IBM App Connect vs SAS Access comparison

IBM and SAS are both solutions in the Cloud Data Integration category. Additionally, 100% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of SAS users who would recommend it.

IBM App Connect

Read 25 IBM App Connect reviews

1,534 Views
84 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

SAS Access

Read 3 SAS Access reviews

273 Views
174 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM App Connect

SAS Access

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between IBM App Connect and SAS Access based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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

To learn more, read our detailed IBM App Connect vs. SAS Access Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM App Connect vs. SAS Access

June 2025

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Helped 859,533 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

IBM App Connect

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Data Integration (7th)

SAS Access

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Integration (56th)

Featured Reviews

Emirhan Guven

Team Leader, Software Development at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees

Transforms data efficiently and navigates licensing challenges with ease

The transition between version 12 and version 13 presents some challenges. While version 12 had approximately 10 features, version 13 includes around 200 features with cloud platform compatibility. The learning curve for developers moving from version 12 to 13 could be smoother. When using new components, better context explanations would be beneficial. In version 13, accessing new features requires connecting through a web browser, which can be challenging to understand. The explanation of new features could be more user-friendly.

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Robert Heck

Co Owner at Hecht und Heck GmbH

The solution is stable, scalable, and flexible

I rate the solution eight out of ten. The number of people required to maintain the solution is dependent on the other applications running. The solution in itself does not require a lot of maintenance. The solution is flexible and I recommend it when you have more complex applications with special requirements.

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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

"App Connect's best feature is that it can be deployed in a container."

"Very scalable, flexible, and user-friendly."

"There is a friendly interface for configuration, and integration is made easy."

"The solution is very fast-paced when it comes to making things right. We can quickly download what we need if we need any app migrations for our software business. We can download it plenty of times when we need to use it. It gives us very high speed for delivering any development."

"When using IBM stacks, IBM App Connect is suitable and integrates well with other IBM products like WebSphere."

"We use IBM App Connect for the integration between the applications."

"One of the most beneficial features is the ability to handle multiple communication technologies, like integrating Kafka flows, which is helpful as other teams heavily use it. Regarding error handling, I initially wrote most of the handling myself. While built-in features for error handling are built-in, it largely depends on the developer. We use a custom solution that catches all exceptions, logs them in a database, and replays them as needed. It has been effective for us for over twenty years."

"Technical support is good."

More IBM App Connect pros

"The most valuable aspect of the solution is the ease of access to the data in those databases."

"The most valuable feature is you have native access to the external databases."

"The most valuable part of SAS/ACCESS is what it is made for: connecting to remote systems that are not part of your physical SAS environment."

Cons

"More connectors could be available for the product as some of the third-party software doesn't have default connectors."

"The installation of containers could be simplified, as it currently requires a senior-level installer."

"IBM App Connect is scalable. From the administration side, they need to improve the RBAC model, as well as the clustering of this product. It will be good if we can start up the cluster, via IBM Connect Console. Some other products like MuleSoft, are providing this type of administration. MuleSoft is easy to use and user friendly."

"One more important point is that if IBM improves its CI/CD capabilities, it will make a big difference. Right now, I have to create my own CI/CD setup from scratch for every client, which is inefficient."

"Finding developers for the product is difficult since it is a niche solution. I know the OpenShift environment is running well for the microservice environment. We had some issues with the other environment we tried to implement. It can be easily implemented internally, but we have some problems in practice."

"The addition of string functionality would be a benefit, particularly in the ESQL space that IBM already uses internally."

"The setup time for App Connect could be improved."

"The user interface of IBM App Connect can be a little bit more user-friendly, I would say because the first-time developer is onboarded while using IBM App Connect, he or she may get a little intimidated or daunted looking at all the options available or the pipelines, et cetera."

More IBM App Connect cons

"The pricing model needs to be reconsidered and adjusted."

"I can't really recall any missing feature or general improvement that is needed. We don't really add too many new kinds of databases and therefore our needs are already met."

"The solution can provide access to the newer databases that come out sooner."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM App Connect's pricing is high compared to other products."

"The price could be better."

"The solution's pricing isn't cheap, but you can get good discounts based on your competitive deal."

"It is very expensive if we want to scale."

"The cost depends upon the consumer."

"The licensing cost for IBM App Connect is very high."

"Initially, App Connect was quite expensive because the cost was based on the number of processors we used. However, it's now based on containers, which means we can be more specific about our consumption and get a better price."

"App Connect is not cheap."

"The solution's pricing and licensing are expensive."

"The pricing model is complex and is based on modular packages as well as the size of the applicable environment."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

22%

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

27%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM App Connect?

I like the adapters. The adapters help us achieve scalability. If you want to connect to SAP, there's an adapter. Salesforce? There's an adapter. You want to connect to another system? There's like...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM App Connect?

Configuration time varies by implementation. For insurance companies with simple JDBC connections, the process is straightforward. However, companies requiring multiple configurations for ODBC, JDB...

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What is your primary use case for IBM App Connect?

I am a developer specializing in IBM App Connect. We have a customer interested in comparing ESB tools, such as webMethods, which was previously owned by Software AG company before IBM acquired the...

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Comparisons

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Compared 33% of the time

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Compared 20% of the time

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Compared 10% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

SAP Process Orchestration vs IBM App Connect

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM App Connect

June 2025

Download IBM App Connect product report

Buyer's Guide

Data Integration

June 2025

Download SAS Access product report

Also Known As

IBM Cast Iron

SAS/Access

Overview

Rapidly connect public clouds, private clouds and on-premises application

App Connect Professional is IBM’s cloud integration offering which delivers an integration solution
• With ease-of-use, flexibility and increased responsiveness to the evolving business needs, while removing the daunting complexities of integration.
• Provides the powerful combination of a ‘simple integration experience’ for business users looking to automate how their applications talk to each other; coupled with a ‘configuration based integration’ approach for IT.
• App Connect Professional is for the teams and integration developers who need to solve more complex problems and need powerful tooling for integration scenarios

IBM

SAS/ACCESS is an out-of-the-box solution for integrating SAS and third-party databases. You can read, write and update data regardless of the database or platform. Because the data appears native to SAS, there is no need to learn Structured Query Language (SQL) or any other database-specific query languages.

SAS

Sample Customers

United Way of Allegheny County, Saint-Gobain CPS, Ricoh, SunTrust Banks Inc.

Los Angeles County, West Midlands Police, Credit Guarantee Corporation, Canada Post, Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty

Buyer's Guide

IBM App Connect vs. SAS Access

June 2025

Free Report: IBM App Connect vs. SAS Access

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM App Connect vs. SAS Access and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

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