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IBM Netezza Performance Server vs Snowflake comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 30, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.1
IBM Netezza Performance Server improves data query speed and efficiency, enhancing business performance and cost savings through compression.
Sentiment score
6.2
Users find Snowflake challenging for ROI calculation, but it offers productivity gains, cost reduction, and valuable insights.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
IBM Netezza Performance Server praised for knowledgeable support; mixed feedback on resolution speed post-acquisition, yet communication remains consistent.
Sentiment score
5.7
Snowflake customer service is praised for responsiveness and expertise, though improvements in timeliness and service-level agreements are suggested.
Technical support is very costly for me, accounting for twenty-five to thirty percent of the product cost.
Project Manager at MAF Retail
I received great support in migrating data to Snowflake, with quick responses and innovative solutions.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
I am satisfied with the work of technical support from Snowflake; they are responsive and helpful.
Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong
The technical support from Snowflake is very good, nice, and efficient.
Data Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.1
IBM Netezza struggles with scalability, requiring extra hardware for expansion, prompting users to consider cloud alternatives for growth.
Sentiment score
7.7
Snowflake offers seamless, flexible scalability for storage and computing, supporting diverse business needs with automatic cloud-based infrastructure scaling.
It is provided as a pre-configured box, and scaling is not an option.
Project Manager at MAF Retail
Snowflake is very scalable and has a dedicated team constantly improving the product.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
The billing doubles with size increase, but processing does not necessarily speed up accordingly.
Data Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Recently, Snowflake has introduced streaming capabilities, real-time and dynamic tables, along with various connectors.
Senior Data Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
IBM Netezza Performance Server is stable, offering high uptime and reliable performance, with occasional issues due to maintenance or compatibility.
Sentiment score
8.2
Snowflake offers reliable, fast performance and high stability, with users praising its dependability and minimal disruptions.
Snowflake is very stable, especially when used with AWS.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
Snowflake as a SaaS offering means that maintenance isn't an issue for me.
Data Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
 

Room For Improvement

IBM Netezza struggles with scalability, user interface, query performance, big data support, and high costs, needing better tools and integration.
Snowflake needs better UI, analytics, integration, documentation, governance, AI features, and cost management solutions to address user concerns.
The cloud version is only available in AWS, and in the Middle East, it is not well-developed in the Azure environment.
Project Manager at MAF Retail
Enhancements in user experience for data observability and quality checks would be beneficial, as these tasks currently require SQL coding, which might be challenging for some users.
Data Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
What things you are going with to ask the support and how we manage the relationship matters a lot.
Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong
If more connectors were brought in and more visibility features were added, particularly around cost tracking in the FinOps area, it would be beneficial.
Senior Data Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
 

Setup Cost

IBM Netezza offers high performance and low maintenance but is considered costly, especially for mid-sized organizations, with significant licensing fees.
Snowflake's pricing model offers affordability and flexibility but challenges with cost predictability and potential high processing fees.
Snowflake's pricing is on the higher side.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
Snowflake lacks transparency in estimating resource usage.
Data Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
 

Valuable Features

IBM Netezza Performance Server delivers fast analytics, ease of use, robust support, and efficient data warehousing with minimal maintenance.
Snowflake is scalable and flexible with features like zero-copy cloning, time travel, and integrated security, enhancing efficiency and accessibility.
It operates as a high-speed data warehouse, which is essential for handling big data.
Project Manager at MAF Retail
We had a comparison with Databricks and Snowflake a few months back, and this auto-scaling takes an edge within Snowflake; that's what our observation reflects.
Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong
I have used the Snowflake Zero-Copy Cloning feature in the past while prototyping data in lower environments. This feature is helpful as it saves a lot of time during the data replication process.
Senior Data Engineer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Snowflake is a data lake on the cloud where all processing happens in memory, resulting in very fast query responses.
Technology Leader at eTCaaS
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Netezza Performance Server
Ranking in Data Warehouse
13th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
Hadoop (7th)
Snowflake
Ranking in Data Warehouse
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
103
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (1st), AI Synthetic Data (1st), Database Management Systems (DBMS) (5th), AI Software Development (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of IBM Netezza Performance Server is 4.2%, up from 3.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Snowflake is 10.4%, down from 15.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Warehouse Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Snowflake10.4%
IBM Netezza Performance Server4.2%
Other85.4%
Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Shiv Subramaniam Koduvayur - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager at MAF Retail
Parallel data processing streamlines operations while cost and cloud integration challenge adoption
The cost of the solution is on the more expensive side, which is a concern for me. Additionally, its promotion and interaction with cloud applications are limited. The cloud version is only available in AWS, and in the Middle East, it is not well-developed in the Azure environment. For the cost to be reduced, it should match competitors. Many features need to be incorporated on the cloud.
SunilPatil1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong
Have prioritized security while managing multi-agent data migration and cloud adoption
We utilize Time Travel with Snowflake because this is a very useful feature. Everyone finds it crucial because in conventional data platforms, it's very difficult to handle these kinds of things. This feature is essential, though I don't have the use cases currently; it is just there for implementation. Regarding Snowflake's automated scaling and suspension features, this auto-scaling is very significant. We had a comparison with Databricks and Snowflake a few months back, and this auto-scaling takes an edge within Snowflake; that's what our observation reflects.
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Warehouse solutions are best for your needs.
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Comparison Review

it_user232068 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Data Architect at a pharma/biotech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Aug 5, 2015
Netezza vs. Teradata
Original published at https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/should-i-choose-net Two leading Massively Parallel Processing (MPP) architectures for Data Warehousing (DW) are IBM PureData System for Analytics (formerly Netezza) and Teradata. I thought talking about the similarities and differences…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
23%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
5%
Performing Arts
5%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise33
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise58
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Netezza Performance Server?
The cost of the solution is on the more expensive side, which is a concern for me. Additionally, its promotion and interaction with cloud applications are limited. The cloud version is only availab...
What advice do you have for others considering IBM Netezza Performance Server?
The solution has generally received positive feedback from me and is recommended for continued use by end users. However, the product cost is high compared to others in the market, and this cost ha...
What do you like most about Snowflake?
The best thing about Snowflake is its flexibility in changing warehouse sizes or computational power.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Snowflake?
It is complicated to understand how requests impact warehouse size. Unlike competitors such as Microsoft and Databricks ( /products/databricks-reviews ), Snowflake lacks transparency in estimating ...
What needs improvement with Snowflake?
Snowflake is currently stable, but it can be improved further. They have a couple of information schemas that can track account usage. If more connectors were brought in and more visibility feature...
 

Also Known As

Netezza Performance Server, Netezza, Netezza Analytics
Snowflake Computing, Snowflake Data Cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Seattle Childrens Hospital, Carphone Warehouse, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Battelle, Start Today Co. Ltd., Kelley Blue Book, Trident Marketing, Elisa Corporation, Catalina Marketing, iBasis, Barnes & Noble, Qualcomm, MediaMath, Acxiom, iBasis, Foxwoods
Accordant Media, Adobe, Kixeye Inc., Revana, SOASTA, White Ops
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Netezza Performance Server vs. Snowflake and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
880,745 professionals have used our research since 2012.