Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

IBM API Connect vs TIBCO Cloud API Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

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 API Connect
Ranking in API Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS) (8th)
TIBCO Cloud API Management
Ranking in API Management
28th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of IBM API Connect is 6.2%, down from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO Cloud API Management is 1.0%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Shanmugasundaram Shanmuganathan - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers basic API orchestration and provides robust security and governance features
While Azure API Management offers configurable scalability, IBM API Connect relies on Kubernetes clusters. This might seem manual and require defining cluster instances upfront, but it's completely customizable and not on-the-fly scaling. It's completely custom-driven, not on-the-fly scaling, which some may consider cumbersome. Overall, I would rate the scalability an eight out of ten. Almost all applications we've been exposing lately go through this middleware, so it's used extensively. There are around sixty applications directly using it, but six Kubernetes clusters serve those applications. It's heavily used for integration, including system-to-system integration and product integrations. Our usage has been increasing year-on-year based on our needs.
Amitava Roy - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers pre-built packages for quick and easy onboarding of APIs but configuration is not that easy
The configuration is not that easy. It's not that user-friendly, and security-wise when you try to implement the security layer on top of it, it's not that easy either. There are certain things where the performance is not that great. When the traffic is huge, we see some lag in performance.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution offers a pretty good SLA."
"The management of the API and API portal is good."
"The solution is very stable."
"I have found the API Management to be most valuable."
"We are able to share those APIs instantly within the organization; even if we want to share it outside publicly, then we can have those capabilities."
"The product gathers data to measure API performance."
"Policy configurations are pretty easy."
"It acts as a central gateway for both external APIs and underlying systems. It's basically a central middleware for hosting APIs to the internet and consuming APIs from internal systems. It provides central governance for any APIs going outside the network, ensuring security and a common contract for API definitions."
"The solution is a good general API manager. They have a few propriety features but are offering items that are standard in the industry as well."
"Conversion to RESTful and SOAP protocols and management console (can manage individually throttled settings to manage our service levels for customers)."
"The control that we have and the security features are very valuable. With regard to API implementation or API orchestration, it works very well in the cloud because as soon as you create an API with one click, you can actually expose your APIs."
"Very few outages or SLA issues."
"We can completely manage the APIs at the org level and BU (business unit) level."
"The reason why we selected the solution originally was because of its ability to have a gateway both on-premise and in the cloud. This is the most valuable aspect of the solution for us."
"The platform's most valuable features are its capabilities to support security measures such as tokenization, token refresh, throttling, and enforcement of payloads."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to have different packages based on the API keys. The same core system can have different packages based on different environments."
 

Cons

"The integration of an API gateway that implements the sidecar pattern, which can be deployed in cloud applications, and expose the microservices directly in each pod, this can be more decentralized components."
"While Azure API Management offers configurable scalability, IBM API Connect relies on Kubernetes clusters. This might seem manual and require defining cluster instances upfront, but it's completely customizable and not on-the-fly scaling. It's completely custom-driven, not on-the-fly scaling, which some may consider cumbersome."
"It would be nice to have a SaaS solution that can be deployed into the cloud."
"Like any typical IBM infrastructure setup, you need to learn to set it up yourself. It's not one of those simple zip files or an archive unzip and you're up and running in some few minutes. Knowledge to set it up is key."
"We have asked IBM for scalability and for some other features that we wanted. We had a dialogue with them and in the end, they have agreed to provide us with features related to API setup and security."
"The only disadvantage I can see is that it requires heavy hardware support."
"It is expensive within this class of products."
"It would be helpful to have access monitoring."
"Monetization is not that great in API management. You need customization. Improvements are needed with sandbox local as well as with monetization. Those features are missing."
"There are some areas for improvement in TIBCO Cloud API Management, especially regarding network protocols such as SMPP, SMTP, GVI, SVI, and Diameter which could show performance issues in terms of handling and connection management pooling efficiency."
"It's not that user-friendly, and security-wise when you try to implement the security layer on top of it, it's not that easy either."
"The management console of API and customers' applications are not the most intuitive."
"I'd like to see TIBCO integrate authentication and security features into Mashery."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management should improve its installation and make it easy."
"Policy management has been a bit of a concern."
"The security needs improvement, specifically, propagation of security to an API. Calling other APIs is something that is missing in the product and that makes us think about going to a competitor."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a pretty expensive tool."
"API Connect is expensive - I'd rate their pricing five out of ten."
"It should be cheaper. It has a yearly licensing."
"Pricing for IBM API Connect varies, e.g. it could be subscription-based. Deploying it on private cloud also means you have to own most of the software licensing."
"This is a licensed product. If your company is looking to obtain a license, you have to work with IBM partners."
"We pay for the IBM API Connect monthly. We only need to pay the standard licensing fee."
"It is quite an expensive product."
"I haven't seen anyone go from on-premise to the cloud. In fact, I am seeing people go from the cloud to on-premise because the costs can quickly grow on the cloud."
"Its price is pretty reasonable. There are some lightweight API options available in the market, but given the feature set that TIBCO provides, its price is really reasonable."
"We have secured terms on which we have been happy to renew for a number of years."
"Licensing is quite flexible."
"TIBCO Cloud API Management is not an expensive solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which API Management solutions are best for your needs.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Insurance Company
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Retailer
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM API Connect?
Publishers can easily identify, create, and publish APIs on the developer portal, defining plans, packages, and potentially billing rules.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM API Connect?
Pricing depends on how many instances run across environments. I don't deal with licensing, but compared to other IBM products, the licensing is not significantly higher.
What needs improvement with IBM API Connect?
When comparing API Gateway with DataPower Gateway, several features in DataPower Gateway are absent in the APIC layer. Examples include the lack of connectivity to MQ ( /categories/message-queue-mq...
What do you like most about TIBCO Cloud API Management?
The platform's most valuable features are its capabilities to support security measures such as tokenization, token refresh, throttling, and enforcement of payloads.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Cloud API Management?
My primary role was to assess the solution from a capability perspective. So, there are some issues with the licensing cost.
What needs improvement with TIBCO Cloud API Management?
There are some areas for improvement in TIBCO Cloud API Management, especially regarding network protocols such as SMPP, SMTP, GVI, SVI, and Diameter which could show performance issues in terms of...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Mashery API Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Heineken, Tine, Finologee, Axis Bank
uShip, Sabre, TouchTunes, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, athenahealth, Coca-Cola Enterprises, CentralIndex.com, Constant Contact, Edmunds.com, FoodEssentials, Getty Images, Klout, Rovi, Rotten Tomatoes, Sportradar, TomTom, ACTIVE.com
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM API Connect vs. TIBCO Cloud API Management and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.