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IBM Informix vs SAP IQ comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 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 Informix
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
25th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Embedded Database (10th)
SAP IQ
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
23rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Data Warehouse (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Relational Databases Tools category, the mindshare of IBM Informix is 1.8%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP IQ is 2.2%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Relational Databases Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SAP IQ2.2%
IBM Informix1.8%
Other96.0%
Relational Databases Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Nasir Niamat - PeerSpot reviewer
DB Consultant at i2c
Has offered a cost-effective option despite frequent technical issues and limited market demand
We find some bugs in IBM Informix. Maybe we are using it more aggressively than others. Every month or every second month, we find some bugs in it, which is not ideal. It should be rare, not this frequent. The good thing is they cover those bugs in the next release within weeks or days on demand. IBM Informix should become hybrid and should include AI features similar to other DBMS systems such as Snowflake, Redshift, and DataBricks. This would help its value rise with the market.
KK
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Works well with existing platform integration but could improve error messaging and technical support
I do not use SAP IQ's machine learning capabilities. I cannot assess the benefit of SAP IQ's distributed query processing for complex queries, as I am a non-technical operator. I am not sure if we use SAP IQ's data compression features. I think the compression we are doing is on the data storage level and not on the database level. I believe we do not use it, but I'm not certain. We do not utilize SAP IQ's support for unstructured data, as we do not have unstructured data. I do not have any strong opinions on SAP IQ's security features such as data encryption. It's not been something that has been much in focus, neither in our choice of the platform, nor in our daily operations. I guess they're satisfactory as they have not been a problem. I am not aware of the pricing and licensing of SAP IQ, as it's part of a bigger agreement, and I'm not the owner of that agreement. My impression is that SAP IQ is a rather expensive tool in terms of value for money. On a scale of 1-10, I rate SAP IQ a 7.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"So far, we do not have a lot of issues. It's pretty problem-free."
"Informix can support huge quantities of data with less memory and less capacity."
"Replication, all levels of replication, query charting, and the MongoDB embedded are the most valuable features of this solution."
"It supports multiple applications and business intelligence tools."
"For IoT business cases, having Informix Enterprise Edition work on edge computers, like Raspberry Pi and using Informix replication, makes complex situations simple to build and maintain."
"This solution has made financial reporting possible by allowing financial people the opportunity to set Informix to "Auto Pilot" so that they can attend other duties."
"Replication is a valuable feature and easy to use."
"The scalability is very good."
"SAP IQ is actually quite effective when it comes to scalability; we have a setup that's built with multiple servers involved and that seems to be working fairly efficiently, and if we wanted to add more servers into this entire setup, that would be fairly easy."
"It is very robust for ad hoc DW queries and its columnar compression is unique and valuable."
"Unbeatable speed and compression with a colummn-structured relational database."
"With IQ, a transaction that previously took three days to execute can now be completed in thirty seconds."
"The feature I appreciate the most about SAP IQ is the compression, which is very good; we cannot compare with any other type of EDW."
"The column-based technologies (basically all the database for ITP) are used for SAP IQ. It is used as a column-based solution."
"All data is compressed and indexed, allowing for fast execution of transactions."
"We can now have over one billion rows in a table for semi-real trans-national querying."
 

Cons

"There should be more intelligence surrounding discovering data to be able to automatically create indexes."
"The solution should offer replication. It would be helpful if the solution would allow us to access third-party tools."
"Every month or every second month, we find some bugs in it, which is not ideal."
"The solution doesn't include functionality like data anonymization."
"The solution lacks some functionality."
"I really would love to have a QT plugin."
"This solution is in need of more current tools."
"The solution really doesn't add new features very often. Other solutions are much more actively pushing out upgrades and improvements."
"Concurrency and functional error messaging."
"With various patches of v15.4 and v16.0, we had instances where the IQ server crashed under certain circumstances."
"The solution works best when combined with other SAP solutions. If the environment has other systems other options might be better."
"Aborts happen, and we don't know why."
"I think the universe should be part of the Sybase IQ tool set."
"The downside I see is that it doesn't allow most integrated backups; many of the marketplace players such as NetBackup or Veritas, those software integrated backups are not available."
"The tool gets stuck sometimes."
"In my interaction with SAP IQ's technical support, the people we are talking to don't know this application very thoroughly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The free edition can be enough to handle moderate-size implementations, but you may want a pay for edition to benefit from more functionality, such as replication."
"For me, it's always too expensive."
"I am not aware of the licensing costs or terms."
"The product has reasonable pricing. We purchase its yearly license."
"Negotiate based on the features required."
"Evaluate all options; check to see if you need expensive add-ons."
"The only costs after standard licensing fees are for add-ons and upgrades."
"Negotiation is very important."
"It's not that costly. So, the pricing is cheap."
"The cost of implementation is about $3,000."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
26%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise16
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Informix?
There is a cost reason to move from IBM Informix. It is relatively cheaper than Oracle. The second reason is that moving the whole application to a new database would require significant cost. The ...
What needs improvement with IBM Informix?
We find some bugs in IBM Informix. Maybe we are using it more aggressively than others. Every month or every second month, we find some bugs in it, which is not ideal. It should be rare, not this f...
What is your primary use case for IBM Informix?
We are using IBM Informix for OLTP systems. We are using IBM Informix although it is a technology that is not very popular compared to others. We are using it because our application was initially ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP IQ?
IQ implementation costs about three thousand dollars. It's less expensive compared to alternatives like Teradata Base in terms of transactional efficiency.
What needs improvement with SAP IQ?
When it comes to SAP IQ, the areas that could be improved or enhanced include the error messaging and the locking capabilities, as that's where we often encounter problems. When there is an issue, ...
What is your primary use case for SAP IQ?
Our usual use cases for SAP IQ is that we have a Software-as-a-Service architecture where this database is the foundation for our SAP BusinessObjects platform. This is where it's getting its data f...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Informix
Sybase IQ
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Shaspa, Hildebrand, Kaifa, Ranhill Powertron, Federaci‹ Farmacutica (FedeFarma), Camden Council, The German Aerospace Center (DLR), Myers, Votorantim Group, Doosan Infracore, GreenIvory
ASR Group, Citrix, State of Indiana, PocketCard Co. Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Informix vs. SAP IQ and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
909,725 professionals have used our research since 2012.