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Camunda vs IBM Blueworks Live comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 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

Camunda
Ranking in Business Process Design
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (1st), Process Automation (1st)
IBM Blueworks Live
Ranking in Business Process Design
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of Camunda is 12.5%, up from 10.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Blueworks Live is 3.6%, up from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Design
 

Featured Reviews

FABIO NAGAO - PeerSpot reviewer
Reduces costs with hardware abstraction and simplifies scaling
There is an issue where, in some situations, I need to scale up by observing both CPU and memory usage of containers, yet under the current options available at Amazon, this is not possible. I have to choose between monitoring CPU or memory to scale my solution. Not every software is built for deployment as a container service, although the current architecture trend is changing this.
AjarMathur - PeerSpot reviewer
An easily scalable and affordable solution that enables users to document and digitize processes with ease
IBM Blueworks is BPMN 2.0 compliant, but it does not adapt to the overarching BPMN 2.0 concepts. There is only one kind of BPMN 2.0 diagram. It is a process diagram. It doesn't have the concept of separate tools, which other products offer. If I had to do a hardcore BPMN 2.0 modeling, the product would have its own reservations. There were features we could not explore from a BPMN 2.0 perspective. Most of the time, people who are shifting from Microsoft Office tools to a digitized way of working still want the reporting capabilities to be strong. Some tools, like ARIS or Signavio, offer customized solutions from the reporting perspective. If I have documented my whole finance process and want to fetch out a complete SOP report in a very customized manner, IBM Blueworks cannot provide it. We have to rely on some other services. So that's one area in which we always struggled, how to really customize the reporting aspects. I understand that we need to keep the tool a little more asset-light. It's very difficult to keep adding many options, but at least a few BPMN 2.0 options were needed. We have been suggesting to IBM that we should have some way of customizing the reporting. At least we should get a custom way of reporting it into different formats like Excel or putting up a logo for one of the clients so that their SAP can be printed that way.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is an absolutely stable solution."
"For an internal project, this is a solution that you can install and have up and running quite quickly."
"The solution is useful for small projects."
"The platform's approach to BPMN modeling is straightforward and versatile, making it easy to adopt and use effectively."
"It is a scalable product. I would rate the scalability a ten out of ten."
"The visibility – the diagrams you create – and then being able to automate based on them are valuable features. It's easy to explain and comprehend, and the integration aspects are valuable."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to share the logic within the rules engine with the business, so you can put it up for everybody to read."
"The most valuable feature is the scheduling."
"The stability is pretty good. It is highly available, which is key. You don't lose your work and can autosave."
"IBM Blueworks Live is cloud-based and provides easy access to all your processes in one place."
"The solution is stable. All the refreshes run very well."
"The licenses are transferrable between different users."
"For me, what I find to be the most valuable is its simplicity and the association with Microsoft Office."
"Business users understand it really well, which means we can then help them automate their business processes."
"Collaboration is most valuable. You can collaborate online with many people. People can comment, and you can comment back. It is just like a social network, and that, for me, is very good."
"It is a stable solution since there has not been any downtime. Everything loads fast."
 

Cons

"The product must provide more videos and training materials."
"The deployment model could be improved for easier implementation. More open documentation would be beneficial to understand the deployment process better and facilitate easier setup."
"As we experienced some difficulties in the beginning, deployment took almost a month."
"Without a proper frontend, the business cannot effectively use the platform."
"Initial setup can be quite complex."
"In the future, I would definitely like to see the process administration (migration, audit, tracking) and process evaluation (optimize) features added to the community edition."
"Like all BPM tools, they're very bad with proprietary UIs. In general, anyone who uses BPM tools should not expect to use their proprietary UI."
"I would also like a very easy to use form builder."
"The ability to create a very structured rule. With the capability that we have right now, Blueworks Live is more process focused. We should be able to enhance it to include a lot more of decisions as well."
"The solution is a very basic discovery product so it doesn't have that much modeling capability. This can be improved."
"Some of the import functionality was a bit restrictive, in terms of loading data in from other data sources. Something as simple as Excel, loading data tables from Excel, wasn't great. And vice-versa. Some of the export and import functionality with something like Visio - which, I know it's a slightly different tool - but being able to work seamlessly with those other tool sets would've been quite useful. I know it was something that was in the pipeline to be looked at. So that would be useful."
"Sometimes, the tool is automatic, which can complicate it, but once you're accustomed to manipulating it, you can use it very effectively."
"The APIs are great, except the normal business user doesn't know how to create APIs. So it's hard because IBM comes to us as the business users and tell us to create reporting with APIs, except we don't know that, so we have to turn around and flip it to our IT people."
"The initial setup is neither straightforward nor complex however you do need to know what you are doing."
"The user interface is quite easy at first but process analysts soon run into roadblocks of limited functionality, which is disappointing."
"The objects that the solution creates are not unique."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We're using the open-source version for now."
"Cheaper licensing and resources than competitors"
"Camunda is a cheaply priced product, making it one of its major USPs."
"It is less cost-prohibitive than other solutions on the market. This solution was in our price range."
"The license is quite expensive, which is why we went with the community version."
"It is good for a startup. When we started, its price was fair, but the way we are using it to orchestrate microservices makes it expensive. When you are growing as a company, you would have more microservices, and you would have more users. There is an exponential effect when you are growing in terms of the number of conditions, processes, and users because they bill you per process. So, the price was increasing very quickly for us, and it was very difficult."
"Compared to other software, Camunda Platform is quite cost-effective."
"When compared with the proprietary products, the pricing costs are much less, even though it is an enterprise edition."
"Price wise, IBM Blueworks Live is in the middle range, and I would give it a five out of ten."
"Making it less expensive would be good."
"We are seeing ROI from this solution. The solution has saved us time."
"The solution is very, very cost-effective."
"The solution is not very expensive."
"They have a free subscription model that gives a lot of power to the users."
"There are editor licenses that are around 50 euros per month, and contributor licenses that are around 30 euros per month."
"Based on the licenses purchased, from a footprint perspective, you can have as many people as you want. You have multiple different categories of licenses to keep the cost low."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Bonita compare with Camunda Platform?
One of the things we like best about Bonita is that you can create without coding - it is a low-code platform. With Bonita, you can build the entire mechanism using the GUI, it’s that simple. You c...
Which do you prefer - Appian or Camunda Platform?
Appian is fast when building simple to medium solutions. This solution offers simple drag-and-drop functionality with easy plug-and-play options. The initial setup was seamless and very easy to imp...
Which would you choose - Camunda Platform or Apache Airflow?
Camunda Platform allows for visual demonstration and presentation of business process flows. The flexible Java-based option was a big win for us and allows for the integration of microservices very...
What do you like most about IBM Blueworks Live?
The solution is easy to operate. Also, there is an automatic mode to make the business flow. You don't have to put any lines or arrows in a decision point in IBM Blueworks Live; it's very automatic.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Blueworks Live?
The solution costs around 600-700 dollars/year, which is quite affordable.
What needs improvement with IBM Blueworks Live?
Sometimes, the tool is automatic, which can complicate it, but once you're accustomed to manipulating it, you can use it very effectively.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Camunda BPM
IBM Lombardi Blueprint
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

24 Hour Fitness, Accruent, AT&T Inc., Atlassian, CSS Insurance, Deutsche Telekom, Generali, Provinzial NordWest Insurance Services, Swisscom AG, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, VHV Group, Zalando
Cloudsoft Corp. Ltd., Bayer, S¾SS, Essex County Council
Find out what your peers are saying about Camunda vs. IBM Blueworks Live and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
851,604 professionals have used our research since 2012.