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IBM BPM vs IBM Business Automation Workflow vs Nintex Process Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.5
Businesses using IBM BPM reported improved efficiency, automation, and cost savings despite high costs and moderate ROI.
Sentiment score
7.6
IBM Business Automation Workflow enhances efficiency, reduces costs, and accelerates digital transformation for improved ROI and user experience.
Sentiment score
8.2
Nintex Process Platform reduces maintenance costs, increases efficiency, and provides ROI within a year despite some cost concerns.
Initially performed manually, workflows now provide a better user experience and increased efficiency.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.6
IBM BPM customer service is generally positive, with effective support, though response delays and communication issues are noted.
Sentiment score
5.9
IBM Business Automation Workflow's support has mixed reviews, but many find value once acquainted with their processes.
Sentiment score
6.8
Nintex Process Platform customer service is generally well-received, though users desire quicker assistance and note technical support limitations.
The customer service is outstanding.
We had a contract that provided on-site support, which was very satisfactory.
IBM provides long-term support and maintains a traditionally good customer-vendor relationship.
If the solution is readily available to IBM support team, they provide it instantly.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.9
IBM BPM offers impressive scalability, efficiently managing high user volumes with varied experiences and requiring occasional careful tuning.
Sentiment score
7.8
IBM Business Automation Workflow is highly scalable, supporting extensive transactions, concurrent users, and both cloud and on-premises deployments.
Sentiment score
6.9
Nintex Process Platform is generally scalable, effective on Office 365, yet faces challenges with on-premises infrastructure and pricing.
The solution has scalability issues; on a scale, I would rate it at eight out of ten.
I found IBM BPM to be scalable to a certain level but it struggled with large volumes of concurrent transactions.
We are implementing load balancing and horizontal scalability.
We can manage the license usage and scale our environment while optimizing license use.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.1
IBM BPM stability varies; recent versions improve reliability, but issues remain with infrastructure, configuration, and developer expertise.
Sentiment score
7.6
IBM Business Automation Workflow is stable, with minor bugs, improving over time; users rate stability highly due to IBM's robust infrastructure.
Sentiment score
7.5
Users generally praise Nintex Process Platform's stability, noting improvements, reliable performance, and minor disruptions, with ratings averaging seven to nine.
Outside of these maintenance periods, the environment is quite stable.
 

Room For Improvement

IBM BPM needs improved customization, integration, and user-friendliness, addressing complexity and high cost with enhanced API and AI features.
IBM Business Automation Workflow needs improved integration, usability, cloud features, and support to enhance user experience and modernize the platform.
Enhancements needed in Nintex for usability, performance, integration, reporting, UI, deployment, AI integration, and support for custom code.
IBM BPM also lacks smaller solutions, so I must purchase multiple solutions to start with workflows and applications.
Many developments are focused on AI, LLM models, and data science.
Code management lacks merging capabilities.
IBM Business Automation Workflow could be more intuitive, with more advanced low-code features and services definition.
Additionally, the deployment process should be easier.
 

Setup Cost

IBM BPM's high costs suit large enterprises, while flexible Cloud Pak and tiered licensing offer varied pricing options.
IBM Business Automation Workflow is costly but offers high-quality features, flexible licensing, and worthwhile enterprise-level capabilities.
Nintex Process Platform's subscription pricing is considered high compared to competitors, with significant costs for cloud-based user licensing.
SAP is more expensive, but IBM BPM is very expensive.
It is not a cheap license but in line with expectations for such software.
The price of IBM Business Automation Workflow is on the higher side compared to the features it offers.
Nintex Process Platform is expensive.
 

Valuable Features

IBM BPM offers integration, scalability, and low-code development with strong UI, enhancing efficiency and reducing complexities.
IBM Business Automation Workflow offers agile, user-friendly workflow solutions with RPA integration, enhancing collaboration, customization, and AI-driven processes.
Nintex Process Platform offers scalable, no-code solutions with seamless integration, enhancing data management and workflow automation for enterprises.
The integration capabilities of IBM BPM are excellent.
It offers robust workflow features and, despite being a low-code tool, provides extensive customization options.
It assisted in making users concentrate on the process flow rather than just features.
We have integrations with different banks, ERP systems, and other human resource management systems by integrating through different systems.
My team and I created a demo using Nintex, focusing on getting emails, reading, writing, and managing attachments.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Business Process Management (BPM) category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 6.9%, down from 7.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Business Automation Workflow is 2.2%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nintex Process Platform is 2.0%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Management (BPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Prince Mathew - PeerSpot reviewer
More customizable than IBM FileNet and useful for automation
One suggestion for IBM BPM is to provide better integration between their products, such as DataCap, which we use for scanning. Although the new CP4BA offers offline capabilities, not everyone is on CP4BA, so enhanced integration for those on older versions would be beneficial. Another major suggestion is to offer a migration path when a product reaches its end of life. For example, there was no migration path when we moved, so we had to redo everything we had developed over ten years completely.
Ateeq Rehman - PeerSpot reviewer
Customizable features empower seamless workflow automation
The system is fully customizable, very resilient, and fault-tolerant. We have first-line support from IBM, so there are no issues. We have integrations with different banks, ERP systems, and other human resource management systems by integrating through different systems. It provides many ways to integrate, and we are utilizing it effectively.
Vitor Medeiros - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers capacity to integrate with external platforms but technically difficult
There is room for improvement in the user experience in the forms. When we need to develop the forms, we don't have much customization, and I think we need more flexibility there. It's technically difficult, but it would be great to be able to develop our own code and integrate it into the platform. We could then run our own code for specific actions and requests or even develop a page or form. So, if I can ask Nintex for something, it would be a way to integrate our own code for specific actions. When it comes to integration, it could have more options for custom requests.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
30%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
36%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
6%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
19%
Educational Organization
6%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better, IBM BPM or IBM Business Automation Workflow?
We researched both IBM solutions and in the end, we chose Business Automation Workflow. IBM BPM has a good user inter...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM BPM?
Once it is installed, maintaining it is not a big issue.
What do you like most about IBM Business Automation Workflow?
It performs the basic tasks that are required for the BBM solution as part of the overall integration with ECM or ent...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Business Automation Workflow?
The price of IBM Business Automation Workflow is on the higher side compared to the features it offers.
What needs improvement with IBM Business Automation Workflow?
Code management lacks merging capabilities. If parallel development requires merging, improvements in this area would...
What do you like most about K2?
The latest version of Nintex has many features. We have a clear roadmap and the necessary application to integrate it...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for K2?
Nintex Process Platform is expensive. Prices relate to both features and the professional services necessary due to o...
What needs improvement with K2?
The user interface in Nintex needs improvement. It is not very intuitive and requires changes. Additionally, the depl...
 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
Business Automation Workflow
K2 blackpearl, K2 Five, Nintex Workflow
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Barclays, EmeriCon, Banca Popolare di Milano, CST Consulting, KeyBank, KPMG, Prolifics, Sandhata Technologies Ltd., State of Alaska, Humana S.A., Saperion, esciris, Banco Espirito Santo
Key Bank, Barclays, Control€xpert, MIR Insurance Brokers, Conqord Oil
SEA Corp, Omnicom Group, Verizon, STIHL
Find out what your peers are saying about Camunda, Automation Anywhere, Apache and others in Business Process Management (BPM). Updated: June 2025.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.