IBM MQ vs Redis comparison

IBM and RedisLabs are both solutions in the Message Queue (MQ) Software category. Additionally, 94% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of RedisLabs users who would recommend it.

IBM MQ

Read 165 IBM MQ reviews

6,308 Views
4,175 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Redis

Read 22 Redis reviews

1,261 Views
1,141 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM MQ

Redis

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between IBM MQ and Redis based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Message Queue (MQ) Software solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM MQ vs. Redis Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ vs. Redis

April 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 849,686 peers since 2012

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 MQ

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

165

Ranking in other categories

Business Activity Monitoring (1st), Message Queue (MQ) Software (1st), Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) (1st)

Redis

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

NoSQL Databases (7th), In-Memory Data Store Services (1st), Vector Databases (4th)

Featured Reviews

SelvaKumar4

System Analyst at Walmart

Offers the ability to batch metadata transfers between systems that support MQ as the communication method

We find it scalable for internal applications, but not so much for external integrations. It should support a wider range of protocols, not just a few specific ones. Many other products have broader protocol support, and IBM MQ is lagging in that area. IBM MQ needs to improve the UI for quicker logging. Users should also have a lot more control over logging, with a dashboard-like interface. That's something they should definitely work on.

Read full review

Yaseer Arafat

.Net Developer at Freelance

Unmatched Performance and Scalability for Modern Applications

Redis has room for improvement in a few areas. Enhanced tools for managing and monitoring clusters would be beneficial, as would built-in security mechanisms like advanced encryption and granular access controls. Simplifying setup and configuration could make Redis more accessible to new users. Introducing more enterprise-grade features, such as better multi-tenancy support and improved backup and restore capabilities, would also be advantageous. For the next release, it would be great to see enhanced cluster management tools, native multi-region supports for better data redundancy, integrated analytics for deeper insights, AI and ML integration features, and improved developer experience through enhanced SDKs and tools.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"IBM MQ processes many thousands of messages in a second, which is efficient for handling high transaction volumes."

"Reliable messaging and throughput are the most valuable."

"Has helped integrate between applications, reduce rework, and costs by reusing working components of existing applications."

"The solution is very stable."

"I haven't seen any issues with respect to the message loss."

"This initial setup is not complex at all. Deploying it was very easy."

"Combined with IBM MQ, this product is our primary data store."

"IBM is still adding some features and coding some other systems on the security end. However, it has the most security features I've seen in a communication solution. Security is the most important thing for our purposes."

More IBM MQ pros

"What I like best about Redis is its fast and easy use. It has interesting algorithms like HyperLogLog and provides useful features. It's also good for implementing scalable rate limiting."

"The performance of Redis is very fast."

"The best thing about Redis is its ability to handle large amounts of data without frequently hitting the database. You can store data in temporary memory, especially for high-volume data."

"Redis has multiple valuable features such as being a free and reliable open-source tool."

"Redis provides an easy setup and operation process, allowing users to quickly connect and use it without hassle."

"Redis is a simple service that does what it promises."

"It is particularly efficient for cloud-based storage and operations."

"It makes operations more efficient. The information processing is very fast, and very responsive. It's all about the technology."

More Redis pros

Cons

"The scalability is the one area where IBM has fallen behind. As much as it is used, there is a limit to the number of people who are skilled in MQ. That is definitely an issue. Places have kept their MQ-skilled people and other places have really struggled to get MQ skills. It's not a widely-known skillset."

"They need to add the ability to send full messages (header + payload) from the MQ Explorer program, not just the payload."

"It needs a User Interface which is better than the aging MQ Explorer. The existing solution MQ Explorer is outdated."

"It's hard to put in a nutshell, but it's sort of developed as more of an on-premise solution. It hasn't moved much away from that."

"the level of training as well as product marketing for this product are not that great. You rarely find a good training institute that provides training. Many of the architects in several organization are neither aware of the product nor interested in using it. IBM should provide good training on products like this."

"If they could come up with monitoring dashboards that would be good. We are using external monitoring tools, apart from our IBM MQ, to monitor IBM MQ. If we could get monitoring tools or dashboards to keep everything simple for the user to understand, that would be good."

"What could be improved is the high-availability. The way MQ works is that it separates the high-availability from the workload balance. The scalability should be easier. If something happens so that the messages are not available on each node, scalability is only possible for the workload balance."

"IBM MQ could improve by adding more protocols or APIs for a standard application, such as MuleSoft."

More IBM MQ cons

"Sometimes, we use Redis as a cluster, and the clusters can sometimes suffer some issues and bring some downtime to your application."

"The development of clusters could improve. Additionally, it would be helpful if it was integrated with Amazon AWS or Google Cloud."

"There is room for AWS to provide more options for server types or a way to configure more or less memory for them."

"Redis could be improved by introducing a GUI to display key-value pair database information, as it is currently a CLI tool with no visual representation."

"The initial setup of Redis was difficult, with a rating of two or three out of ten."

"The only thing is the lack of a GUI application. There was a time when we needed to resolve an issue in production. If we had a GUI, it would have been easier."

"There are some features from MongoDB that I would like to see included in Redis to enhance its overall efficiency, such as the ability to perform remote behaviour. MongoDB is more efficient in handling updates than deletions and is quicker in processing updates, but it can be slower regarding deletions. This can sometimes pose a challenge, especially when dealing with large datasets or frequent data manipulations that involve deletions. In such cases, I often rewrite columns or update values instead of directly deleting data, as it can be more efficient."

"The initial setup took some time as our technical team needed to familiarize themselves with Redis."

More Redis cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM MQ is expensive and they charge based on the CPU."

"If one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the tool's price a seven. The product is expensive."

"IBM's licensing model seems more reasonable than some competitors. They charge based on usage, which is good."

"99.999 percent availability for less than a penny per message over the past 25 years. IBM MQ is the cheapest software in the IBM software portfolio, and it is one of the best."

"The licensing fees are paid quarterly and they are expensive."

"The fee for this solution is on the higher end of the scale."

"It's super expensive, so ask them if they can consolidate some other licensing costs. But, IBM is IBM, so I guess we'll pay for it."

"We have a special contract with IBM MQ that give us a certain price."

More IBM MQ pricing and cost advice

"Redis is not an overpriced solution."

"We saw an ROI. It made the processing of our transactions faster."

"Redis is an open-source product."

"The tool is open-source. There are no additional costs."

"Redis is an open-source solution. There are not any hidden fees."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

37%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

15%

Educational Organization

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What is MQ software?

Hi As someone with 45+ years of experience in the Transaction and Message Processing world, I have seen many "MQ" solutions that have come into the market place. From my perspective, while each pro...

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What are the differences between Apache Kafka and IBM MQ?

Apache Kafka is open source and can be used for free. It has very good log management and has a way to store the data used for analytics. Apache Kafka is very good if you have a high number of user...

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How does IBM MQ compare with VMware RabbitMQ?

IBM MQ has a great reputation behind it, and this solution is very robust with great stability. It is easy to use, simple to configure and integrates well with our enterprise ecosystem and protocol...

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What do you like most about Redis?

Redis is better tested and is used by large companies. I haven't found a direct alternative to what Redis offers. Plus, there are a lot of support and learning resources available, which help you u...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Redis?

There are a few areas where Redis could improve. The pub-sub capabilities could be optimized to handle network sessions better, as there are challenges with maintaining sessions between clients and...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Redis?

We use Redis ( /products/redis-reviews ) for several purposes, including ranking, counting, saving, sharing, caching, and setting time-to-live notifications. These functionalities are employed acro...

See all answers

Comparisons

ActiveMQ vs IBM MQ

Compared 43% of the time

Apache Kafka vs IBM MQ

Compared 8% of the time

MuleSoft Anypoint Platform vs IBM MQ

Compared 8% of the time

Red Hat AMQ vs IBM MQ

Compared 8% of the time

Avada Software Infrared360 vs IBM MQ

Compared 1% of the time

More IBM MQ Competitors

Chroma vs Redis

Compared 12% of the time

Oracle Coherence vs Redis

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Data Grid vs Redis

Compared 9% of the time

Amazon SQS vs Redis

Compared 8% of the time

Google Cloud Memorystore vs Redis

Compared 2% of the time

More Redis Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ

April 2025

Download IBM MQ product report

Buyer's Guide

Redis

April 2025

Download Redis product report

Also Known As

WebSphere MQ

Redis Enterprise

Overview

IBM MQ is a middleware product used to send or exchange messages across multiple platforms, including applications, systems, files, and services via MQs (messaging queues). This solution helps simplify the creation of business applications, and also makes them easier to maintain. IBM MQ is security-rich, has high performance, and provides a universal messaging backbone with robust connectivity. In addition, it also integrates easily with existing IT assets by using an SOA (service oriented architecture).

IBM MQ can be deployed:

On-premises
In the cloud
Hybrid cloud

IBM MQ supports the following APIs:

MQI (Message Queue Interface)
REST
.NET
MQTT
JMS
IBM MQ Light

IBM MQ Features

Some of the most powerful IBM MQ features include:

High availability
Stability and scalability
Flexible deployment options
Uniform clusters
Automated and intelligent workload balancing
Broad language, API, and messaging protocol support
Administrative features that simplify messaging management
Open standards development tools
Simple management tools

IBM MQ Benefits

Some of the benefits of using IBM MQ include:

Multi-style messaging: IBM MQ supports simple multi-style messaging, making it easy to connect diverse systems with support for message queuing, transactions, and more.
Reduced risk: With IBM MQ you will never lose a message, and messages are never delivered more than once.
Cloud-native: Because IBM MQ has a minimal infrastructure, it is suitable to be cloud-native, and therefore has the capability to always remain on.
Available anywhere: Using IBM MQ, you have access to secure messaging anywhere, at any time.
Secure: IBM MQ makes sure to keep your data safe by using TLS secured communications, providing access identity management, message-level security, and more measures to protect your information.
Easy for application programmers: To use IBM MQ, application programmers do not need to have any knowledge of communications programming.
Technical support: IBM MQ has a large user community and also provides support 24/7 as needed.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by IBM MQ users who are currently using the solution.

PeerSpot user Sunil S., a manager at a financial services firm, explains that they never lose messages are never lost in transit, mentioning that he can store messages and forward them as required: "Whenever payments are happening, such as incoming payments to the bank, we need to notify the customer. With MQ we can actually do that asynchronously. We don't want to notify the customer for each and every payment but, rather, more like once a day. That kind of thing can be enabled with the help of MQ."

Another PeerSpot reviewer, Luis L. who is a solutions director at Thesys Technologies, says that IBM MQ is a valuable solution and is "A stable and reliable software that offers good integration between different systems."

The head of operations at a financial services firm notes that "I have found the solution to be very robust. It has a strong reputation, is easy to use, simple to configure in our enterprise software, and supports all the protocols that we use."

In addition, a Software Engineer at a financial services firm praises the security benefits of it and states that “it has the most security features I've seen in a communication solution. Security is the most important thing for our purposes."

IBM

Redis is a high-performance, scalable, and easy-to-use caching solution that improves application performance. It is also used for session management, real-time analytics, and as a message broker.

Redis's valuable features include its ability to handle large amounts of data quickly, its simplicity and straightforward setup process, and its support for various data structures, providing flexibility for different use cases.

RedisLabs

Sample Customers

Deutsche Bahn, Bon-Ton, WestJet, ARBURG, Northern Territory Government, Tata Steel Europe, Sharp Corporation

1. Twitter 2. GitHub 3. StackOverflow 4. Pinterest 5. Snapchat 6. Craigslist 7. Digg 8. Weibo 9. Airbnb 10. Uber 11. Slack 12. Trello 13. Shopify 14. Coursera 15. Medium 16. Twitch 17. Foursquare 18. Meetup 19. Kickstarter 20. Docker 21. Heroku 22. Bitbucket 23. Groupon 24. Flipboard 25. SoundCloud 26. BuzzFeed 27. Disqus 28. The New York Times 29. Walmart 30. Nike 31. Sony 32. Philips

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ vs. Redis

April 2025

Free Report: IBM MQ vs. Redis

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM MQ vs. Redis and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

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