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IBM BPM vs Make comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 11, 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

IBM BPM
Ranking in Process Automation
5th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
113
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (5th), Application Infrastructure (6th)
Make
Ranking in Process Automation
23rd
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
AI Software Development (20th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Process Automation category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 4.9%, down from 7.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Make is 1.1%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Process Automation Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM BPM4.9%
Make1.1%
Other94.0%
Process Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Ateeq Rehman - PeerSpot reviewer
Unit Head System Implementor at Allied Bank Limited
Automation platforms streamline processes and offer flexibility, but AI integration and version upgrades pose challenges
In the technology world, there is always room for improvement. Technologies evolve day by day, especially with the emergence of artificial intelligence and generative AI models. Although IBM BPM is a substantial product, adopting and integrating new technologies quickly is not easy due to the migration and upgrade paths involved. Every time new versions are released, we face business and production challenges that make rapid adoption challenging. The main concern bothering me today regarding IBM BPM is the integration of AI components.
FA
Chief Executive Officer at Ashtex Solutions
Flexibility and efficiency accelerate business processes
Make needs to put some focus on or clarify the security aspect in its documentation or website. When creating automation through these modules between two different applications, there should be clarity about whether the data is secure while passing through these automations or integrations created within Make. The pricing of Make at this point is through operations consumption, and it becomes really expensive in certain scenarios when iterations are involved. The operation consumption is too high and sometimes becomes a burden on the client. Make needs to review its pricing strategy since they have tough competition from n8n. Make sometimes has issues with user logins and data saving when simultaneously working on two different PCs or when two developers are working on something or some blueprint. It can lose saved data from one interface to the other, and when logging on with the same user on another workstation, it occasionally misbehaves. We were unaware that Make had its own local implementation module. They need to advertise this feature more effectively as we are developing many projects in Make and working with various clients.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The reach with Integration Adapters and support for adding custom Java code are valuable features."
"It makes the company business processes work more efficiently."
"We have used a lot of out-of-the-box reporting on the process performance metrics. We have been able to make suggested changes to staff for this role or streamlining by eliminate some activities where people were not requiring a lot of work in the first place."
"The designer feature, compared to other solutions is easy to use."
"Scalability is good. In the time that I have been there, we have added more JVMs to help with the increased workload, so it does scale."
"It excels at analytics. It provides visibility across all activities of a company's processes and performance."
"It is easy to take a requirement, put it in the code, and deploy it."
"Automation is the most valuable feature of IBM BPM."
"Make has a very good return on investment because although we pay that amount, we secure clients and the client life cycle is kept intact."
"Make's front-end interface, the modular interface that it has, drag-and-drop interface, is very easy to understand, use, and integrate."
"The most valuable features of Make are the additional options when compared to other similar solutions. For example, with Google my business, you can only do certain things with Zapier, whereas with Make, you can do a little bit more."
"Make's front-end interface, the modular interface that it has, drag-and-drop interface, is very easy to understand, use, and integrate."
 

Cons

"Where it can be improved is Integration. I think that the direction that IBM is taking now, to have something that is much more integrated, that can be seen as one single solution, is clearly the right way."
"The initial setup can be tricky because IBM BPM is not based on a popular stack, and it's difficult to hire a developer for this product."
"I hope IBM uses something from IBM Content Navigator to make the interface easier to navigate."
"There are negative aspects, such as IBM BPM being quite heavy and not lightweight, and the licensing cost is higher, which has caused some companies to shift away."
"We would appreciate more user-friendly definitions of processes with a more user-friendly interface for documenting processes."
"Integration with web services, especially in the standard version of the product."
"Performance in the development environment space. I know that they have been taking it off the desktop version and putting on the web, and it is not 100% yet."
"Could increase vulnerability and security patches to make it more robust."
"The pricing of Make at this point is through operations consumption, and it becomes really expensive in certain scenarios when iterations are involved."
"Make could improve the ease of use, it can be more complicated than other solutions. There are a lot of elements that are more technical than in other solutions."
"One thing is that the platform is really slow when loading. It takes about three minutes to get to the page of an automation and start changing things."
"The pricing of Make at this point is through operations consumption, and it becomes really expensive in certain scenarios when iterations are involved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I wish it was less expensive. I don't know why their pricing model is so high for a piece of software that could benefit so many. It just seems to me that they could have a lower cost, maybe with fewer features or whatever, but it should be possible to do a lower cost workflow software that uses the same interface and underlying engine but does not cost so much that you have to be a Fortune 50 company to buy it. It is annoying to me. There are a lot of solutions that IBM has that are really powerful but nobody can afford them. They know their business, but I still feel that there are a lot of customers who would benefit from this sort of thing. I don't know what this elitism is all about. I am sure they have people doing the money numbers, but it seems like you can make a lot more money by selling it to way more people for a little bit less."
"I rate the tool's pricing a seven out of ten."
"IBM BPM cannot be considered a cheaply priced product. IBM BPM is a really expensive product compared to other companies. One needs to opt for the perpetual licensing model offered by IBM."
"Its price is on the higher side, and it can be improved. Its licensing is on a yearly basis. There are no additional costs."
"I give the pricing an eight out of ten."
"We have a yearly licensing model. It is not expensive. There are no addition costs to the standard license."
"We chose to purchase IBM BPM because it was bundled with the actual RPA program/solution that we decided to purchase. We decided to use Automation Anywhere tool (RPA), and it is was bundled with IBM BPM."
"It has a low cost to implement. You'll get your money back in the same year that you complete the project."
"The price of Make is approximately $20 per month for the platform."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
25%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Insurance Company
6%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise72
No data available
 

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 interface and the BPM coach is a helpful tool. The API is very useful in providing en...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM BPM?
Once it is installed, maintaining it is not a big issue.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Make?
I find the pricing, setup costs, and licensing costs of Make to be reasonable.
What needs improvement with Make?
One thing is that the platform is really slow when loading. It takes about three minutes to get to the page of an automation and start changing things. That is really slow and frustrating. Another ...
What is your primary use case for Make?
In our current company, we have a funnel workflow for the people who sign up. We do certain things such as creating database entries, creating our CRM entries, and then updating the information. If...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
Integromat
 

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
Buan Consulting, Armadia
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM BPM vs. Make and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,114 professionals have used our research since 2012.