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AWS Batch vs Apache Spark comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on May 21, 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

Apache Spark
Ranking in Compute Service
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
68
Ranking in other categories
Hadoop (1st), Java Frameworks (2nd)
AWS Batch
Ranking in Compute Service
6th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Compute Service category, the mindshare of Apache Spark is 11.2%, down from 11.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of AWS Batch is 12.9%, down from 19.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Compute Service Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Apache Spark11.2%
AWS Batch12.9%
Other75.9%
Compute Service
 

Featured Reviews

Devindra Weerasooriya - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Architect at Devtech
Provides a consistent framework for building data integration and access solutions with reliable performance
The in-memory computation feature is certainly helpful for my processing tasks. It is helpful because while using structures that could be held in memory rather than stored during the period of computation, I go for the in-memory option, though there are limitations related to holding it in memory that need to be addressed, but I have a preference for in-memory computation. The solution is beneficial in that it provides a base-level long-held understanding of the framework that is not variant day by day, which is very helpful in my prototyping activity as an architect trying to assess Apache Spark, Great Expectations, and Vault-based solutions versus those proposed by clients like TIBCO or Informatica.
AK
Software Engineering Manager – Digital Production Optimization at Yara International ASA
Flexibility in planning and scheduling with containerized workload management has significantly improved computational efficiency
AWS Batch is highly flexible. It allows users to plan, schedule, and compute on containerized workloads. In previous roles, I utilized it for diverse simulations, including on-demand and scheduled computations. It facilitates creating clusters tailored to specific needs, such as memory-centric or CPU-centric workloads, and supports scaling operations massively, like running one hundred thousand Docker containers simultaneously.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"With Spark, we parallelize our operations, efficiently accessing both historical and real-time data."
"Apache Spark is known for its ease of use. Compared to other available data processing frameworks, it is user-friendly."
"DataFrame: Spark SQL gives the leverage to create applications more easily and with less coding effort."
"The processing time is very much improved over the data warehouse solution that we were using."
"The tool's most valuable feature is its speed and efficiency. It's much faster than other tools and excels in parallel data processing. Unlike tools like Python or JavaScript, which may struggle with parallel processing, it allows us to handle large volumes of data with more power easily."
"One of the key features is that Apache Spark is a distributed computing framework. You can help multiple slaves and distribute the workload between them."
"The product is useful for analytics."
"The most significant advantage of Spark 3.0 is its support for DataFrame UDF Pandas UDF features."
"There is one other feature in confirmation or call confirmation where you can have templates of what you want to do and just modify those to customize it to your needs. And these templates basically make it a lot easier for you to get started."
"The stability of AWS Batch is impeccable; we have run thousands of jobs without encountering any problems, and AWS Batch consistently performs as expected."
"AWS Batch manages the execution of computing workload, including job scheduling, provisioning, and scaling."
"I appreciate that AWS Batch works with EC2, allowing me to launch jobs and automatically spin up the EC2 instance to run them; when the jobs are completed, the EC2 instance shuts down, making it cost-effective."
"AWS Batch's deployment was easy."
"AWS Batch is invaluable for parallelizing processes and samples, which is essential for our large data sets, such as terabytes of genome data."
"AWS Batch is highly flexible; it allows users to plan, schedule, and compute on containerized workloads, create clusters tailored to specific needs like memory-centric or CPU-centric workloads, and supports scaling operations massively, like running one hundred thousand Docker containers simultaneously."
"We can easily integrate AWS container images into the product."
 

Cons

"At the initial stage, the product provides no container logs to check the activity."
"Stream processing needs to be developed more in Spark. I have used Flink previously. Flink is better than Spark at stream processing."
"The solution’s integration with other platforms should be improved."
"I would like to see integration with data science platforms to optimize the processing capability for these tasks."
"There could be enhancements in optimization techniques, as there are some limitations in this area that could be addressed to further refine Spark's performance."
"Include more machine learning algorithms and the ability to handle streaming of data versus micro batch processing."
"In data analysis, you need to take real-time data from different data sources. You need to process this in a subsecond, do the transformation in a subsecond, and all that."
"Apache Spark can improve the use case scenarios from the website. There is not any information on how you can use the solution across the relational databases toward multiple databases."
"The solution should include better and seamless integration with other AWS services, like Amazon S3 data storage and EC2 compute resources."
"AWS Batch needs to improve its documentation."
"When we run a lot of batch jobs, the UI must show the history."
"The main drawback to using AWS Batch would be the cost. It will be more expensive in some cases than using an HPC. It's more amenable to cases where you have spot requirements."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is an open-source solution, it is free of charge."
"They provide an open-source license for the on-premise version."
"Since we are using the Apache Spark version, not the data bricks version, it is an Apache license version, the support and resolution of the bug are actually late or delayed. The Apache license is free."
"Apache Spark is open-source. You have to pay only when you use any bundled product, such as Cloudera."
"Apache Spark is an open-source solution, and there is no cost involved in deploying the solution on-premises."
"The solution is affordable and there are no additional licensing costs."
"Apache Spark is an open-source tool."
"It is an open-source platform. We do not pay for its subscription."
"The pricing is very fair."
"AWS Batch's pricing is good."
"AWS Batch is a cheap solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
25%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
30%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Apache Spark?
We use Spark to process data from different data sources.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apache Spark?
Apache Spark is open-source, so it doesn't incur any charges.
What needs improvement with Apache Spark?
Areas for improvement are obviously ease of use considerations, though there are limitations in doing that, so while various tools like Informatica, TIBCO, or Talend offer specific aspects, licensi...
Which is better, AWS Lambda or Batch?
AWS Lambda is a serverless solution. It doesn’t require any infrastructure, which allows for cost savings. There is no setup process to deal with, as the entire solution is in the cloud. If you use...
What do you like most about AWS Batch?
AWS Batch manages the execution of computing workload, including job scheduling, provisioning, and scaling.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS Batch?
Pricing is good, as AWS Batch allows specifying spot instances, providing cost-effective solutions when launching jobs and spinning up EC2 instances.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Amazon Batch
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA JPL, UC Berkeley AMPLab, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, UC Santa Cruz, TripAdvisor, Taboola, Agile Lab, Art.com, Baidu, Alibaba Taobao, EURECOM, Hitachi Solutions
Hess, Expedia, Kelloggs, Philips, HyperTrack
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Batch vs. Apache Spark and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.