IBM Db2 on Cloud vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB comparison

IBM and Microsoft are both solutions in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category. IBM is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.0, while Microsoft is ranked #6 with an average rating of 8.2. IBM holds a 1.1% mindshare in DS, compared to Microsoft’s 1.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

IBM Db2 on Cloud

Read 2 IBM Db2 on Cloud reviews

195 Views
140 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Read 89 Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB reviews

224 Views
82 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

IBM Db2 on Cloud

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB and IBM Db2 on Cloud are competing in the cloud database market. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB seems to have the upper hand with its scalability and flexibility, while IBM Db2 on Cloud shines with its robust analytical capabilities.

Features: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB offers global distribution, multi-model database support, and high scalability. IBM Db2 on Cloud provides advanced analytics, transactional processing, and comprehensive data management solutions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB provides swift deployment and comprehensive support services for seamless cloud integration. IBM Db2 on Cloud offers an easy deployment process with robust customer service for supporting complex analytics tasks.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is recognized for its flexible pricing and beneficial ROI owing to its scalability. IBM Db2 on Cloud, although potentially higher in initial costs, justifies the investment with its advanced analytical capabilities.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Db2 on Cloud vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Db2 on Cloud vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

April 2025

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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 Db2 on Cloud

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

11th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)

6th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

NoSQL Databases (3rd), Managed NoSQL Databases (1st), Vector Databases (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of IBM Db2 on Cloud is 1.1%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is 1.6%. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

Featured Reviews

FarhanFarhan

Database Engineer at Meezan Bank

Multi-node architecture and it is good from a security point of view

I would rate the stability a seven out of ten. Most of the issues we faced during troubleshooting were due to specific bugs in the environment, and the only solution was to upgrade the database environment or services. But it is not easy to upgrade the database level when third-party applications are involved, as they are not always comfortable with upgrading. There should be some cumulative solution provided by IBM for their customers, just like other vendors. Upgrading to a certain version doesn't always resolve the issue. It might get resolved at the database level, but what about the other applications integrated with that database that are only compatible with older versions?

Read full review

MichaelJohn

Director | Data & AI at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Very efficient for application-facing scenarios

There are several areas for improvement. Firstly, having a local development emulator or simulator for Azure Cosmos DB would be beneficial. It would be very handy to have a Docker container that developers can use locally. Although, I know there is a free tier and so on and so forth, having a local environment would be nice. For example, SQL Server is very portable. You can even install it on your machine. That is the number one thing that is missing in Azure Cosmos DB. The second improvement area is the IDE of choice. That means how you interact with Azure Cosmos DB. For example, with SQL Server, you have SQL Server Management Studio. I know there is a little bit of support for Azure Cosmos DB in Azure Data Studio, but it is not heavily advertised or it does not feel like first-class citizen support. Developer experience or developer tooling is missing in terms of interacting with the database. Better developer tools or an IDE for interacting with Azure Cosmos DB would enhance the developer experience. Lastly, there is some mixed messaging about what Azure Cosmos DB is, given its multiple APIs. There are so many Azure Cosmos DB APIs available. There is NoSQL. There are MongoDB, Gremlin, and others. There is still some mixed messaging for others who are new to Azure Cosmos DB about what Azure Cosmos DB is. Is this like MongoDB, but then there is also MongoDB in Azure Cosmos DB? I know it well, and I know that the default one is just NoSQL, but others I have interacted with over the last ten years or so get confused.

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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

"The reliability is the most valuable feature. It is also user-friendly."

"Multiple business departments rely on reports and predictive analysis to make decisions for future business based on their data warehouse and Db2 network analytics tool. It helps our business department make decisions."

"The most valuable features include the global write capability, which allows customers to read and write across different regions simultaneously, enhancing performance and availability."

"We have both our SaaS app and the analytical side running without throttling issues."

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is very fast. Data retrieval and data storage are very quick."

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB simplifies the process of saving and retrieving data."

"I truly recommend Cosmos DB because it is a serverless product."

"I like the scalability. There aren't any constraints for posting in the geolocation. I also like the SQL architecture."

"One of the nice features is the ability to auto-scale"

"Cosmos DB's greatest strengths are its easy setup and affordability, especially for those who understand its usage."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pros

Cons

"I would give their support a ten if they had more tutorials available."

"In other environments like Oracle or Teradata, they provide their own solutions for troubleshooting issues. They provide built-in AI services or autonomous databases, which I don't see in the Db2 environment."

"It is easy to use, but optimization has been a mixed experience. It has been more of trying to figure out how to do so. We have not found much support there, so we have to come up with our own way of optimizing it in different ways. That is one area of improvement."

"Overall, it works very well and fits the purpose regardless of the target application. However, by default, there is a threshold to accommodate bulk or large requests. You have to monitor the Request Units. If you need more data for a particular query, you need to increase the Request Units."

"There's a little bit of a learning curve because I was new to Azure. But once you learn the tool, it's pretty straightforward."

"It should offer a simple user interface for querying Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB."

"From about half a billion rows, we're returning maybe 20,000 in two or three minutes. We don't know why, but we are working with Microsoft and a third party to figure that out."

"A minor improvement would be enabling batch operations through the UI. Currently, to delete all documents in a collection, we must use an API, which some of my team finds inconvenient for admin tasks."

"I would give a low rating to Microsoft support, as whenever I talked to them, I never got a solution. I had to guide them."

"The size of the continuation token in Azure Cosmos DB should be static rather than increasing with more data, as it can lead to application crashes."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pricing is based on RUs. Reading 1 KB document costs one RU, whereas writing one document costs five RUs. Pricing for querying depends on the complexity of the query. If you increase the document size, it will automatically increase the RU cost."

"When we've budgeted for our resources, it's one of the more expensive ones, but it's still not very expensive per month."

"Cosmos DB is expensive compared to any virtual machine based on conventional RDBMS like MySQL or PostgreSQL."

"Pricing is one of the solution's main features because it is based on usage, scales automatically, and is not too costly."

"Cost isn’t a big hurdle for us right now. The solution is not costly."

"Azure is a pay as you go subscription."

"The Cosmos DB pricing model, initially quite complicated, became clear after consulting with Azure Advisor, allowing us to proceed with confidence."

"Cosmos DB gave us three accounts for $400. We pay according to the usage."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

No data available

Legal Firm

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Db2 on Cloud?

In other environments like Oracle or Teradata, they provide their own solutions for troubleshooting issues. They provide built-in AI services or autonomous databases, which I don't see in the Db2 e...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering IBM Db2 on Cloud?

Since I have worked with almost every product, including IBM, Teradata is far better than any other data warehouse product. It's a separate database with its own features, architecture, and working...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IBM Db2 on Cloud?

It's a multi-node logical database clustered in three physical nodes. We use a lot of services already provided in our private cloud environment. It's a multi-node architecture.

See all answers

What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The initial setup is simple and straightforward. You can set up a Cosmos DB in a day, even configuring things like availability zones around the world.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

Its cost is transparent. Pricing depends on the transaction and data size, but overall, it is cheaper compared to hosting it on your corporate network due to other factors like power consumption. C...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

I had a challenging experience implementing the emulator with a Mac. I had to install the emulator in a Docker container because it is not natively compatible. A significant amount of time was spen...

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Azure SQL Database vs IBM Db2 on Cloud

Compared 52% of the time

Amazon RDS vs IBM Db2 on Cloud

Compared 48% of the time

More IBM Db2 on Cloud Competitors

Chroma vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 15% of the time

Pinecone vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 10% of the time

Amazon Neptune vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 6% of the time

Amazon DynamoDB vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 6% of the time

Neo4j Graph Database vs Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Compared 5% of the time

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Database as a Service (DBaaS)

March 2025

Download IBM Db2 on Cloud product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

April 2025

Download Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB product report

Also Known As

No data available

Microsoft Azure DocumentDB, MS Azure Cosmos DB

Overview

A fully-managed cloud SQL database. Powered by a turbo-charged Db2 engine.

IBM

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is a globally distributed, multi-model database service providing scalability, user-friendliness, and seamless integration, suitable for managing large volumes of structured and unstructured data across diverse applications.

Azure Cosmos DB is renowned for its scalability, stability, and ease of integration, offering robust support for multiple data models and APIs. Its capacity for handling unstructured data efficiently and providing real-time analytics makes it ideal for applications requiring high performance and global distribution. With features like automatic failover and integration with Microsoft products, users benefit from cost optimization and secure data handling. Enhancement opportunities include simplifying queries, improving documentation, and expanding backup and analytics functionalities.

What are the most important features of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

Scalability and Autoscaling: Efficiently handles growing data and user demands.
Multi-Model Support: Adapts to different data models seamlessly.
Global Distribution: Provides low-latency access across multiple regions.
Automatic Failover: Ensures high availability and reliability.
Integration with Microsoft Products: Offers seamless connectivity with Azure services.

What benefits should users look for in Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB reviews?

Performance and Speed: Exceptionally fast processing for real-time data analytics.
Cost Optimization: Tools for managing expenses effectively.
Secure Data Handling: Implements strong data security measures.
Flexible Data Ingestion: Supports diverse data ingestion methods.

Azure Cosmos DB is frequently used in sectors like web, mobile, IoT, and analytics. It supports applications as a key-value store, processes real-time data, and enables global scalability with low-latency access. Its big data management capabilities and integration with Azure services enhance its utility across industries.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Owens-Illinois, KONE Corp., Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue, Canon Europe, Delhaize America, Wimbledon

TomTom, KPMG Australia, Bosch, ASOS, Mercedes Benz, NBA, Zero Friction, Nederlandse Spoorwegen, Kinectify

Buyer's Guide

IBM Db2 on Cloud vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

April 2025

Free Report: IBM Db2 on Cloud vs. Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

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