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Amazon SNS vs IBM MQ 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

Amazon SNS
Ranking in Message Oriented Middleware (MOM)
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM MQ
Ranking in Message Oriented Middleware (MOM)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
170
Ranking in other categories
Business Activity Monitoring (1st), Message Queue (MQ) Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) category, the mindshare of Amazon SNS is 5.4%, down from 7.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM MQ is 24.2%, down from 27.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM MQ24.2%
Amazon SNS5.4%
Other70.4%
Message Oriented Middleware (MOM)
 

Featured Reviews

Bireshwar Adhikary - PeerSpot reviewer
The best service available with easy message flow and a pay-as-you-go model
Messages easily flow from publisher or application to subscriber. You can also flow messages from publisher to SNS with an https-like mediator. Amazon SQS is there, so message queue services are also there. The message transports to the service provider such as Redshift, the SQ bucket, Teams, Splunk, or any other message service. The solution has no up-front costs. Messages flow much more quickly than in the past. They used to run a bit late after being published.
Md Al-Amin - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable and secure performance consistently enhances message transfer
IBM MQ is more reliable and secure than other software. There is a saying that for the last 30 years IBM MQ has never been hacked. It is more secure and reliable. Whenever the configuration is done, I do not have to touch it again. It works fine, it is stable, and its communication is to the point and accurate. All performance-related aspects are better. Performance-wise, it is scalable, and other features such as DR, DC, replication, and active passive mode are complex to configure, but it remains scalable. The pricing model for IBM MQ could be more flexible for clients.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Amazon SNS has SMS notifications as well. Most of the other solutions have only email notifications."
"We have found the key feature of this solution to be the simplicity of sending out notifications."
"The best aspect of this solution is its simplicity. We just have to create topics and can have as many subscriptions as we want under any topic we create."
"It's a simple communication service that allows us to communicate with customers."
"The most valuable feature of Amazon SNS is speed. It's really fast."
"The mobile push notifications are the most valuable. Previously, we used to use Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM) for this functionality. It is a Google service for sending push notifications. Android did not have a good service for sending push notifications, but now, Amazon SNS integrates with FCM. Under the road, it is actually using FCM, but we can see all the metrics on our AW service itself, which makes it a lot easier instead of using a third-party service for this particular functionality."
"The initial setup of Amazon SNS was easy."
"Messages easily flow from publisher or application to subscriber."
"The initial setup is easy."
"IBM MQ processes many thousands of messages in a second, which is efficient for handling high transaction volumes."
"On a scale of 1-10, I rate IBM MQ a nine."
"IBM MQ is robust compared to other products in the market. It also gives you support from the IBM team."
"It improves reliability and guarantees that messages are not lost."
"Reliable messaging and throughput are the most valuable."
"I like the MQ's simplicity and rock-solid stability. I've never experienced a failure in two decades caused by the product itself. It has only failed due to human error."
"The most valuable feature is the interaction within the system."
 

Cons

"We would like to have the option when someone leaves the organization or moves to another team, to remove notifications. Currently this needs to be done manually by the company admin."
"In future releases, I want to see if the platforms that SMS can reach. It would be a good way to improve it. More platforms to be able to use it."
"There could be more integration with other solutions."
"There needs to be more documentation on the integration with different platforms."
"We would like the integration with third party applications to be improved within this solution."
"I recently worked with Firebase, and it provides an option to create a marketing campaign with a title and a specific image to inform our audience about something. We just design the campaign and then use the push notifications. It would be good if Amazon also adds a similar feature."
"In terms of improvement, I would like to have better customer support for SNS. We can then manage it very easily."
"Messages should flow through a gateway without the need for a mediator."
"They probably need to virtualize the MQ flow and allow us to design the MQ flow using the UI. It would also help to migrate to the cloud easily and implement AWS Lambda functions with minimum coding. If you have to code, then just with NodeJS or Java."
"The customer service or technical support from IBM is not as good as we expected; it could be better. They don't meet our standards due to the timing to get a person with knowledge."
"While there is support for API, it's not like the modern API capabilities."
"IBM could revamp the interface. The API is huge, but some developers find it limiting because of the cost. They tend to wrap the API course into the JMS, which means they're missing out on some good features. They should work a little bit on the API exposure."
"Scalability is lacking compared to the cloud native products coming into the market."
"the level of training as well as product marketing for this product are not that great. You rarely find a good training institute that provides training. Many of the architects in several organization are neither aware of the product nor interested in using it. IBM should provide good training on products like this."
"There are many complications with IBM MQ servers."
"What could be improved is the high-availability. The way MQ works is that it separates the high-availability from the workload balance. The scalability should be easier. If something happens so that the messages are not available on each node, scalability is only possible for the workload balance."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution has no up-front costs because you pay based on the number of messages you publish."
"One can use the tool for free."
"It is the cheapest solution in the market. It is on a monthly basis. After a month, you are build based on your usage. There are no additional costs to the standard licensing fees."
"Amazon SNS is cheap and I would rate it a three out of ten. The pricing is usage-based."
"The pricing is very cheap."
"The pricing of push notifications and everything is quite fair. If you are using FCM under the hood, it is completely free. When you are using push notification on SMS, it is just a nominal price that you need to pay. SMS services are a lot more costly. It is because we don't have proper providers in India. That's why it gets a lot more costly in terms of SMS. This is the reason why we don't use SMS services from SNS itself. We use other third-party services like SMS Horizon. We use a third-party service for email services. It is almost free. It is just around $1 a month. Configuring Lambda is also quite cheap. You only pay for the Lambda usage. You don't pay for SNS itself."
"Their pricing is competitive. I would rate the cost four out of five."
"Licensing for this software is on a yearly basis. The standard fee includes the maintenance and updates that are released periodically."
"The price of the solution could be reduced, and we are on an annual subscription."
"The pricing needs improvement."
"IBM MQ is expensive and they charge based on the CPU."
"There is real money involved here. As compared to RabbitMQ, IBM MQ is on the higher side in terms of cost."
"IBM's licensing model seems more reasonable than some competitors. They charge based on usage, which is good."
"IBM MQ appliance has pricing options, but they are costly."
"IBM MQ is an expensive solution compared to other solutions. However, if you pay less you will not receive the same experience or features."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
25%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Healthcare Company
6%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
36%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise144
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon SNS?
The most valuable feature of Amazon SNS is speed. It's really fast.
What needs improvement with Amazon SNS?
In future releases, I want to see if the platforms that SMS can reach. It would be a good way to improve it. More platforms to be able to use it.
What is MQ software?
Hi As someone with 45+ years of experience in the Transaction and Message Processing world, I have seen many "MQ" solutions that have come into the market place. From my perspective, while each pro...
What are the differences between Apache Kafka and IBM MQ?
Apache Kafka is open source and can be used for free. It has very good log management and has a way to store the data used for analytics. Apache Kafka is very good if you have a high number of user...
How does IBM MQ compare with VMware RabbitMQ?
IBM MQ has a great reputation behind it, and this solution is very robust with great stability. It is easy to use, simple to configure and integrates well with our enterprise ecosystem and protocol...
 

Also Known As

No data available
WebSphere MQ
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PlayOn! Sports, NASA, Change Healthcare, FCBarcelona
Deutsche Bahn, Bon-Ton, WestJet, ARBURG, Northern Territory Government, Tata Steel Europe, Sharp Corporation
Find out what your peers are saying about Amazon SNS vs. IBM MQ and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,349 professionals have used our research since 2012.