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IBM API Connect vs TIBCO Cloud API Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 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

IBM API Connect
Ranking in API Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS) (8th)
TIBCO Cloud API Management
Ranking in API Management
27th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of IBM API Connect is 6.1%, down from 6.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO Cloud API Management is 1.0%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM API Connect6.1%
TIBCO Cloud API Management1.0%
Other92.9%
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Shanmugasundaram Shanmuganathan - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers basic API orchestration and provides robust security and governance features
While Azure API Management offers configurable scalability, IBM API Connect relies on Kubernetes clusters. This might seem manual and require defining cluster instances upfront, but it's completely customizable and not on-the-fly scaling. It's completely custom-driven, not on-the-fly scaling, which some may consider cumbersome. Overall, I would rate the scalability an eight out of ten. Almost all applications we've been exposing lately go through this middleware, so it's used extensively. There are around sixty applications directly using it, but six Kubernetes clusters serve those applications. It's heavily used for integration, including system-to-system integration and product integrations. Our usage has been increasing year-on-year based on our needs.
AftabAlam - PeerSpot reviewer
Trust and reliability have been established with long-term usage and significant integration benefits
TIBCO Cloud API Management offers API management plus the ability to orchestrate all inbound and outbound API calls. When an API is exposed to the external system, it functions as a single integration. Behind the scenes, you can perform extensive API modeling, aggregation, and downstream systems can have more than one API and give the response back to a single API call. It has many features such as orchestration rule engine, which makes it quite good. TIBCO Cloud API Management has brought numerous benefits for our organization, especially in product maturity and support. Sales and support are strong areas, and I think it is very good. If they do not get the right support, then they should consider other options. The sales and support also provides cost optimization.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a very scalable solution."
"The most valuable features of the solution stem from the fact that it is very easy to use and is something that is easily configurable."
"One of the most valuable features is the easy-to-use web interface."
"API Connect is a good product, and everything works fine. All the analytics are good, and it is easy to follow up. I like it in that sense. I'm more focused on following up on analytics by seeing how many API calls we are getting and where we see a lot of problems. I was working on that API level."
"The interface is very nice. It makes the solution easy to use and navigate."
"Policy configurations are pretty easy."
"Its speed and performance are valuable."
"The management of the API and API portal is good."
"This has provided a new stream of traffic and exposure of our catalogue beyond the normal web store offering."
"The solution is a good general API manager. They have a few propriety features but are offering items that are standard in the industry as well."
"The control that we have and the security features are very valuable. With regard to API implementation or API orchestration, it works very well in the cloud because as soon as you create an API with one click, you can actually expose your APIs."
"The platform's most valuable features are its capabilities to support security measures such as tokenization, token refresh, throttling, and enforcement of payloads."
"We can completely manage the APIs at the org level and BU (business unit) level."
"It has something called packages. In that way, it's good because we have some pre-built packages. So, if you want to onboard different APIs, we can just add them to the package, and it's there."
"Conversion to RESTful and SOAP protocols and management console (can manage individually throttled settings to manage our service levels for customers)."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management has brought numerous benefits for our organization, especially in product maturity and support."
 

Cons

"When comparing API Gateway with DataPower Gateway, several features in DataPower Gateway are absent in the APIC layer. Examples include the lack of connectivity to MQ."
"The platform’s integration with the payment gateway needs enhancement. The setup process and support services could be improved."
"The integration of an API gateway that implements the sidecar pattern, which can be deployed in cloud applications, and expose the microservices directly in each pod, this can be more decentralized components."
"The installation was difficult with the IBM toolkit."
"Debugging could be improved."
"The solution is not scalable."
"The documentation needs to be a bit better."
"Different versions of the same thing can mean unnecessary duplication."
"The management console of API and customers' applications are not the most intuitive."
"It lacks many features at the API gateway compared to other solutions."
"Policy management has been a bit of a concern."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management should improve its installation and make it easy."
"There are some areas for improvement in TIBCO Cloud API Management, especially regarding network protocols such as SMPP, SMTP, GVI, SVI, and Diameter which could show performance issues in terms of handling and connection management pooling efficiency."
"We observed delays under heavy load conditions, and without proper tuning, changes could take an extended period to filter and become effective."
"They can fix some stability issues and probably make it more user-friendly so that not only an IT savvy person but an end-user can also easily navigate through this solution."
"Monetization is not that great in API management. You need customization. Improvements are needed with sandbox local as well as with monetization. Those features are missing."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an expensive product."
"It is expensive when compared to other products in this class. There were no extra fees for add-ons or technical support."
"This is a licensed product. If your company is looking to obtain a license, you have to work with IBM partners."
"It is an expensive solution. The licensing model is based on a per-subscription and per-subscriber end-user basis, meaning the price is determined by the end-users of the platform."
"The pricing is too expensive with IBM. Sometimes, we prefer to go with an open source or something more lightweight."
"I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price."
"It is a pretty expensive tool."
"It is quite an expensive product."
"Licensing is quite flexible."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management is not an expensive solution."
"Its price is pretty reasonable. There are some lightweight API options available in the market, but given the feature set that TIBCO provides, its price is really reasonable."
"We have secured terms on which we have been happy to renew for a number of years."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Insurance Company
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise58
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM API Connect?
Publishers can easily identify, create, and publish APIs on the developer portal, defining plans, packages, and potentially billing rules.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM API Connect?
Pricing depends on how many instances run across environments. I don't deal with licensing, but compared to other IBM products, the licensing is not significantly higher.
What needs improvement with IBM API Connect?
When comparing API Gateway with DataPower Gateway, several features in DataPower Gateway are absent in the APIC layer. Examples include the lack of connectivity to MQ ( /categories/message-queue-mq...
What do you like most about TIBCO Cloud API Management?
The platform's most valuable features are its capabilities to support security measures such as tokenization, token refresh, throttling, and enforcement of payloads.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Cloud API Management?
My primary role was to assess the solution from a capability perspective. So, there are some issues with the licensing cost.
What needs improvement with TIBCO Cloud API Management?
There are some areas for improvement in TIBCO Cloud API Management, especially regarding network protocols such as SMPP, SMTP, GVI, SVI, and Diameter which could show performance issues in terms of...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Mashery API Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Heineken, Tine, Finologee, Axis Bank
uShip, Sabre, TouchTunes, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, athenahealth, Coca-Cola Enterprises, CentralIndex.com, Constant Contact, Edmunds.com, FoodEssentials, Getty Images, Klout, Rovi, Rotten Tomatoes, Sportradar, TomTom, ACTIVE.com
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM API Connect vs. TIBCO Cloud API Management and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,370 professionals have used our research since 2012.