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Amazon MQ vs Apache Kafka comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Amazon MQ
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
Message Queue (MQ) Software (9th)
Apache Kafka
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Streaming Analytics (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Amazon MQ and Apache Kafka aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Amazon MQ is designed for Message Queue (MQ) Software and holds a mindshare of 3.7%, down 4.3% compared to last year.
Apache Kafka, on the other hand, focuses on Streaming Analytics, holds 3.5% mindshare, down 3.8% since last year.
Message Queue (MQ) Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Amazon MQ3.7%
IBM MQ21.4%
ActiveMQ20.1%
Other54.8%
Message Queue (MQ) Software
Streaming Analytics Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Apache Kafka3.5%
Databricks7.4%
Apache Flink6.7%
Other82.4%
Streaming Analytics
 

Featured Reviews

RamilCerrada - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution architect at SM Supermalls
Has provided consistent functionality across on-premise and cloud while simplifying cloud integration
I have experience with on-premise setups using ActiveMQ and RabbitMQ, but with regards to AWS, I use it via cloud only. There's a free tier with Amazon MQ based on their website, which is a six-month free trial of a single instance, allowing per month usage of either ActiveMQ or RabbitMQ, five gig of Amazon EFS storage, and for ActiveMQ, it's 20 gig of Amazon EBS storage for RabbitMQ. I did not purchase Amazon MQ through AWS Marketplace. Amazon MQ has published information about having 650 hours of free trial usage. This can be found via the AWS website by searching for AWS MQ. On a scale of one to ten, I rate Amazon MQ an eight out of ten.
Amandeep Pawar - PeerSpot reviewer
Engineer Technology at Iris Software Technologies Private Limited
Event-driven architecture has improved asynchronous communication and supports high throughput
We can improve the high throughput because there are some limitations. We could add something to improve Apache Kafka. Based on my daily usage and analysis, there is a complex setup and management, which is one area requiring improvement. Apache Kafka does not have built-in message delay or scheduling capabilities. Apache Kafka cannot natively schedule messages. Limited message prioritization is also an area requiring improvement. Ordering is limited to a single partition. Large messages affect performance. Apache Kafka is optimized for many small to medium-sized messages, but large payloads increase network usage, increase disk usage, and slow down producers and consumers. I rate Apache Kafka eight out of ten instead of ten out of ten because operating an Apache Kafka cluster requires expertise in partitioning, application monitoring, and capacity planning. Self-managed deployment can become complex as the cluster grows. Pro-managed Apache Kafka services significantly reduce the operational overhead.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Since we utilize AWS, it's easy to integrate Amazon MQ and work with other third-party software, as they have standard communications via API or native language."
"Amazon MQ is managed by AWS and is easy to use."
"Amazon MQ is important for being collaborative, allowing for centralized information."
"Amazon MQ is a very scalable solution."
"The initial Amazon MQ setup is very easy both when you do it on your own or use the self-managed instance."
"We have found Amazon MQ to provide scalability, robustness, and security."
"The tool's most valuable feature is its managed service aspect. It's simple to implement and use. It requires minimal effort to maintain business operations."
"Amazon MQ is a secure solution."
"I like Kafka's flexibility, stability, reliability, and robustness."
"It is a useful way to maintain messages and to manage offset from our consumers."
"One of the best features which I have worked with is replay."
"We used to lose some of our messages when we integrated them in bulk, this solution has stopped that happening."
"It's a high-performance distributed system."
"With Kafka, events and streaming are persistent, and multiple subscribers can consume the data. This is an advantage of Kafka compared to simple queue-based solutions."
"The most valuable feature of Apache Kafka is its versatility. It can solve many use cases or can be a part of many use cases. Its fundamental value of it is in the real-time processing capability."
"Kafka is scalable. It can manage a high volume of data from many sources."
 

Cons

"Amazon MQ is a good solution for small and medium-sized enterprises. It's open-source software, which means it's cheaper than its competitors."
"Depending on your use cases, Amazon MQ can be cheap or expensive."
"On a scale of one to 10, one being the best and 10 being the worst, I would give Amazon MQ an eight for overall performance."
"Amazon MQ isn't a cheap tool."
"Monitoring capabilities are not yet fully developed, since it's a message broker service, so it focuses more on the health of Apache."
"In community support, especially with distributed systems and integration, there is a need for better system organization."
"The solution needs improvement in the back end and security."
"If Amazon provided a templating engine, it would be great."
"Apache Kafka can improve by providing a UI for monitoring."
"The support on Apache Kafka could be improved."
"The GUI tools for monitoring and support are still very basic and not very rich. There is no help in determining a shard key for performance."
"The manageability should be improved. There are lots of things we need to manage and it should have a function that enables us to manage them all cohesively."
"Apache Kafka can improve by making the documentation more user-friendly. It would be beneficial if we could explain to customers in more detail how the solution operates but the documentation get highly technical quickly. For example, if they had a simple page where we can show the customers how it works without the need for the customer to have a computer science background."
"There is a lot of information available for the solution and it can be overwhelming to sort through."
"The solution can improve its cloud support."
"We struggled a bit with the built-in data transformations because it was a challenge to get them up and running the way we wanted."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Depending on your use cases, Amazon MQ can be cheap or expensive."
"As a client or as an end user, I would say that Google Cloud Storage or Google Cloud are cheaper than Amazon MQ."
"The price of Apache Kafka is good."
"This is an open-source solution and is free to use."
"Apache Kafka is open-source and can be used free of charge."
"This is an open-source version."
"The solution is free, it is open-source."
"The cost can vary depending on the provider and the specific flavor or version you use. I'm not very knowledgeable about the pricing details."
"The solution is open source; it's free to use."
"Apache Kafka is an open-source solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Outsourcing Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise51
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Amazon MQ?
Amazon MQ needs to have data collected on performance to analyze trends for improvement. Additionally, some tools can suggest how to improve performance in terms of speed, time, and processing, whi...
What is your primary use case for Amazon MQ?
I have some experience working with Amazon MQ.
What advice do you have for others considering Amazon MQ?
I have experience with on-premise setups using ActiveMQ and RabbitMQ, but with regards to AWS, I use it via cloud only. There's a free tier with Amazon MQ based on their website, which is a six-mon...
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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Kafka?
Based on my understanding for the setup and cost to set up Apache Kafka, I was not responsible for the pricing or licensing decisions. Apache Kafka itself is open source and free to use. Infrastruc...
What needs improvement with Apache Kafka?
We can improve the high throughput because there are some limitations. We could add something to improve Apache Kafka. Based on my daily usage and analysis, there is a complex setup and management,...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SkipTheDishes, Malmberg, Dealer.com, Bench Accounting
Uber, Netflix, Activision, Spotify, Slack, Pinterest
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM, Apache, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and others in Message Queue (MQ) Software. Updated: October 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.