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

Control-M vs F5 BIG-IQ comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 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

Control-M
Ranking in Process Automation
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
135
Ranking in other categories
Managed File Transfer (MFT) (4th), Workload Automation (1st)
F5 BIG-IQ
Ranking in Process Automation
25th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Process Automation category, the mindshare of Control-M is 4.7%, up from 4.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IQ is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Process Automation Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Control-M4.7%
F5 BIG-IQ0.4%
Other94.9%
Process Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Mark_Francome - PeerSpot reviewer
Easily connects to different platforms and ties everything together in a centralized screen
Areas of Control-M that have room for improvement include the reporting feature. The reporting on Control-M hasn't changed much over the years, although it is in a different internal format. It used to be Crystal Reports, and now they've upgraded that. It would be better if that was really flexible where you could define your own reports. You can customize it a little bit, but when people come in with complex questions, you should be able to use that tool and access anything in the database. Control-M has two internal databases that are core to the product. You can go in and do your own SQL queries against the database, but this reporting tool should really be able to do everything that you can do with SQL, and give you good information. Instead, you end up having to export to spreadsheets and then change and update them. It can be very labor-intensive to get this information out. Other than the reporting, they've addressed most things over the years. Control-M is a tool that's been around for more than 30 years, so they have actually fixed most issues that you would encounter. They have a request for enhancement process that most users have sent requests to, but it doesn't move very quickly. The other challenge is they're supporting so many different platforms; BMC just wants it to be a trouble-free release. When users request new features, such as improved reporting, BMC's priority remains maintaining a clean-running system.
Ravindra-Mali - PeerSpot reviewer
Key features like SSL uploading strengthen file handling
From the study material point of view, there are multiple certifications available. The challenge is there is hardly any study material available that can be referred to or used as a study material. Of course, from the knowledge perspective, multiple courses and details are available. However, from a hands-on experience perspective, more resources should be available on the Internet, like labs and lab preparations.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"First of all, the shift from manual to automation has been valuable. We have a tool that can automate."
"The most valuable feature is the reporting function. It allows us to pull up reports for specific information that the end-users are looking for."
"The Automation API has opened up a world of possibilities for us, including the ability to create workflows on-demand using traditional DevOps tools."
"The GUI is the best feature, along with the file transfer capabilities."
"Control-M has enabled true enterprise batch automation, which combined with the other BMC Control products on our mainframe platform, allows us to run a 24/7 site with the lights out."
"Most valuable feature would be the ability to detect and notify when a process has not completed successfully."
"The most valuable features are the Advanced File Transfer and the manage file transfer. They make transferring files securely seamless. It's very easy to set up, get deployed, and have it transferred to and from vendors. As long as we can get our firewall rules implemented at a decent time, it's very easy and seamless to get important files transferred in a secure manner."
"It can do anything that I need. We do real-time jobs. We also do jobs that have to run at certain times. I have not been presented with a scheduling need that I was not able to do. It is very flexible and dynamic."
"The best aspect of the solution is that we can have everything integrated with a rather large capacity in order to personalize and configure specific rules."
"The customer service is great."
"The backup, monitoring and logging are the best features."
"Scalability: To move from larger boxes to smaller boxes, along with virtualization. So, we are not locked into a particular size."
"We use this solution on a daily basis, and it is very stable."
"The reporting feature is quite good."
"Features like AFM, the gateway, and Global DNS are the coolest features that save work for us."
"F5 BIG-IQ reduces the propensity for error."
 

Cons

"In general, it is a very good product, and we are very happy with it. It meets all of our expectations."
"The initial setup was complex, because I wasn't used to it."
"A Control-M on-prem license is based on the number of jobs, which is the number of tasks a particular customer wants to have. These tasks have to be run within 24 hours window. For example, if you have a license for 100 jobs, you can run a maximum of 100 jobs in a 24-hour window. If your operations could not run 10 jobs, and they ran only 90 jobs, they just carry over to the next day, but the next day, they will have 110 jobs. Control-M asks you to buy those 10 more licenses because you were out of compliance in terms of the number of licenses. This is something that needs to be indicated in Control-M GUI so that customers know the number of licenses they're going to use in this time window. Their support and documentation should be improved. I am not that satisfied with their customer support. Sometimes, they don't have the answers. Their documentation is very poor. It is not well written, and it is not in a very logical manner. You can use it on Unix, Linux, Windows, and AIX, but it needs some improvement on iSeries. It needs a built-in mechanism inside the system to give you an option to restore from the last point of failure. If a process crashes, the Control-M needs to have a mechanism in iSeries where the process can be restored from the last point of failure."
"We did encounter a few scalability issues. Sometimes, there are too many jobs in our environment on different servers, but that’s not the tool issue, we can simply increase the FS size. However, that requires bank cost; hence the scalability issue."
"Currently, the history module captures only seven days of job execution data, and if we had at least 30 days available, that would be beneficial for investigating any issues."
"The stability could be improved. I ran into an issue with a recent Control-M patch. The environment would become unstable if security ports were scanned. This is an area they need to improve on, but ultimately it's a relatively small improvement."
"We've also had a few database bugs within our organization. I think we are migrating to OpenJDK rather than just regular Java and that has since shown some issues with our Control-M instance, timing out and causing our jobs to stop running. We are still working with BMC to fine-tune that and get that resolved."
"The community and the networking that goes on within that community need improvement. We want to be able to reach out to an SME, and say, "Hey, we are doing it this way. Does that make sense?" Ideally, they come back. and say, "Yes, it does make sense to do it that way. However, if you want to do it this way, then it is a little more efficient." We understand that one solution framework doesn't fit everybody. Depending on the breadth of the data and how broad it is, you may have different models for one over the other."
"From a hands-on experience perspective, more resources should be available on the Internet, like labs and lab preparations."
"The solution should improve pricing. It's expensive in comparison to other American solutions."
"I had trouble with high availability deployment in my environment."
"The shell, kernel, or Linux has something like a delay, especially with the Virtual Edition, when you are trying to implement it in the cloud and you want to access it remotely with web management. It would be great if they could improve their kernel. It was difficult for me, especially when I got started with BIG-IP. I was struggling to find which commands work with it. If you want to work with it, you have to be a Linux guy."
"They could use YAML or JSON if they wanted to make it a little bit easier for us."
"Integration with VAS is something that they need to work on."
"F5 BIG-IQ should improve by being a complete certificate management solution because currently, it is only for Venafi. Other automation platforms, should be added."
"F5 BIG-IQ is a complex solution, and it cannot manage everything related to BIG-IPs."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost is basically $100 a job, give or take."
"This is an area where it is a little difficult to work with BMC. They want to do licenses by job, which is what we have. For example, the simplest is to license by job, but they can also license by nodes. While the licensing is simple to use, it might not be the correct licensing model for the customer. It is okay because we want to license by job, which is something measurable. At the end of the day, licensing by job is the most important."
"The license model is based on the number of jobs we run on the SaaS application or the number of executions, unlike the on-premise model options. If we have a handful of jobs, it's always good to consider Control-M, but if it's a large number of jobs, Control-M might not be a great option."
"The solution is not cheap, it comes with quite a hefty price tag. Control-M is the market leader, but we still want the price to be as friendly as possible."
"You must accept that BMC licensing can be very confusing. No one can easily understand how they calculate things, whether it is user-based, job-based, or server-based. The calculation is quite tough. How BMC calculates licensing is not easily available anywhere."
"For the tooling that you get, the licensing is acceptable. It has competitive pricing, especially with all the value that you get out of it. There are additional costs with some of the additional modules, but they are all electives. Out of the box, you get the standard Control-M experience and the standard license. They're not forcing some of the modules on you. If you decide that you do need them, you can always purchase those separately."
"Pricing can be steep, but you get what you pay for."
"There are human costs in addition to the standard pricing and licensing of this solution."
"F5 BIG-IQ is a cheap solution."
"I would like the product to be cheaper."
"There is only one licensing fee for F5 BIG-IQ and everything is included in the price."
"Users have to pay an annual subscription fee for the solution's iSeries."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Process Automation solutions are best for your needs.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise113
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

How does Control-M compare with AutoSys Workload Automation?
Control-M acts as a single, centralized interface for monitoring and managing all batch processes, which is helpful because nothing gets left unattended since it is all visible in one place, and th...
What do you like most about Control-M?
First of all, the shift from manual to automation has been valuable. We have a tool that can automate.
What do you like most about F5 BIG-IQ?
F5 BIG-IQ is a central management system for the BIG-IP.
What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IQ?
The product is really good with no significant downsides. However, better and simpler integration with ACI could improve the product.
 

Also Known As

Control M
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CARFAX, Tampa General Hospital, Navistar, Amadeus, Raymond James, Railinc
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Control-M vs. F5 BIG-IQ and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.