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IBM BPM vs Oracle SOA Suite comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 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 Application Infrastructure
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
112
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (7th), Process Automation (6th)
Oracle SOA Suite
Ranking in Application Infrastructure
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
SOA Governance (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Application Infrastructure category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 3.1%, up from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle SOA Suite is 3.6%, down from 4.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Infrastructure Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM BPM3.1%
Oracle SOA Suite3.6%
Other93.3%
Application Infrastructure
 

Featured Reviews

Muhammad Kamran - PeerSpot reviewer
Has efficient processes and intuitive workflow with many valuable features
You will have access to make any needed changes. Additionally, the review will be published on PeerSpot.com in written or audio format, available to other people. You can stay anonymous if you wish. Notifications and the use of the review are subject to PeerSpot's terms of use, which you can find at PeerSpot.com/TOS. I would give the solution an overall rating of ten out of ten points.
MANOHAR SADDALA - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless integration with multiple systems
I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten. It's not much more dynamic, not as dynamic as you may think, like seeing it in the cloud. In order to use it, you need to have the download servers and then scale up your systems. Oracle SOA Suites serves as a middle layer between applications. For example, let's say you have SAP, and we have Salesforce or Oracle ERP system. Users connect to those systems and perform certain activities or transactions on the applications. Now, if any data needs to be synchronized or any integration needs to happen between these applications, we use the Oracle SOA Suite. It acts as the bridge between the applications, not between the users. It's like having endpoints between the applications. Currently, we have 20 endpoints; 20 systems are connected to it, which is great. Oracle SOA Suite is being used daily. We are using it to its maximum potential.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I liked its robustness the most. It was a very robust platform in my experience. It seemed like a very stable and powerful tool for handling lots of concurrent users and hammering at the system."
"The designer feature, compared to other solutions is easy to use."
"It has improved my organization quite a bit. It brought awareness to what the business processes are, even to the business side, who did not necessarily know what they are."
"Our customers use the solution as a workflow platform to manage their processes."
"I rate the technical support a ten out of ten...The product's installation was easy."
"There are a lot of things that you get out-of-the-box: Timers and so on, which took a lot of effort and code before."
"Its Analytics is the most valuable feature."
"The process creation."
"Middleware jobs developing for EC, ERP, and shipping systems become easier."
"The product allows you to visualize how a company is working currently by providing rich possibilities for analysis such as the audit trails and therefore shows where improvements might be valuable."
"Valuable features include web service development and cloud connectivity."
"Conceptually, how it integrates a lot of essential enterprise process components. That's the most valuable."
"Valuable features include connectors and BAM."
"The new product has come out with SOA Cloud Service and Integration Analytics as well, which gives more options for clients to pick their point of requirements."
"The solution's XSLT or XSL Transformation feature was very useful."
"Enables our Product Manager to post products to different outside EC platforms with only one interface and one process."
 

Cons

"They could provide case studies to investigate and understand the functionality of business processes before development."
"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 would say the scalability is very good but it's not perfect. It is much more scalable than it has been in the past but... it does require some work to keep it stable. So that is an area that should be improved."
"It is a rather thick stack because you have to have WebSphere skills, IBM BPM skills, and an understanding of how the product runs on WebSphere. A lot of this will start to get a lot easier as they put it in containers, which will allow the platform to manage itself in some regards."
"From the testing perspective and minor enhancements perspective, customization is something that is a little tedious as compared to new tools. In addition, various open-source tools that are available are not working with IBM BPM."
"Importing and exporting between multiple environments is more difficult with other tools."
"Stability wavers. We have some opportunities for improvement in this space, especially as we approach our target volume of a million transactions a day. It is tough, because it is not necessarily the product. It is more around the platform and infrastructure to support it, so the connectivity to the database, web sessions, and reverse proxies in front of that."
"The integration could be improved."
"I would like to see divided containers more separately as a microservice."
"One area that could be better is the human task feature. It could be improved to provide more functionality and customization options because it has limited options available."
"Another area of improvement is performance. Because with multiple solutions connecting to the SOA platform, the performance of the SOA platform can be affected in time. So, that could be one area that could be improved with the SOA."
"The installation and adjustment process seems too complex."
"An area for improvement in Oracle SOA Suite is the cost. It could be lower."
"SOA, OSB, SOA Cloud Service."
"If the disk space expansion can be made more flexible, not requiring a database restart, it would be a major benefit."
"Its function options can be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Due to its extensive features and capabilities, the product pricing is more aligned with medium—to large enterprises."
"Price wise, IBM BPM is cheaper than other similar solutions and has excellent pricing."
"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."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the pricing a ten."
"Starting out with Express can also help reduce the cost for adopting the product."
"We have a yearly licensing model. It is not expensive. There are no addition costs to the standard license."
"It is pricey."
"The pricing is very high."
"Based on my knowledge, Oracle SOA Suite doesn't have user-based licensing. It has a system-based licensing model, so you pay for whole systems. Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution, so it's a four out of ten for me."
"It is necessary to evaluate the requirement regarding the platform usage and what the main operation area of the platform will be."
"Oracle pricing is expensive. Support is based on your license. AWS is much better than Oracle in this regard."
"The pricing is not very high as compared to its competitors."
"The product is moderately priced."
"This product is WebLogic based, hence it can be both resource hungry as well as expensive from a licensing point of view."
"Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
28%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
6%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
9%
Performing Arts
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise71
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise40
 

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 do you like most about Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution's XSLT or XSL Transformation feature was very useful.
What needs improvement with Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution’s initial setup is complex and could be improved. A big challenge for Oracle SOA Suite is that you don't get too many technical resources.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
SOA Suite
 

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
7-Eleven, Arcor SAIC, Banca Transilvania, Eaton Corporation, Emdeon, Ferrovial, Griffith University, National Instruments, Pella Corporation, Vodafone Group Plc,
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM BPM vs. Oracle SOA Suite and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,370 professionals have used our research since 2012.