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Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud vs Starburst Galaxy 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

Apache Kafka on Confluent C...
Ranking in Streaming Analytics
11th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
3.7
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Starburst Galaxy
Ranking in Streaming Analytics
12th
Average Rating
9.8
Reviews Sentiment
1.0
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Data Science Platforms (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Streaming Analytics category, the mindshare of Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud is 0.1%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Starburst Galaxy is 1.3%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Streaming Analytics Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud0.1%
Starburst Galaxy1.3%
Other98.6%
Streaming Analytics
 

Featured Reviews

FABIO LUIS VELLOSO DA SILVA - PeerSpot reviewer
Has enabled asynchronous communication and real-time data processing with strong performance
The valuable features with Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud are the messaging and the asynchronous messages; it's the basic, not advanced usage. It's only to create clusters to receive and send messages. The point is the asynchronous messages and the scalability; it is important for us. To guarantee the compliance of the architecture and the patterns for the company, to provide scalability, and to guarantee the security to send the messages. The Kafka Streams API helps with real-time data transformations and aggregations. It's very fast and helps us to create the project, guarantee the message delivery, and the performance. It's a good experience with very impressive processing and a very impressive project and product.
Stephen-Howard - PeerSpot reviewer
Federated querying delivers integrated data at record speed and reduces processing time
The biggest win has been the ability to combine data from multiple sources and deliver it to the business at record speed. This capability has allowed us to query directly through Starburst Galaxy, enabling teams to access integrated data that would otherwise be hard to pull together. This has reduced both our ETL processing time and storage costs. We are answering questions that would have been hard, if not impossible, to answer previously because the data came from disparate, disconnected sources.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's very fast and helps us to create the project, guarantee the message delivery, and the performance."
"The product's installation phase is pretty straightforward for us since we know how to use it."
"Confluent Cloud handles data volume pretty well."
"Overall, I think it's a good experience. Apache Kafka can be quite complex and difficult to maintain on your own, so using Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud makes it much easier to use it without worrying about setup and maintenance."
"Kafka provides handy properties that allow us to directly configure the data, whether to keep it or discard it after use."
"In case of huge transactions on the web or mobile apps, it helps you capture real-time data and analyze it."
"The state-saving feature is very much appreciated. It allows me to rewind a certain process if I see an error and then reprocess it."
"Some of the best features with Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud are streaming and event capabilities, which are important due to scalability and resiliency."
"Starburst has provided us with virtually guaranteed performance on complex queries across datasets that are in the tens of gigabytes which complete in seconds."
"Starburst on Trino, combined with our SQL-native data transformation tool SQLMesh, has delivered anywhere from a two to five times improvement in compute performance across our transformation DAG."
"Starburst has provided us with virtually guaranteed performance on complex queries across datasets that are in the tens of gigabytes which complete in seconds."
"Starburst Galaxy is becoming a cornerstone of our data platform, empowering us to make smarter and faster decisions across the organization."
"Starburst Galaxy serves as our primary SQL-based data processing engine, a strategic decision driven by its seamless integration with our AWS cloud infrastructure and its ability to deliver high performance with low-latency responses."
"Starburst Galaxy has improved our organization by unifying access to all major data sources, reducing the need for complex ETL processes."
"The most fundamental feature is the query engine, which is much faster than any of the competitors; Starburst is able to finish most queries within 10 seconds, which is especially important for many non-technical employees."
"Starburst Galaxy has improved our organization by unifying access to all major data sources, reducing the need for complex ETL processes."
 

Cons

"In terms of improvements, observability and monitoring are areas that could be enhanced. They are lacking in terms of observability and monitoring compared to other products."
"Maybe in terms of Apache Kafka's integration with other Microsoft tools, our company faced some challenges."
"There are some premium connectors, for example, available in Confluent, which you cannot access in the marketplace, so there are some limitations."
"Regarding real-time data usage, there were challenges with CDC (Change Data Capture) integrations. Specifically, with PyTRAN, we encountered difficulties. We recommended using our on-premises Kaspersky as an alternative to PyTRAN for that specific use case due to issues with CDC store configuration and log reading challenges with the iton components."
"The administration port could be more extensive."
"There could be an in-built feature for data analysis."
"Some areas for improvement in Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud include issues faced during migration with Kubernetes pods."
"There's one thing that's a common use case, but I don't know why it's not covered in Kafka. When a message comes in, and another message with the same key arrives, the first version should be deleted automatically."
"Cluster startup time can be slow, sometimes taking over a minute."
"I would like Starburst to leverage AI to improve usability. Data lakes are complicated and difficult for users to explore."
"Multi-tenancy could be improved. In order to have multiple environments for SSO, we maintain multiple tenants that are connected to different AWS accounts via the Marketplace."
"Cluster startup time is another pain point, typically 3 to 5 minutes, which is not the worst with proper planning but can be annoying for ad-hoc work."
"The most persistent issue is the cluster spin-up time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Regarding pricing, Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud is not a cheap tool. The right use case would justify the cost. It might make sense if you have a high volume of data that you can leverage to generate value for the business. But if you don't have those requirements, there are likely cheaper solutions you could use instead."
"I consider that the product's price falls under the middle range category."
"I think the pricing is fair, but Confluent requires a little bit more thinking because the price can go up really quickly when it comes to premium connectors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
6%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
29%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
8%
Consumer Goods Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise6
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise1
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud?
Kafka and Confluent Cloud have proven to be cost-effective, especially when compared to other tools. In a recent BI integration program over the past year, we assessed multiple use cases spanning s...
What needs improvement with Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud?
If it were easier to configure clusters and had more straightforward configuration, high-level API abstraction in the APIs could improve it. The clustering is a little hard for juniors and clients....
What is your primary use case for Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud?
We need to send a lot of asynchronous messages in this project, and we use the middleware and Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud to guarantee asynchronous messaging between the services. We use Apache...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Starburst Galaxy?
You pay for cluster uptime. It is important to be aggressive about autoscaling, as a single worker will get you a long way. I recommend never connecting a BI tool to your Galaxy cluster. Instead, w...
What needs improvement with Starburst Galaxy?
As a hosted option, I wish I had more control over the cluster configuration, specifically regarding some of the more advanced options. Trino is extremely flexible and powerful, but some of this fu...
What is your primary use case for Starburst Galaxy?
I use Starburst as a cost-efficient hosted option for Trino for data integration and ad-hoc analysis across a broad range of data sources. It is surprisingly useful to query SQL Server, a Google Sh...
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Apache Kafka on Confluent Cloud vs. Starburst Galaxy and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,202 professionals have used our research since 2012.