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IBM Security QRadar vs IBM Watson for Cyber Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 19, 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 Security QRadar
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
212
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (7th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (1st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (18th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (4th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (8th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (11th)
IBM Watson for Cyber Security
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
58th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of IBM Security QRadar is 7.0%, down from 9.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Watson for Cyber Security is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Security QRadar7.0%
IBM Watson for Cyber Security0.4%
Other92.6%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Mahmoud Younes - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable installation and diverse use cases provide strong value
IBM Security QRadar has some areas for improvement. We have missed some DSM components. We need to customize logs where there is no DSM or connector for certain products. We can integrate but we have missed the DSM, which is the connector to pass logs coming from different applications. For example, with a university customer, we tried onboarding Canvas service. IBM Security QRadar does not support Canvas, so we had to create custom scripts and workarounds to pull logs from Canvas.
Elena Stefanovska - PeerSpot reviewer
Knowledgeable support, reliable, and useful compliance policies
IBM Watson for Cyber Security can be deployed on-premise or in the cloud and it is used as a SIEM solution The most valuable features of IBM Watson for Cyber Security are ease of use and out-of-the-box reports and compliance policies. Additionally, if there are aspects that are missing IBM add…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The best feature of IBM QRadar is visualization which shows you when there's a spike in the system, and this makes you realize that there's something wrong with the log."
"It showed us where weaknesses were in our environment, so we could actively target those patches first."
"This solution has allowed us to correlate logs from multiple sources."
"The solution is quite flexible."
"It's built around Red Hat Linux, which is highly robust."
"My overall rating for this solution is nine out of ten."
"The most valuable features would have to be the products' ability to customize vulnerability management settings."
"A nice benefit is when we go to the process of selecting our youth cases, they go by building blocks. QRadar links it to building blocks."
"The customer support is very good."
"IBM Watson for Cyber Security is very stable."
"The most valuable features of IBM Watson for Cyber Security are ease of use and out-of-the-box reports and compliance policies. Additionally, if there are aspects that are missing IBM add them in the next release."
"The most valuable feature of this product is innovation, where the research and upgrading of technology never ends."
 

Cons

"The product does not have a team for investigating malware."
"The dashboard is pathetic and it takes a long time to perform a search."
"The solution is expensive compared to other products."
"The only challenge with products like IBM is the EPS. You just have to be really on the events per second, as that's where the cost factor becomes a huge issue."
"The API integration for AD is a problem when it comes to vulnerability management. If you want to incorporate multiple factor authentication it becomes a problem with the AD. It doesn't integrate well. That needs to be improved."
"Before we didn't have any security issues but recently a few of the user emails were hacked. We had to actually recreate their emails for them."
"They need to improve their threat intelligence feed and they need to improve their user behavior analytics modules."
"There could be improvements made to the UI, the user interface. Though the newer version, 7.3.2, might already have this improvement in place."
"They need to continue to build the AI capabilities."
"In the future, I would like to see threat intelligence included."
"The dashboard could improve in IBM Watson for Cyber Security."
"This is an expensive product, so making it more cost-effective would be an improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It would be great if this product were cheaper."
"found other solutions, with more features at the same cost or less. You don’t have to leave the Gartner Magic Quadrant to beat their price."
"When it comes to the initial pricing there can be a huge discount from there side and also I think they are open to competing with other products."
"I would like for them to lower the price."
"I feel that the price is reasonable but compared to other products that are on the market, such as an offering by Microsoft, it is more expensive."
"There is a license required for this solution."
"There are additional costs, such as the cost associated with the different hardware required for implementation and deployment. Along with the add-on apps, these are all additional costs, and they require licensing as well."
"IBM has subscriptions plans that run for one year."
"IBM Watson for Cyber Security is very simple to license and is priced well."
"The price of this solution should be lower, although I understand why IBM charges a premium price."
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Comparison Review

VS
Jun 28, 2015
Qradar vs. ArcSight
Continuing with the SIEM posts we have done at Infosecnirvana, this post is a Head to head comparison of the two Industry leading SIEM products in the market – HP ArcSight and IBM QRadar Both the products have consistently been in the Gartner Leaders Quadrant. Both HP and IBM took over niche SIEM…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business90
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise103
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What are the biggest differences between Securonix UEBA, Exabeam, and IBM QRadar?
It mostly depends on your use-cases and environment. Exabeam and Securonix have a stronger UEBA feature set, friendlier GUI and are not licensed based on capacity (amount of logs and information in...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Security QRadar?
The pricing, setup cost, or licensing with IBM Security QRadar was costly. It was costly mainly for the things we used to use it for. The customers used to pay the price, but it was one of the prob...
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Also Known As

IBM QRadar, QRadar SIEM, QRadar UBA, QRadar on Cloud, IBM QRadar Advisor with Watson
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Clients across multiple industries, such as energy, financial, retail, healthcare, government, communications, and education use QRadar.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security QRadar vs. IBM Watson for Cyber Security and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
872,706 professionals have used our research since 2012.