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IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud vs Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse comparison

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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:
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (18th)
Microsoft Parallel Data War...
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Data Warehouse (9th)
 

Featured Reviews

FM
Database Engineer at Meezan Bank
Enhancing analytics with seamless data dumping and reliable support
Our primary use case is data storage and analytics The organization has decided to purchase a full stack solution from IBM due to positive responses, which helped them upgrade from the previous version. The data dumping into the raw zone and the feature of BigQuery is quite attractive. There…
reviewer2254953 - PeerSpot reviewer
Service Desk Administrator at a real estate/law firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Virtual machines have handled large data and supported growth but pricing still needs improvement
I believe the product is pretty fast. When I have used it, it is handy. The integration with other Azure products is good and integrates well. Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse's security measures help ensure our sensitive data protection during analysis through measures such as encryption. Its scalability is impressive as it scales up and down really well. We go from a couple of users to tons of users all the time, and it scales and handles things really well. One of the major benefits with this product is that it's Microsoft, which is one of the best ones, and it's just plug and play.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Ease of migration from Netezza DB; IBM ported over all Netezza's functionality and made the warehouse DB/dashDB the best of breed of the two."
"The way that it scales will help a lot of customers that are stuck with Netezza boxes that can't grow any larger.​"
"Since my company is an IBM partner, it has enabled us to offer cloud data warehouse solutions on a 100% IBM stack."
"It will be MPP, so performance should improve."
"I like that the dashDB solution is built on DB2 technology, which means that you can use all the features of a DB2 database while outsourcing all the hardware and software maintenance."
"One of the most amazing features of dashDB is how it uses compression to get results in lighting speed."
"It is stable when there is support from IBM."
"DashDB is a good product to work with and the extra cost you spend on performance, technical support and tools to work with is worth it."
"This is a solution that has good performance and I recommend it."
"The solution's integration is good."
"We are able to monitor daily jobs, so if there is anything that needs to be done then we can do it."
"Microsoft SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse provides significant performance boost from 10-100 X times faster for data loading operation."
"The biggest advantage of Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse is the possibility to stop or pause the service because it can be very expensive, and the ability to pause the service when I don't use it is probably the main feature, along with the possibility to handle huge amounts of data, which is quite an interesting capability of the service."
"With PDW’s Massively Parallel Processing (MPP) design, queries run in minutes instead of hours, and in seconds instead of minutes in comparison to Symmetric Multi-Processing (SMP) databases."
"We can store the data in a data lake for a very low cost."
"We are using PDW as an EDW solution."
 

Cons

"Tech support for dashDB is awful. We usually have tickets open for three to four weeks."
"Containers get corrupted very easily. Restoring them using GPFS can result in a lot of issues."
"Db2 is not a solution that I recommend. We have a lot of experience and we are not satisfied with the product or the support that we received."
"I would rate the level of dashDB support 3.5/5. While they are very knowledgeable in many areas, you can still struggle to get the correct resolution."
"The support channels need to improve."
"With dashDB, scalability and uptime need more improvement."
"I would like to see improvements in backup and authentication. It needs the ability to increase the number of retained backups to more than 2 days."
"Ultimately, the product itself has challenges and we are not currently satisfied with the support, either."
"The product scalability needs improvement."
"If the database is large with a lot of columns then it is difficult to clean the data."
"The performance could be improved because the query is slow if we don't optimize it. And even if we optimize it, sometimes it still runs very slow."
"​Concurrent queries are limited to 32, making it more of a data storage mechanism instead of an active DWH solution."
"In the future I would love to see a slightly better automation engine, just for the data integration layer, to make it slightly easier for end-users or junior developers to get involved in incremental updating."
"We have to take the time and resources to build our own business intelligence when other products already incorporate such solutions."
"The product does not have all of the features that the native products have."
"Sometimes, the product requires rolling back to its previous version during a software update. This particular area could be enhanced."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If your going to go with warehouse DB/dashDB, use the cloud or Sailfish version."
"Technical support is an additional fee and is expensive."
"They offer an annual subscription. The pricing depends on the size of the environments."
"The solution is cost-effective."
"The solution's pricing is fairly decent for organizations with huge data sizes."
"Microsoft has an agreement with the government in our country, so our customers get their licensing costs from the Ministry. Whenever we work with any government, company, or government institute, which is mainly what we are doing, that license comes directly from the Ministry of Technology and Information."
"The tool could be expensive if we need to manage a lot of data."
"All the features that we use do not require any additional subscription or yearly fees."
"I think the program is well-priced compared to the other offerings that are out in the market."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Construction Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
21%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise22
 

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud?
Organizations of all sizes, especially those who are in need of powerful and elastic cloud data warehouse solutions that can help administrators maximize the efficiency of their data-based operatio...
What needs improvement with IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud?
There are some limitations in adding data files to table spaces, and improvements are needed for regional support.
What is your primary use case for IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud?
Our primary use case is data storage and analytics.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse?
The pricing could be better; I think it actually just went up.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse?
The basic use case for us is virtual machines. In real estate, we use it for our operations. They handle large data sets well, and the performance is good during those times.
 

Also Known As

IBM dashDB
Microsoft PDW, SQL Server Data Warehouse, Microsoft SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse, MS Parallel Data Warehouse
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Copenhagen Business School, BPM Northwest, GameStop
Auckland Transport, Erste Bank Group, Urban Software Institute, NJVC, Sheraton Hotels and Resorts, Tata Steel Europe
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Db2 Warehouse on Cloud vs. Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.