Databricks vs IBM Db2 Warehouse comparison

Databricks and IBM are both solutions in the Cloud Data Warehouse category. Additionally, 96% of Databricks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 81% of IBM users who would recommend it.

Databricks

Read 91 Databricks reviews

2,200 Views
88 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

IBM Db2 Warehouse

Read 12 IBM Db2 Warehouse reviews

958 Views
253 Comparison Views

81% willing to recommend

Databricks

IBM Db2 Warehouse

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Databricks and IBM Db2 Warehouse based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Cloud Data Warehouse solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Databricks vs. IBM Db2 Warehouse Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Databricks vs. IBM Db2 Warehouse

June 2025

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Helped 859,129 peers since 2012

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

Databricks

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Data Warehouse (8th), Data Science Platforms (1st), Streaming Analytics (1st)

IBM Db2 Warehouse

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Warehouse (11th)

Featured Reviews

ShubhamSharma7

Data Engineer at a engineering company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Capability to integrate diverse coding languages in a single notebook greatly enhances workflow

Databricks offers various courses that I can use, whether it's PySpark, Scala, or R. I can leverage all these courses in a single notebook, which is beneficial for clients as they can access various tools in one place whenever needed. This is quite significant. I usually work with PySpark based on client requirements. After coding, I feed the Databricks notebooks into the ADF pipeline for updates. Databricks' capability to process data in parallel enhances data processing speed. Furthermore, I can connect our Databricks notebook directly with Power BI and other visualization tools like Qlik. Once we develop code, it allows us to transform raw data into visualizations for clients using analysis diagrams, which is very helpful.

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Ismail Aboulezz

Chief Executive Officer at LeaseWeb

Enhancements in data analysis and decision-making elevate overall performance

The most valuable features of IBM Db2 Warehouse ( /products/ibm-db2-warehouse-reviews ) include its availability, easy integration, ability to deal with a large size of data, excellent performance with no delays, powerful security mechanisms, and effective support. The response time is very quick, and the technical manuals and support from IBM are of high quality. Additionally, it is easy to install, troubleshoot, operate, and secure the environment.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We can scale the product."

"Easy to use and requires minimal coding and customizations."

"I like how easy it is to share your notebook with others. You can give people permission to read or edit. I think that's a great feature. You can also pull in code from GitHub pretty easily. I didn't use it that often, but I think that's a cool feature."

"It can send out large data amounts."

"It's great technology."

"I like that Databricks is a unified platform that lets you do streaming and batch processing in the same place. You can do analytics, too. They have added something called Databricks SQL Analytics, allowing users to connect to the data lake to perform analytics. Databricks also will enable you to share your data securely. It integrates with your reporting system as well."

"The solution offers a free community version."

"Databricks is based on a Spark cluster and it is fast. Performance-wise, it is great."

More Databricks pros

"The most valuable features of IBM Db2 Warehouse include its availability, easy integration, ability to deal with a large size of data, excellent performance with no delays, powerful security mechanisms, and effective support."

"The standout feature of IBM Db2 Warehouse, which is particularly valuable for large enterprises, is its ability to handle big data."

"The analytics engine is not bad at forecasting predictions."

"IBM Db2 Warehouse is more resilient when dealing with business intelligence applications."

"The solution is stable."

"Some of the best features are stored procedures, parallelism, and different indexing strategies."

"I think it scales really well and as long as you take enough time to learn a little bit about it, it works really well."

More IBM Db2 Warehouse pros

Cons

"The integration and query capabilities can be improved."

"Databricks requires writing code in Python or SQL, so if you're a good programmer then you can use Databricks."

"The integration features could be more interesting, more involved."

"The product should incorporate more learning aspects. It needs to have a free trial version that the team can practice."

"Databricks would have more collaborative features than it has. It should have some more customization for the jobs."

"I would like more integration with SQL for using data in different workspaces."

"The biggest problem associated with the product is that it is quite pricey."

"The tool should improve its integration with other products."

More Databricks cons

"In terms of improvement, IBM Db2 Warehouse should be more scalable."

"IBM Db2 Warehouse needs to improve its interface."

"There were some initial challenges with IBM Db2 Warehouse about eight months ago when I worked in this environment. When I coordinated with IBM support, they mentioned that the memory was insufficient for our needs. Our business environment required significantly more memory than the previous cluster could provide. Consequently, we have worked closely with on-site IBM technical personnel to address this issue."

"Lacks sufficient documentation and particularly in Spanish."

"There should be more material available for training and training should be free."

"The primary challenges customers face with IBM Db2 Warehouse are related to its complexity in usage. It requires highly skilled professionals who understand Db2, and both training and support are challenging to obtain."

"Responding to support tickets takes a lot of time. It can range from two to four days, even for critical issues."

More IBM Db2 Warehouse cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is affordable."

"The cost is around $600,000 for 50 users."

"The product pricing is moderate."

"Licensing on site I would counsel against, as on-site hardware issues tend to really delay and slow down delivery."

"The solution requires a subscription."

"The solution is a good value for batch processing and huge workloads."

"We find Databricks to be very expensive, although this improved when we found out how to shut it down at night."

"We pay as we go, so there isn't a fixed price. It's charged by the unit. I don't have any details detail about how they measure this, but it should be a mix between processing and quantity of data handled. We run a simulation based on our use cases, which gives us an estimate. We've been monitoring this, and the costs have met our expectations."

More Databricks pricing and cost advice

"In a traditional on-prem database, in a data warehouse, the solution is probably on the expensive side."

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859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Educational Organization

38%

Financial Services Firm

18%

Computer Software Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Which do you prefer - Databricks or Azure Machine Learning Studio?

Databricks gives you the option of working with several different languages, such as SQL, R, Scala, Apache Spark, or Python. It offers many different cluster choices and excellent integration with ...

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How would you compare Databricks vs Amazon SageMaker?

We researched AWS SageMaker, but in the end, we chose Databricks. Databricks is a Unified Analytics Platform designed to accelerate innovation projects. It is based on Spark so it is very fast. It...

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Which would you choose - Databricks or Azure Stream Analytics?

Databricks is an easy-to-set-up and versatile tool for data management, analysis, and business analytics. For analytics teams that have to interpret data to further the business goals of their orga...

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What do you like most about IBM Db2 Warehouse?

The standout feature of IBM Db2 Warehouse, which is particularly valuable for large enterprises, is its ability to handle big data.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Db2 Warehouse?

The pricing for medium and large environments is almost the same as Oracle. I rate the pricing as six out of ten.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Db2 Warehouse?

There is room for improvement in optimizing certain processes, but most issues arise from my data, hardware architecture, and resources, not from IBM Db2 Warehouse itself.

See all answers

Comparisons

Dataiku vs Databricks

Compared 11% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Databricks

Compared 9% of the time

Informatica PowerCenter vs Databricks

Compared 7% of the time

Dremio vs Databricks

Compared 7% of the time

Tableau vs Databricks

Compared 5% of the time

More Databricks Competitors

Snowflake vs IBM Db2 Warehouse

Compared 44% of the time

Teradata vs IBM Db2 Warehouse

Compared 33% of the time

Oracle Exadata vs IBM Db2 Warehouse

Compared 23% of the time

More IBM Db2 Warehouse Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Databricks

June 2025

Download Databricks product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Db2 Warehouse

June 2025

Download IBM Db2 Warehouse product report

Also Known As

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash

InfoSphere Warehouse, IBM InfoSphere Warehouse

Overview

Databricks is utilized for advanced analytics, big data processing, machine learning models, ETL operations, data engineering, streaming analytics, and integrating multiple data sources.

Organizations leverage Databricks for predictive analysis, data pipelines, data science, and unifying data architectures. It is also used for consulting projects, financial reporting, and creating APIs. Industries like insurance, retail, manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals use Databricks for data management and analytics due to its user-friendly interface, built-in machine learning libraries, support for multiple programming languages, scalability, and fast processing.

What are the key features of Databricks?

User-friendly interface: Simplifies operations and usability.
Built-in machine learning libraries: Facilitates machine learning tasks.
Support for multiple programming languages: Enhances flexibility.
Scalability: Efficiently handles growing data needs.
Fast processing: Improves performance and speed.
Automated optimization: Reduces manual efforts.
Data visualization: Provides insightful visuals.
Collaborative features: Enhances teamwork.
Delta Lake performance: Boosts data management.
Seamless cluster management: Simplifies system operations.

What are the benefits or ROI to look for in Databricks reviews?

Efficiency in handling large datasets: Ensures smooth processing.
Interactive workspace environment: Improves user collaboration.
Integration with platforms: Provides connectivity benefits.
Performance optimization: Enhances overall system performance.
Support for data governance and security: Ensures data integrity and protection.

Databricks is implemented in insurance for risk analysis and claims processing; in retail for customer analytics and inventory management; in manufacturing for predictive maintenance and supply chain optimization; and in pharmaceuticals for drug discovery and patient data analysis. Users value its scalability, machine learning support, collaboration tools, and Delta Lake performance but seek improvements in visualization, pricing, and integration with BI tools.

Databricks

InfoSphere Warehouse is a suite of products that combines the strength of DB2 with a data warehousing infrastructure from IBM. You can use InfoSphere Warehouse to build a complete data warehousing solution that includes a highly scalable relational database, data access capabilities, and front-end analysis tools.

IBM

Sample Customers

Elsevier, MyFitnessPal, Sharethrough, Automatic Labs, Celtra, Radius Intelligence, Yesware

Alameda County Social Services Agency, Sui Southern Gas Company Limited

Buyer's Guide

Databricks vs. IBM Db2 Warehouse

June 2025

Free Report: Databricks vs. IBM Db2 Warehouse

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