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Oracle Database In-Memory 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
4.3
Oracle Database In-Memory offers substantial ROI and benefits, though support costs may impact long-term finances for some users.
Sentiment score
6.2
SAP IQ boasts high ROI with substantial hardware savings, low maintenance costs, though some users lack authorization to confirm it.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.5
Oracle Database In-Memory customer service improves in some regions but is inconsistent, with users finding varied support experiences.
Sentiment score
5.6
Customer service is 24/7 but varies in quality; technical support lacks experts, causing slow escalation and limited advanced assistance.
Support quality varies across regions, with more advanced solutions from the U.S. and UK compared to Asian region support.
DB Architect / Consultant at Virtusa Global
The technical support from Oracle is very good.
Technical Solution Architect at Vodafone
I rate the technical support of Oracle an eight or nine out of ten.
Sr. Oracle Database Administrator at Shoukat Khanum Memorial Hospital
It seems very difficult to get proper advanced assistance on advanced or complicated problems.
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
The quality of support from SAP is very good; if it's a known problem, they will have a knowledge base, so we will get immediate assistance.
Tech Lead, Database Section. at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Oracle Database In-Memory is highly scalable and easily adjustable, effectively managing large datasets and supporting enterprise needs.
Sentiment score
7.4
SAP IQ offers scalable solutions with Simplex and Multiplex architectures, accommodating vast data volumes across PCs or servers.
We can span the read and write load into multiple nodes, and that scalability is there.
Tech Lead, Database Section. at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
If we wanted to add more servers into this entire setup, that would be fairly easy, so it's rather good when it comes to scalability.
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.6
Users find Oracle Database In-Memory stable and reliable, despite occasional bugs and high maintenance needs for resource-intensive setups.
Sentiment score
6.0
SAP IQ is stable, effectively managing complex transactions despite occasional issues, making it a reliable choice for implementations.
Oracle Database In-Memory is stable, which means there are no glitches or issues.
Technical Solution Architect at Vodafone
It was very difficult to move data from on-site to cloud in one attempt at the start, because we didn't have sufficient bandwidth to copy the data files to the cloud.
Sr. Oracle Database Administrator at Shoukat Khanum Memorial Hospital
It's usually something external, such as lack of disk space or problems arising from the integration to other systems.
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Room For Improvement

Oracle Database In-Memory users seek enhancements in cost, installation, integration, security, scalability, interface, and column store support.
SAP IQ faces challenges with high costs, inadequate training, stability issues, and integration limitations, impacting performance and adoption.
Allowing in-memory support features to handle processes without relying heavily on vector databases.
DB Architect / Consultant at Virtusa Global
The area where improvement is required the most in the product is the UI.
Technical Solution Architect at Vodafone
It is easy to deploy SAP IQ; the implementation and installation are easy.
Tech Lead, Database Section. at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
When there is an issue, the error messaging we get is not always sufficient to do a fast and solid fix.
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Setup Cost

Oracle Database In-Memory is costly, yet offers valuable performance and features, benefiting larger enterprises despite high licensing fees.
SAP IQ is cost-effective with various licensing models, though price understanding and negotiation are essential for optimal implementation.
Recent reductions in cloud costs and learning opportunities, such as free portals for students, make the pricing reasonable without hindering access to powerful features and performance.
DB Architect / Consultant at Virtusa Global
The pricing for Oracle Database In-Memory is more affordable.
Sr. Oracle Database Administrator at Shoukat Khanum Memorial Hospital
 

Valuable Features

Oracle Database In-Memory enhances performance with real-time analytics, backward compatibility, automated configuration, fast queries, and efficient management.
SAP IQ features column-based architecture, high compression, rapid queries, large-scale data handling, and integration with SAP BusinessObjects.
The biggest benefit of Oracle Database In-Memory is dealing with a huge amount of information without any latency for our response time.
Technical Solution Architect at Vodafone
The valuable features of Oracle Database In-Memory include its capability to bypass disk storage for faster memory operations, which is critical for transactions and analytics.
DB Architect / Consultant at Virtusa Global
We can get historical data quickly, and you can fetch information very quickly because every column is indexed.
Tech Lead, Database Section. at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
The most valuable feature of SAP IQ for us is that it works very effectively with the SAP BusinessObjects which we use it with.
Tech Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Oracle Database In-Memory
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
9th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
33
Ranking in other categories
Embedded Database (4th)
SAP IQ
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
25th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Data Warehouse (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Relational Databases Tools category, the mindshare of Oracle Database In-Memory is 1.9%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP IQ is 1.4%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Relational Databases Tools Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Oracle Database In-Memory1.9%
SAP IQ1.4%
Other96.7%
Relational Databases Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Hosney Osman - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Solution Architect at Vodafone
Real-time analytics have transformed response times and support huge data volumes with compression
I do not have any comment related to the improvement of the solution; for sure, it needs improvement, but for my use cases, it is very sufficient, and I think for the biggest companies, it needs a very powerful infrastructure. The area where improvement is required the most in the product is the UI. The problem with the UI is that it is not complex for understanding, but it needs some training to know what each button does, how it works, and the many variables needed.
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.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Pharma/Biotech Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
36%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise23
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise16
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Oracle Database In-Memory?
We can integrate it with any data sources as well.
What needs improvement with Oracle Database In-Memory?
I currently don't know how Oracle Database In-Memory has benefited my organization. We recently received this query from our high management to use this In-Memory function, so we are currently in p...
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...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sybase IQ
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Shanghai Customs
ASR Group, Citrix, State of Indiana, PocketCard Co. Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Database In-Memory vs. SAP IQ and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,259 professionals have used our research since 2012.