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Mule ESB vs TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Mule ESB
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) category, the mindshare of Mule ESB is 21.4%, down from 22.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus is 3.9%, up from 3.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
 

Featured Reviews

PurbayanSaha - PeerSpot reviewer
Has API-led architecture and provides a unique, user-friendly, and scalable architecture for hosting APIs
There's room for improvement in multi-file transfer functionality. It's not convenient when using MuleSoft, and it should have better capability for handling large amounts of data. For example, applications like GoAnywhere can handle huge chunks of data, so the tool should also have something to facilitate that aspect of integration.
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 setup is straightforward."
"The transformation and the data format are the features that I like the most."
"It was pretty fast to develop APIs on this platform, which is something I liked about it. So, the time to value was pretty good."
"Most of our use cases are for Salesforce. So, the connectors for Salesforce have been really helpful. They've made development two times faster."
"The solution has a good graphical interface."
"The most valuable feature of Mule ESB is data transformation, i.e. our interacting with different systems and orchestrating for our business needs."
"Mule Expression Language"
"For complex cases, we employ the SSLi engine, whereas for simpler ones like healthcare or response data, such as EDI 270 or 271. We prefer to use an external XRT engine instead of handling it within the ESB for ease of management."
"The technology is really easy to learn."
"The most valuable feature is that it is a service-oriented architecture, SOA-based."
"It's very stable and reliable."
"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 most attractive and beneficial feature is the ease of development."
"The most valuable features are the monitoring, ease of use, and easy to understand development GUI."
"The stability of this solution is excellent."
"The product’s most valuable feature is stability."
 

Cons

"The solution isn't as stable as we'd like it to be. There are some ongoing issues and therefore Mule has to provide frequent patches. Mule's core IP should be more stable overall."
"Mule ESB is more into the latest REST APIs, not much into the SOAP web services. Developing is all about web services and not easy with Mule."
"It's not easy to troubleshoot and we still can't make it work."
"There are limitations with the subscription model that comes with the product."
"From an improvement perspective, there should be fewer coding challenges for users in Mule ESB."
"We would like to have a built-in logging framework in which we can do auditing."
"In the next release, I would like to see improvement in the generator for the DataWeave language so that it's a little more graphic."
"In order to meet the new trend of active metadata management, we need intelligent APIs that can retrieve new data designs and trigger actions over new findings without human intervention."
"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."
"In the configuration, where we need to customize, it takes more time that we expect it to, ideally."
"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."
"Our version does not have cloud capabilities."
"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."
"Migration to cloud solutions or products should be made convenient, transparent, and easily understandable."
"The initial setup process could be easier."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This product is cheaper than some offered by other vendors, although there is a problem because you have to pay for some third-party adapters."
"This product is expensive, but it does offer value for money."
"Mule ESB is an expensive solution."
"Most of the challenges that I had with this solution were for smaller customers. There is not a good licensing model or pricing model. It is more expensive than other solutions, and that's the downside of MuleSoft. I had to be creative to be able to sell it to the business, but we did. This is something they have to work on because for large companies, it's affordable, but for small and medium businesses, it's very hard to sell."
"Plan your licensing model (cloud or on-premises or hybrid) that will allow seamless integration with new partners."
"The licensing is yearly, and there are additional fees for services."
"The pricing must be improved."
"The various features and components for this solution are no longer free."
"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."
"The licensing cost is a challenge for quite a few customers."
"Its licensing cost is considerably high as compared to other ESBs."
"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."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Retailer
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Migration from IBM Integration Bus to Mulesoft ESB for a large enterprise tech services company
I was previously part of the Oracle SOA/OSB development team. In my current capacity I architected solutions using MuleSoft Anypoint Platform on cloud / on-premises and hybrid modes and on PCE/RTF ...
IBM Integration Bus vs Mule ESB - which to choose?
Our team ran a comparison of IBM’s Integration Bus vs. Mule ESB in order to determine what sort of ESB software was the best fit for our organization. Ultimately we decided to choose IBM Integratio...
What do you like most about Mule ESB?
The solution's drag-and-drop interface and data viewer helped us quite a lot.
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

No data available
ActiveMatrix Service Bus
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Ube, PacificComp, University of Witwatersrand, Justice Systems, Camelot
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 Mule ESB vs. TIBCO ActiveMatrix Service Bus and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.