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Appian vs IBM BPM vs Pega Platform 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
7.3
Appian enhances ROI for companies by improving efficiency, reducing costs, and achieving break-even within the first year.
Sentiment score
7.5
Businesses using IBM BPM reported improved efficiency, automation, and cost savings despite high costs and moderate ROI.
Sentiment score
7.6
Pega Platform boosts efficiency, revenue, and ROI up to 80% through improved processes, automation, and quick digital transformation.
They see return on investment in terms of cost savings, time savings, more efficient processes, and more efficient employees.
Appian is very efficient, allowing us to build a lot of applications within a financial year, making it cost-effective.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.5
Appian's customer service is excellent but faces capacity challenges; proactive support is valuable despite complex issue delays and high costs.
Sentiment score
6.6
IBM BPM customer service is generally positive, with effective support, though response delays and communication issues are noted.
Sentiment score
6.8
Pega Platform's customer support receives mixed reviews; premium service users report higher satisfaction but slower response for critical issues.
Their customer service is responsive, and the team is very prompt for support.
The technical support for Appian rates as 10 out of 10 because they have a great support team.
The technical support is generally good.
The customer service is outstanding.
We had a contract that provided on-site support, which was very satisfactory.
The technical support from Pega is very low, rating a one or two out of ten.
I never needed support from the platform standpoint, but if additional features are required, we have regular meetings with the product team for feedback.
Pega's technical support team is very helpful.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
Appian is scalable and flexible, but may encounter performance issues with complex processes and large data volumes.
Sentiment score
6.9
IBM BPM offers impressive scalability, efficiently managing high user volumes with varied experiences and requiring occasional careful tuning.
Sentiment score
7.6
Pega Platform is scalable across industries with some performance challenges, requiring robust infrastructure and strategic capacity planning.
On a scale of one to 10, Appian rates as a nine for scalability.
Appian is scalable, but it depends on how you build your applications.
Initially, without much coding, I can easily handle five thousand records.
The solution has scalability issues; on a scale, I would rate it at eight out of ten.
I found IBM BPM to be scalable to a certain level but it struggled with large volumes of concurrent transactions.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.0
Appian is praised for stability and reliability, with high uptime, seamless updates, and occasional minor database issues.
Sentiment score
7.1
IBM BPM stability varies; recent versions improve reliability, but issues remain with infrastructure, configuration, and developer expertise.
Sentiment score
7.7
Pega Platform is generally stable and reliable, but high task volumes or configurations can cause occasional glitches.
It depends on how it has been designed and how it has been configured.
The stability of Appian would rate as nine, as it's a stable environment.
 

Room For Improvement

Appian needs improvements in flexibility, integration, scalability, team collaboration, mobile features, documentation, licensing, and handling complex processes.
IBM BPM needs improved customization, integration, and user-friendliness, addressing complexity and high cost with enhanced API and AI features.
Users report Pega Platform's complexity, UI issues, and limited customization, seeking improved AI, better support, and enhanced integration.
It has room to improve for use cases where the users are public facing, where anonymous users could come to a site and run a business workflow or interact with some data.
I would like to see more enhancement in the user interface to allow more freedom in designing the sites and pages.
If there is a very complex process that includes a lot of data transitioning and memory-centric processes, it consumes a lot of memory.
IBM BPM also lacks smaller solutions, so I must purchase multiple solutions to start with workflows and applications.
Pega introduced Constellation, which allows a user to build a more engaging visual experience.
My learning curve in robotics has been challenging.
 

Setup Cost

Appian offers flexible pricing with cloud and on-premise options, but costs can rise with usage and require negotiation.
IBM BPM's high costs suit large enterprises, while flexible Cloud Pak and tiered licensing offer varied pricing options.
Pega Platform is costly for small businesses, offering scalable features and negotiable pricing, ideal for large enterprises.
On the pricier side, both Appian and Pega are enterprise-level solutions, placing them on the slightly higher side.
The price of Appian, on a competitive landscape, is a little bit on the higher side for companies, rating maybe a 6.5.
The pricing of Appian is based on the number of users and generally ranges from 70 to 100 USD per user per month.
SAP is more expensive, but IBM BPM is very expensive.
The pricing is expensive, and this is an issue.
Pega is priced higher than open-source options like Flowable but is suitable for large-scale industries like banking and insurance.
 

Valuable Features

Appian provides low-code development, easy integration, scalability, and strong AI-enhanced features with a user-friendly interface and robust support.
IBM BPM offers integration, scalability, and low-code development with strong UI, enhancing efficiency and reducing complexities.
Pega Platform offers rapid deployment, strong integration, and flexible workflows with extensive functionalities for diverse industry needs.
The zero-code integration feature is remarkable, allowing for ease of data transfer and workflow enhancement.
Appian is aiding in leveraging AI technologies in multiple ways: one way is for developers, as they make development efficient and quick by enabling developer co-pilots across various phases of the application, which helps design Appian quickly and provides suggestions along the way.
It is easy for me to define the process and create configurable workflows.
The integration capabilities of IBM BPM are excellent.
Management capabilities such as dashboards.
Pega Platform is excellent for enterprise-level solutions with integrations to entire systems, including case management, service orchestration, CRM, decision-making capabilities, digital process automation, and AI-driven functionalities.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Business Process Management (BPM) category, the mindshare of Appian is 5.7%, down from 6.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM BPM is 6.9%, down from 7.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pega Platform is 5.4%, down from 6.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Management (BPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Nitin-Agarwal - PeerSpot reviewer
Seamless integration enhances workflows while memory optimization can improve complex processes
I am working with all of these products: Pega, Appian, and OutSystems. I use Appian as a process orchestrator for workflow and rule-based routing, and it is preferred when I am developing an enterprise-wide application. The application is mobile-friendly, allowing me to use it across any device…
Prince Mathew - PeerSpot reviewer
More customizable than IBM FileNet and useful for automation
One suggestion for IBM BPM is to provide better integration between their products, such as DataCap, which we use for scanning. Although the new CP4BA offers offline capabilities, not everyone is on CP4BA, so enhanced integration for those on older versions would be beneficial. Another major suggestion is to offer a migration path when a product reaches its end of life. For example, there was no migration path when we moved, so we had to redo everything we had developed over ten years completely.
Balaji  Choda - PeerSpot reviewer
Cost-effective wwith good automation and enhanced UI flexibility
Initially, the Pega Platform was used as a BPM tool. Now, it is not limited to BPM. We can use it for CPM, GRM, and various other functions. We also utilize robotic automation, including desktop automation and process automation The Pega Platform helps in integrating a lot of manual data and…
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
30%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which do you prefer - Appian or Camunda Platform?
Appian is fast when building simple to medium solutions. This solution offers simple drag-and-drop functionality with...
Is Appian a suitable solution for beginners who have no additional preparation?
Appian is actually pretty big on educating its users, including with courses that reward you with certifications. The...
Is it easy to set up Appian or did you have to resort to professional help?
We had some issues when we were setting up Appian. It was quite surprising, since this is a low-code tool which, in i...
Which is better, IBM BPM or IBM Business Automation Workflow?
We researched both IBM solutions and in the end, we chose Business Automation Workflow. IBM BPM has a good user inter...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM BPM?
Once it is installed, maintaining it is not a big issue.
Is Pega BPM easy to work with and can beginners utilize this software?
You do need some preparation to be able to use all functions of Pega BPM. However, all users of this platform are in ...
Have you encountered any issues while using Pega BPM and were you assisted by the company?
My company has been using this tool for years and the only issue we have had, if you can call it that, was while sett...
When you consider the features and benefits of Pega BPM, would you say this product is fairly priced?
Pega BPM can be considered overpriced for some; it all depends on the size of your company and the requirements of y...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Appian BPM, Appian AnyWhere, Appian Enterprise BPMS
WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
Pega BPM, Pegasystems, SmartBPM, PegaRULES
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Hansard Global plc, Punch Taverns, Pirelli, Crawford & Company, EDP Renewables, Queensland Government Department of State Development, Infrastructure and Planning (, Bank of Tennessee
Barclays, EmeriCon, Banca Popolare di Milano, CST Consulting, KeyBank, KPMG, Prolifics, Sandhata Technologies Ltd., State of Alaska, Humana S.A., Saperion, esciris, Banco Espirito Santo
The State of Maine, ANZ, Coca-Cola, Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA), ME, New South Wales, OptumRx, Texas Department of Transportation, UnitedHealthcare Medicare & Retirement
Find out what your peers are saying about Camunda, Automation Anywhere, Apache and others in Business Process Management (BPM). Updated: June 2025.
862,514 professionals have used our research since 2012.