Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Azure Backup vs IBM Spectrum Protect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

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

Azure Backup
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
57
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM Spectrum Protect
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
17th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
149
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Azure Backup is 3.4%, down from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Protect is 2.2%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

RituparnaBhattacharya - PeerSpot reviewer
Achieve cost savings and efficiency with high-level restore capabilities
I use Azure Backup mainly for backing up virtual machines The feature I find most effective in Azure Backup is the high-level restore. Additionally, it has a good impact on our cost savings and operational efficiency as it is a low-cost solution. The area that I believe needs improvement in…
Syed Habib - PeerSpot reviewer
Manageable and comprehensive and integrates robust backup features for core banking
It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dashboard from Browser Spectrum. This is why I am searching for another solution. The product also lacks any centralized graphical user interface (GUI), such as Jarek Pod, and I am limited to using a console-based text user interface, which my local partner handles completely.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This solution allows me to restore either the VM or the data, depending on what is needed."
"The fact that Azure Backup is integrated is one of its biggest advantages."
"The feature that I have found the most valuable is that it is easy to create a backup by using Azure Backup. It also has a good user interface and nice features for sending notifications when any backup fails or there is a change in the status of virtual machines."
"We are happy with this product and have not found any issues while using it."
"It's useful, it works, and it's fairly reliable."
"The feature I find most effective in Azure Backup is the high-level restore."
"I like that it's a stable solution and their support is good. I think Microsoft's commercial force is superior."
"The product is very reliable and easy to use."
"IBM Spectrum Protect is stable."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is application-aware backups."
"The solution can back up every kind of workload in the environment."
"All other products contain the same features, but when I'm backing up an IBM Power server I feel more comfortable with IBM Spectrum Protect because it's the same vendor."
"It's a very stable product, and we've never had any downtime with it."
"The file-restoring feature is the most valuable."
"They have recently added support tickets specifically engineered around performance. This has been very useful for us when we run into issues where customers are looking to try to squeeze a lot more horsepower out of older system."
"The backup of Sybase databases is the most valuable feature in the existing environment. They have got the most documentation out there on the internet for its software protection. The documentation is excellent, and there are a lot of blogs, websites. Because it's still one of the oldest products out there for data protection, there are also lots of people who have a lot of experience in using this solution."
 

Cons

"The compression ratio of the backup data should be improved."
"The user interface is a little bit confusing and it could be better."
"Technical support can be slow to respond at times."
"The monitoring and tagging features could be improved."
"My company faces a lot of difficulties in restoring any encrypted VM backup."
"For companies frequently accessing data or not using Microsoft Azure, the solution may not be very helpful."
"I would like to have the option to increase the frequency of the backups. Azure Backup does backups on an hourly basis, but I would prefer it to take backups more often."
"It doesn't have the option to have a backup from the database. It has backup for the files, folders, and backup only the whole virtual machine. But if I need to do a backup from the Oracle database, from an Exchange server or from SharePoint, this ability isn't there. There is no application backup."
"We are not so happy with the technical support because dealing with them is not easy. We have a very complicated environment, therefore I understand for a support person that it is not easy to troubleshoot it."
"High availability (HA) is a scalability challenge."
"In a future release, it would be a benefit to have the ability to add an application as a storage target, as a storage pool. Additionally, they should add more functionality to the administration for the Operation Center."
"Getting technical support all the necessary diagnostic information is still very painful."
"RTO is a huge gap for us. If we had a disaster scenario and had to recover a bunch of stuff from tape, the RTO would be too long for us."
"There could be various client systems and process integration included in the product."
"Their support is lacking. I've talked to their developers and stuff in the last couple of weeks and they reassure me that some people have retired, and they're working on getting that bumped back up. But the support lacks a lot to be desired at this point."
"It doesn't integrate with storage pools, with a normal pool. I'd like to see that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of the solution does not depend on the service itself but rather on the minimum data volume encountered. This pricing approach seems reasonable and is on par with other competitors in the market. It is a good solution for on-premise needs because it is more cost-effective. When evaluating the overall financial expenditure, including operational costs and the impact on the IT team, Azure Backup is a favorable choice."
"Licensing fees are paid on a monthly basis."
"Azure Backup can be expensive if you are not vigilant about your storage steering."
"The price is somewhat high and could be lower."
"The product is neither too expensive nor too cheap."
"It's around $10 to $15 per month per virtual machine, along with something extra based on the size of the data."
"Pay as you go is the pricing model."
"We do not have any additional costs for Azure Backup."
"The licensing is varied. If we have small environments (not many TB being managed) it is best to license by PVUs (depending on the number of cores of the machine). If we manage many TBs we look at licensing by capacity which allows us to use all the agents of the product."
"At scale, the consumption license (per TB) is very expensive."
"IBM Spectrum Protect can be considered an averagely-priced product."
"It can be perceived as expensive since it is designed for enterprise use."
"It is fairly reasonable as compared to other solutions in the market."
"IBM Spectrum Protect, cost-wise, has way higher pricing than Veeam. By switching over to Veeam, my company saved over $600,000 in USD. The IBM Spectrum Protect pricing is a two on a scale of one to ten. My company paid additional fees for maintenance, apart from the standard licensing fees."
"It is very scalable, but the downside is that it costs money."
"We have capacity licensing. We use the front end. The capacity licensing is pretty okay on the licensing price. I used to use the old PVU-based licensing in the early environment, but now we use capacity-based licensing."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Backup and Recovery solutions are best for your needs.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
9%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Azure Backup differ from Veeam Backup & Replication?
Veeam has a version for Azure but there are organizations, like ours, that are considering moving to an Azure environment and wonder if Azure Backup is better than Veeam Backup and Replication (Vee...
What do you like most about Azure Backup?
Azure Backup is easy to configure and restore.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Backup?
Azure Backup is expensive relative to the value we get from it. I do not have specific details about the licensing cost as it falls under another department.
What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Protect?
It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dash...
 

Also Known As

No data available
IBM TSM, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Russell Reynolds Associates, Somerset County Council, Kardem, PCL Construction
CERN, Einstein Healthcare, Nyherji, Allianz Australia, TZM, ABT Online, NCT, Kindred Healthcare Inc., Cobalt Iron, TransGrid, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Cash America, Piedmont Healthcare, RWGV, Arkansas Tech University, British Columbia Institute of Technology
Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Backup vs. IBM Spectrum Protect and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.