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IBM DataPower Gateway vs Oracle Service Bus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 3, 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 DataPower Gateway
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Application Infrastructure (9th), SOA Application Gateways (1st), API Management (12th)
Oracle Service Bus
Ranking in Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) category, the mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 6.0%, up from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle Service Bus is 11.1%, up from 11.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)
 

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts
While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.
Radhey Rajput - PeerSpot reviewer
Allows seamless integration and connectivity with different types of systems
I would suggest using this solution. Oracle Service Bus is very good. Any organization can use it. So it's very robust and scalable, and its security features are very good. Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten because there are some loopholes in service and support. Sometimes, when we have issues and go to Oracle support, they will not give us solutions. Instead, they will ask for so many log files and emails. The product is good, but the support is not.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"You don't have to have a separate DMC proxy because DataPower Gateway is an appliance and will take care of a lot of security features. These include data validations, encryption, as well as XML or any type of scripting or security threats that are present."
"The most valuable features for our business include the ability to monitor and log data transactions and handle multiple request at an enterprise level."
"The scalability of the solution is good."
"If you have an API application in your organization that you want to make safe and secure, in addition to your existing WAF or load balancer, this product comes with all those capabilities:"
"It is a scalable solution."
"The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things."
"I like that it is very stable, and we never experience any downtime."
"The solution is stable."
"The most valuable feature is the adapters."
"Service Bus is good at routing the transformation."
"I like the ease of deployment and the ease of implementation."
"With Oracle Service Bus, we can connect with different types of systems. Another feature I like the most is the security feature."
"The interface is fine and the solution is quite robust."
"It has improved the efficiency of development."
"API management and defining varying protocols are the most valuable features"
"The communication between applications is already defined, which means that you don't have to redefine your service infrastructure at the lower level."
 

Cons

"Scripting needs improvement. It's hard for our customers."
"The initial setup isn't so easy, you need who has experience working with the solution to help."
"Making it more user-friendly would be an improvement."
"The IBM community does not have much engagement from the IT community in Saudi Arabia and developers for this solution are difficult to find."
"In the next release, I would like to see the product price reduced. It should be cheaper."
"Small and medium-sized companies might look for cloud-hosted applications due to the cost."
"For the workloads that are not too high, appliance is a little bit expensive."
"An area for improvement in IBM DataPower Gateway is its price point because it's a relatively expensive product. Sometimes, when the customer use case is just a very small subset of what's being offered in IBM DataPower Gateway, then the product can be expensive, making my company lose some of the opportunities because of the expensive pricing. A lower price point for IBM DataPower Gateway, even if that results in a less feature-rich version, would be appreciated. In terms of additional features that I'd like to see in the next release of IBM DataPower Gateway, nothing specific comes to mind because IBM constantly improves its standards and provides quarterly updates to the product, so it's quite fine."
"It's very complex and hard to learn. There's a steep learning curve."
"If they can containerize this, that would be nice. If they can provide docker images and offer support for those containers, that would be great."
"The main problem could be related to timeout issues. This can happen due to legacy systems that might not allow the use of microservices."
"There are some loopholes in service and support."
"The interface console is very slow. Even in production, we need to increase the RAM or CPU. And even after that, the performance is still not good in production."
"This solution should work better with RESTful services."
"It would be ideal if they could optimize it a bit."
"The error-handling capability can be improved"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool's initial costing is expensive for small banks and financial institutions."
"The total cost of IBM DataPower Gateway would depend on the configuration, but in my experience, it can amount to 60,000 Euros per box, even for the virtual version. Usually, customers need high availability and a non-production environment, so the total price for IBM DataPower Gateway can be quite a lot. It can be 200,000 Euros or a similar figure."
"The solution has a return on investment but is a little expensive."
"The cost of this product varies from customer to customer and the relationship with IBM, including how many offerings from IBM are already being used."
"This product is a bit expensive as IBM products are costly assets. However, for enterprise customers it is a worthwhile investment."
"The appliance is a bit on the expensive side for the workloads that are not too high."
"Most customers' use case budgets are not inlined with the price of IBM DataPower Gateway. It is too expensive."
"The product is expensive."
"Oracle Service Bus is a bit expensive"
"I'm not aware of how much Oracle Service Bus costs."
"The price of this solution is better than the subscription-based Mule ESB."
"The pricing is on the higher side."
"We have an unlimited yearly license."
"This is a very expensive product and the price varies depending on factors such as the number of processors and the number of users. Our licensing fees are approximately $300,000."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
29%
Insurance Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?
The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?
I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...
What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?
The DCDR process should be less complex. AI should improve developer efficiency and effort. Whenever I am writing code, it should give recommendations automatically by incorporating AI so I can wri...
What do you like most about Oracle Service Bus?
The stability is consistently high, with only one notable issue encountered.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Service Bus?
I view both Oracle and IBM products as expensive. There are no significant differences in pricing between these products.
What needs improvement with Oracle Service Bus?
The main problem could be related to timeout issues. This can happen due to legacy systems that might not allow the use of microservices. It's a different viewpoint of the system, and such constrai...
 

Also Known As

WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RBL Bank, Availity
MakeMyTrip Ltd., Griffith University, Colab Consulting Pty. Ltd., Pacfico Seguros Generales, IGEPA IT-SERVICE GmbH, Guangzhou Municipal Human Resources and Social Security Bureau, Pacfico Seguros Generales, Bank Audi S.A.L., Rydges Sydney Airport, Intelligent Pathways, Nacional Monte de Piedad IAP
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Oracle Service Bus and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
864,155 professionals have used our research since 2012.