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IBM Public Cloud vs Pivotal Cloud Foundry comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 2024

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 Public Cloud
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
15th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
IoT Platforms (6th)
Pivotal Cloud Foundry
Ranking in PaaS Clouds
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the PaaS Clouds category, the mindshare of IBM Public Cloud is 3.2%, down from 4.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is 10.1%, up from 8.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
PaaS Clouds
 

Featured Reviews

Premnath Jaganathan - PeerSpot reviewer
Affordability and security improve our cloud experience while learning new systems
I'm not working with any AI features in IBM Public Cloud, but they are in the process of building it.I am very satisfied with the security that IBM Public Cloud provides. I would rate IBM Public Cloud eight out of ten, where one is worst and ten is the best.
Stephen  Hack - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use, simple to sign-in, but lacking graphical interface
Pivotal Cloud Foundry is used as a cloud platform Pivotal Cloud Foundry has helped our organization by the way we've set it up, it's easy to sign in, bind services, push services, and create YAML files. The most valuable features of Pivotal Cloud Foundry are its ease of use and the command line…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This product is very good because it is accessible in remote locations, and anyone can deploy from any place."
"The availability is second to none. Customer support is very good."
"This is a predictable and dependable service."
"The initial setup was very easy. It's quite straightforward. Deployment took about fifteen minutes. Everything is well organized."
"The price of IBM Cloud is most valuable for us. The service is personable and gives us a good rapport. I can't say it's the best, but it was enough for our needs."
"There is no installation for this product because it is a cloud product."
"It is a scalable product. You can scale it up and down."
"I am very much satisfied with the technical support team at IBM Public Cloud."
"I find the ease of deployment and management of microservices to be the most valuable features. The platform also has good auto-scaling capabilities."
"The most valuable feature of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is the UI, it is easy to use."
"The most valuable feature of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is auto-healing and the plenty of other features that are provided."
"We find its stability and scalability valuable."
"It is a scalable product...We are not facing any particular issues since most of the applications in our company are written in Java and .NET."
"PCF is open, so the applications run really smoothly and with little downtime."
"The most valuable features of Pivotal Cloud Foundry are its ease of use and the command line interface has the ability to push instances to the cloud easily."
"The most valuable features are the monitoring and the deployment is easier."
 

Cons

"While they have about 99% of what we need, the only exception, perhaps, was the push notification feature that was discontinued. They delayed the replacement product."
"The solution needs to be more autonomous. It should let the DL go to allow for more jobs on the cloud. It could have a better interface as well."
"The product should offer more computing, similar to Amazon."
"They could improve on customizing reporting capabilities."
"It will be challenging to implement if you do not have any experience."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"Recently, we just faced some issues with the operating system due to the end of life of CentOS 6...So, then the client wanted to try it out under AWS instead of IBM. In short, it has some complexities."
"They do not have a very good virtual network implemented, and the VPC is the most important feature that needs to be improved."
"Regarding the setup phase, every step is a hurdle. With Pivotal Cloud Foundry, I won't get any proper resources for that. Even if I Google it, there is no proper solution for Pivotal Cloud Foundry."
"There is a lot of uncertainty surrounding the future of Pivotal Cloud Foundry."
"In the next release, they should offer additional applications for the databases, and improve the deployment experience."
"There are no synthetic application monitoring and real-time monitoring features."
"Something that can be done better is canary deployment. So, right now, we're using blue-green deployment. The support for canary deployment would be nice."
"The Pivotal Cloud Foundry's initial setup has a learning curve for my team, but it was easy to use."
"The user interface should be simpler to navigate because it t can take time for users to learn it."
"I'd like to see a larger service offering."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing is not as fair as Amazon or Azure."
"IBM has a lesser price compared to other cloud service providers like Azure and AWS."
"We are using the trial version of this solution, so we have not paid anything."
"In order to be competitive, you have to commit to a contract for at least one year, but you pay a fixed monthly fee."
"The licensing fees are straightforward and predictable."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a nine out of ten."
"IBM Public Cloud is pretty cheap. They have an ongoing free tier that basically won't expire, so as long as your solution is small enough, you can have a test set that you can use for demos, which will cost you almost nothing."
"The price of IBM Cloud is very cheap compared to competitors AWS and Azure."
"The pricing is on the higher side and there are cheaper options available."
"The price of Pivotal Cloud Foundry could improve. However, in this category of solutions, they are all expensive."
"We do pay for the licensing cost because we have opted for a private cloud setup. So, it is a cloud setup, and we have to make payments based on the cloud size. I do not consider it very costly when comparing it to the market."
"The price of Pivotal Cloud Foundry is based on the customer's requirements. However, the price is comparable to other similar solutions."
"You're paying for the number of virtual machines you want to install in the installation."
"Licensing is on a monthly basis and right now we pay $24/month. There are no other costs over and above that."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
University
13%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
37%
Manufacturing Company
18%
Insurance Company
6%
Healthcare Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is preferable - IBM Public Cloud or Microsoft Azure?
IBM Public Cloud is IBM’s Platform-as-a-Service. It aims to provide organizations with a secure cloud environment to manage data and applications. One of the features we like is the cloud activity ...
What needs improvement with IBM Cloud?
The front end is not pervasive, so it is very difficult get the status of your current services or account from a mobile device.
What do you like most about IBM Public Cloud?
The most valuable feature of IBM Public Cloud is the AI integrations.
Which would you recommend - Pivotal Cloud Foundry or OpenShift?
Pivotal Cloud Foundry is a cloud-native application platform to simplify app delivery. It is efficient and effective. The best feature is how easy it is to handle external services such as database...
What do you like most about Pivotal Cloud Foundry?
I find the ease of deployment and management of microservices to be the most valuable features. The platform also has good auto-scaling capabilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pivotal Cloud Foundry?
I would say it is around a nine out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. Just short of Oracle. It's sort of Oracle cloud.
 

Also Known As

IBM Bluemix
PCF, Pivotal Application Service (PAS), Pivotal Container Service (PKS), Pivotal Function Service (PFS)
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Uvionics Tech, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Alpha Modus, Inventive, Web Business Consulting, FindBrok, SilverHook Powerboats, United Way of Allegheny County
Humana, Citibank, Mercedes Benz, Liberty Mutual, The Home Depot, GE, West Corp, Merrill Corporation, CoreLogic, Orange, Dish Network, Comcast, Bloomberg, Internal Revenue Service, Ford Motor Company, Garmin, Volkswagen, Solera, Allstate, US Air Force, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, ScotiaBank
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Public Cloud vs. Pivotal Cloud Foundry and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.