Oracle Data Guard

April 2025

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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 Spectrum Protect

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

16th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

149

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Oracle Data Guard

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

15th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of IBM Spectrum Protect is 2.2%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle Data Guard is 0.9%, down from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Backup and Recovery

Featured Reviews

Syed Habib

Head of Infrastructure Security (S.A.V.P) at EXIM Bank Ltd

Manageable and comprehensive and integrates robust backup features for core banking

It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dashboard from Browser Spectrum. This is why I am searching for another solution. The product also lacks any centralized graphical user interface (GUI), such as Jarek Pod, and I am limited to using a console-based text user interface, which my local partner handles completely.

Read full review

IfeoluwaOshinowo

Senior Oracle Database Administrator at Computer Information Systems (CIS)

Makes data protection and network management much easier

The initial setup is straightforward, provided you know the source, target, data version and format. You need to consider all those things. First and foremost, when deploying Oracle Data Guard, the number one priority is to ensure all parameters are correctly set. Two primary methods exist: using backups or recovering from services if the network is reliable. If the network is robust, backups from the source to the target may not be necessary. You must ensure that NIS names are correctly configured on both sides and that the failover and switchover processes are tested successfully from both production and standby environments. Once these steps are completed, the deployment process becomes straightforward. There's no need to copy the entire parameter file; only specific configurations, such as the SID or file structure, must be adjusted if necessary. Ensuring proper DNS name resolution, SID configurations, parameter settings, and understanding whether to convert the Data Guard are essential. Once these aspects are identified, the deployment process becomes more straightforward. I have implemented numerous Data Guard setups. Setting up Oracle Data Guard is performed within the Oracle CRS. Challenges may arise in establishing connectivity between the standby and production databases, necessitating troubleshooting. Apart from that, once configured within CRS, the setup is complete. The challenge with Oracle Data Guard is that it often takes some time for us to identify whether the issues stem from the disk or the network. If we report issues to the network or storage teams from the database end, we may not perceive any apparent problems, which can lead to confusion. We can convince the storage teams to investigate further until we delve into the disk I/O Guard and determine if specific disks operate at total capacity. When disks are operating at total capacity, it can significantly impact application processes. These difficulties in pinpointing the source of issues contribute to the challenges of maintaining and managing Oracle Data Guard.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Regarding stability, it's been rock solid."

"Every time customers make a change or we have made a change, then they use the product to do a cloning and refreshing. They are happy that they get good performance something changes."

"Incremental forever: This feature helps us reduce backup time and backup storage space."

"IBM Spectrum Protect offers stable software and products."

"What I found most valuable in IBM Spectrum Protect is that it allows you to back up physical machines, and its proxy feature lets you back up virtual machines."

"It is a really scalable solution. We can scale it up. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten."

"All other products contain the same features, but when I'm backing up an IBM Power server I feel more comfortable with IBM Spectrum Protect because it's the same vendor."

"You can do restores very quickly. You can mount a drive and restore it right from the drive."

More IBM Spectrum Protect pros

"One of the most valuable features is real-time replication. The version we're using is reliable and easy to deploy."

"Data Guard also improved because customers with an active Data Guard license want to reduce the I/O in a production environment. Some application complaints to it for Oracle reporting purposes. It has a production environment that needs to be enhanced."

"Oracle Data Guard has a nice feature called the DataGuard snapshot to open the solution in the read-write mode and make some changes to the database."

"We have not encountered any major challenges with replication. We were able to achieve near-real-time replication. Also, with the switchover failover, we were not getting any technical issues. It's a pretty stable product."

"Backup and application continuity are most valuable."

"The most important feature is that if I want to test the database at the disaster recovery site, I can take a snapshot, test it, and then revert it back to the original state without needing to restore the complete database from the primary data center to the disaster recovery."

"We chose this solution for the availability of the databases. We can't afford Oracle Grid, this is the best solution if you want something similar that's less expensive."

"Another valuable feature is the possibility of backing up the database from the standby database instead of the primary database, to avoid backup process overhead in the primary system."

More Oracle Data Guard pros

Cons

"I would like to see monitoring within the platform: monitoring for storage pools and monitoring for the server's health (e.g., CPU and memory)."

"It might be seen as leaning towards the legacy side, missing some features of newer solutions. The main drawbacks would be its complexity and high pricing."

"An area for improvement would be the ease of use - the GUI is not up to the mark compared to other products in the market."

"Replication services would be nice. If these could be enhanced to be always on so multiple storage backup services could be added as a cluster pool. This would provide a better availability service."

"We cannot take VMware backups for our banking data center environment."

"The interface could be more user-friendly."

"This solution is not mature in terms of disaster recovery and could be improved."

"IBM Spectrum Protect could be improved by making the installation easier. Once it's implemented, it's okay. IBM started lagging behind when things started moving to storage and cloud-based solutions. Even though they've recently released updates that give cloud-based protection, personally, I still believe they are not up to par with the likes of Rubrik. The entire product is a little bit clumsy because they have co-joined two different products, so it's complex. Even from a sales/explaining to people what it does point of view, it's complex. Whereas, if you take more current products, it's a single box solution. You reel it in, you fire it up, you do a couple of points and clicks, and off you go, whereas the IBM system is seriously complex. There's a lot of training involved and it's a massively difficult product to sell at this point in time."

More IBM Spectrum Protect cons

"The IP implementation and maintenance are a little bit hard to manage across Oracle solutions, including Oracle Data Guard."

"The pricing of the solution is quite high. They should do what they can to bring it down so that it is more reasonable for customers like us."

"Oracle could be improved by the ability to manage it on the cloud. This on-premises version is secure and reliable, but I'm sure that they will soon provide a cloud solution that will be even better. In one to two years, we will probably move to the cloud—we have already moved to the cloud with Microsoft Exchange, but our databases are still on-premises. I would prefer managing a cloud version of Oracle."

"When the data replicates into the standby database there is a possibility of having a microsecond amount of data loss. The data loss occurs when there is a network disconnection between the primary and secondary standby database located in the data centers or if there is a crash in the primary database."

"The usage of block storage devices in the cloud or migration of a type of storage from one site to another site can be improved. Currently, we have to use multi-node to single node because of the lack of storage support on the Azure side. It did not really work. Our DBA had to spend a lot of time tweaking the Data Guard tools, or the underlying Oracle VMs, to make sure that Data Guard would run on top of different types of storage. So, if it can support transporting or getting from one type of storage to another type of storage in a different site or a different technology, it would be very helpful."

"The implementation is complex for anyone who's jumping into it without any experience. It's all command-line driven implementations. For some, that's a turn-off."

"The database administration needs improvement. With Oracle, we have a lot of features for administrating data, but it might be too many. It needs to be simplified. It should be automated. Looking at Enterprise Manager, there are too many KPIs in place."

"The product could improve its pricing."

More Oracle Data Guard cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing fees are between $8,000 and $10,000 per year."

"The price of IBM Spectrum Protect is expensive. However, there are a few packages and it is unclear because, for the entry suite they have both options, which are the back-end storage capacity and the front-end storage capacity."

"The price of IBM Spectrum Protect is expensive and there is only a standard licensing fee."

"We worked our licensing into a capacity model, which is nice. Now, everything is much simpler to manage from a licensing perspective."

"It is very scalable, but the downside is that it costs money."

"It's very complicated. Licensing is a pain."

"It is really expensive. Its price is not good for Latin America. Its price is good for the United States or Europe."

"We have found that the pricing is high in our country."

More IBM Spectrum Protect pricing and cost advice

"It's a cost-effective solution."

"Oracle Data Guard is a feature available only in Oracle Database Enterprise Edition, and is available for extra cost."

"The cost of the Oracle license will depend on the negotiations with Oracle."

"The cost is expensive."

"The licensing cost is significantly high."

"It is not a cheap product, but if you look at the price, features, availability, scalability, and maturity, it is a very good product."

"If you want to have everything automated and done smoothly, you have to add additional licenses."

"The pricing is on the higher side."

More Oracle Data Guard pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

University

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Spectrum Protect?

IBM Spectrum Protect is stable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Protect?

It's expensive. I acknowledge the cost associated with it.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Protect?

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

Ik fluister:VM Host Oracle en DataGuard hebben we per toeval vervangen door Zerto :-) tijdens de Zerto implementatie en VPG werden de Host Data in write-ack Block-Level gerepliceerd. Qua licentie 1...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

It is a very useful administrative IT tool. It saves on costs. I strongly recommend Data Guard. I've been using it for eight years and I would strongly recommend it. I'd rate Oracle Data Guard a se...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

We're Oracle partners. We've worked with databases 11G and 12C. If a company is planning to implement Oracle solutions, I would suggest they also implement Data Guard. I'd rate the solution nine ou...

See all answers

Comparisons

IBM Spectrum Protect Plus vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 18% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 18% of the time

Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 10% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 10% of the time

Rubrik vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 7% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Protect Competitors

Veeam Data Platform vs Oracle Data Guard

Compared 27% of the time

Cohesity DataProtect vs Oracle Data Guard

Compared 14% of the time

AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery vs Oracle Data Guard

Compared 14% of the time

Veritas NetBackup vs Oracle Data Guard

Compared 9% of the time

Dell NetWorker vs Oracle Data Guard

Compared 9% of the time

More Oracle Data Guard Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Protect

April 2025

Download IBM Spectrum Protect product report

Buyer's Guide

Oracle Data Guard

April 2025

Download Oracle Data Guard product report

Also Known As

IBM TSM, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager

Active Data Guard

Overview

IBM Spectrum Protect (Tivoli Storage Manager) is a data protection platform that gives enterprises a single point of control and administration for backup and recovery. It is the flagship product in the IBM Spectrum Protect (Tivoli Storage Manager) family. It enables reliable, cost effective backups and fast recovery for virtual, physical and cloud environments of all sizes.

IBM

Oracle Data Guard ensures high availability, data protection, and disaster recovery for enterprise data. Data Guard provides a comprehensive set of services that create, maintain, manage, and monitor one or more standby databases to enable production Oracle databases to survive disasters and data corruptions. Data Guard can be used with traditional backup, restoration, and cluster techniques to provide a high level of data protection and data availability.

Oracle

Sample Customers

CERN, Einstein Healthcare, Nyherji, Allianz Australia, TZM, ABT Online, NCT, Kindred Healthcare Inc., Cobalt Iron, TransGrid, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Cash America, Piedmont Healthcare, RWGV, Arkansas Tech University, British Columbia Institute of Technology

Athenahealth, Discover Financial Services

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Oracle Data Guard

April 2025

Free Report: IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Oracle Data Guard

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Oracle Data Guard and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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