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Apache Spark vs Spot comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 2025

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 Spark
Ranking in Compute Service
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
Hadoop (1st), Java Frameworks (2nd)
Spot
Ranking in Compute Service
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Management (32nd), Server Virtualization Software (15th), Cloud Operations Analytics (1st), Cloud Analytics (5th), Containers as a Service (CaaS) (7th), Cloud Cost Management (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Compute Service category, the mindshare of Apache Spark is 12.0%, up from 11.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Spot is 1.8%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Compute Service
 

Featured Reviews

Dunstan Matekenya - PeerSpot reviewer
Open-source solution for data processing with portability
Apache Spark is known for its ease of use. Compared to other available data processing frameworks, it is user-friendly. While many choices now exist, Spark remains easy to use, particularly with Python. You can utilize familiar programming styles similar to Pandas in Python, including object-oriented programming. Another advantage is its portability. I can prototype and perform some initial tasks on my laptop using Spark without needing to be on Databricks or any cloud platform. I can transfer it to Databricks or other platforms, such as AWS. This flexibility allows me to improve processing even on my laptop. For instance, if I'm processing large amounts of data and find my laptop becoming slow, I can quickly switch to Spark. It handles small and large datasets efficiently, making it a versatile tool for various data processing needs.
Manpreet_Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
Used to manage Kubernetes infrastructure, but it doesn't have support from OCI
Spot Ocean is deployed on the cloud in our organization. I would recommend the solution to other users. You need to have an experience with Kubernetes, or else this product is of no use. It is not difficult to learn to use Spot Ocean. Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution has been very stable."
"The features we find most valuable are the machine learning, data learning, and Spark Analytics."
"With Spark, we parallelize our operations, efficiently accessing both historical and real-time data."
"We use Spark to process data from different data sources."
"It provides a scalable machine learning library."
"The distribution of tasks, like the seamless map-reduce functionality, is quite impressive."
"The most valuable feature of Apache Spark is its ease of use."
"It's easy to prepare parallelism in Spark, run the solution with specific parameters, and get good performance."
"The solution offers both block access and file access, making it a nice solution for customers."
"The solution helps us to manage and scale automatically whenever there is a limit to the increase in the application workflow."
 

Cons

"From my perspective, the only thing that needs improvement is the interface, as it was not easily understandable."
"Apache Spark lacks geospatial data."
"At times during the deployment process, the tool goes down, making it look less robust. To take care of the issues in the deployment process, users need to do manual interventions occasionally."
"Apache Spark should add some resource management improvements to the algorithms."
"Apache Spark's GUI and scalability could be improved."
"The solution must improve its performance."
"One limitation is that not all machine learning libraries and models support it."
"I would like to see integration with data science platforms to optimize the processing capability for these tasks."
"The solution doesn't have support from OCI, and it should start working to onboard OCI."
"There are no particular areas for improvement I can identify."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Since we are using the Apache Spark version, not the data bricks version, it is an Apache license version, the support and resolution of the bug are actually late or delayed. The Apache license is free."
"Spark is an open-source solution, so there are no licensing costs."
"The tool is an open-source product. If you're using the open-source Apache Spark, no fees are involved at any time. Charges only come into play when using it with other services like Databricks."
"It is an open-source solution, it is free of charge."
"Apache Spark is not too cheap. You have to pay for hardware and Cloudera licenses. Of course, there is a solution with open source without Cloudera."
"It is an open-source platform. We do not pay for its subscription."
"Apache Spark is an open-source tool."
"The product is expensive, considering the setup."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
26%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
21%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Apache Spark?
We use Spark to process data from different data sources.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Spark?
Apache Spark is open-source, so it doesn't incur any charges.
What needs improvement with Apache Spark?
There is complexity when it comes to understanding the whole ecosystem, especially for beginners. I find it quite complex to understand how a Spark job is initiated, the roles of driver nodes, work...
What do you like most about Spot Ocean?
The solution helps us to manage and scale automatically whenever there is a limit to the increase in the application workflow.
What needs improvement with Spot Ocean?
There are no particular areas for improvement I can identify.
What is your primary use case for Spot Ocean?
Spot by NetApp is primarily used for backup and also for Fiservware.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Spot Ocean, Spot Elastigroup, Spot Eco
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA JPL, UC Berkeley AMPLab, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, UC Santa Cruz, TripAdvisor, Taboola, Agile Lab, Art.com, Baidu, Alibaba Taobao, EURECOM, Hitachi Solutions
Freshworks, Zalando, Red Spark, News, Trax, ETAS, Demandbase, BeesWa, Duolingo, intel, IBM, N26, Wix, EyeEm, moovit, SAMSUNG, News UK, ticketmaster
Find out what your peers are saying about Apache Spark vs. Spot and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
864,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.