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IBM BPM vs Oracle SOA Suite comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 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

IBM BPM
Ranking in Application Infrastructure
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
112
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (7th), Process Automation (6th)
Oracle SOA Suite
Ranking in Application Infrastructure
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
SOA Governance (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Application Infrastructure category, the mindshare of IBM BPM is 3.4%, up from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle SOA Suite is 3.8%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Infrastructure Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM BPM3.4%
Oracle SOA Suite3.8%
Other92.8%
Application Infrastructure
 

Featured Reviews

Muhammad Kamran - PeerSpot reviewer
Has efficient processes and intuitive workflow with many valuable features
You will have access to make any needed changes. Additionally, the review will be published on PeerSpot.com in written or audio format, available to other people. You can stay anonymous if you wish. Notifications and the use of the review are subject to PeerSpot's terms of use, which you can find at PeerSpot.com/TOS. I would give the solution an overall rating of ten out of ten points.
MANOHAR SADDALA - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless integration with multiple systems
I would rate the scalability a seven out of ten. It's not much more dynamic, not as dynamic as you may think, like seeing it in the cloud. In order to use it, you need to have the download servers and then scale up your systems. Oracle SOA Suites serves as a middle layer between applications. For example, let's say you have SAP, and we have Salesforce or Oracle ERP system. Users connect to those systems and perform certain activities or transactions on the applications. Now, if any data needs to be synchronized or any integration needs to happen between these applications, we use the Oracle SOA Suite. It acts as the bridge between the applications, not between the users. It's like having endpoints between the applications. Currently, we have 20 endpoints; 20 systems are connected to it, which is great. Oracle SOA Suite is being used daily. We are using it to its maximum potential.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, I'm satisfied with the product. If you compare it with other products, it's probably not as easygoing or as simple to implement as the rest. But after you get used to it, it works. It has a lot of capabilities and potential, but the people, who come from different technologies, have some difficulty getting used to the way of working with IBM products."
"The functionality to design UI to be responsive and can run on multiple devices."
"With the Process Center, I can go to one place and view what all the environments are doing."
"It continues to keep up with the changing needs of the business. That is the strong value proposition of BPM. It's not a one-time automation."
"The solution offers great notifications."
"Its dashboard is easy to use and very good. It allows us to customize."
"We have automated processes with IBM BPM and DocuSign. Its valuable features include low-code, timer, etc. It makes it simple to implement the products. We generate reports using the solution."
"I liked its robustness the most. It was a very robust platform in my experience. It seemed like a very stable and powerful tool for handling lots of concurrent users and hammering at the system."
"The most valuable features for us are the APIs, which we commonly use, as well as the scheduling capabilities and file transfers."
"The solution's XSLT or XSL Transformation feature was very useful."
"Conceptually, how it integrates a lot of essential enterprise process components. That's the most valuable."
"Enables our Product Manager to post products to different outside EC platforms with only one interface and one process."
"I found the adapters to be most useful."
"In case there is something that doesn't work out of the box, you have the flexibility to customize it."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the option to design, and the development can happen at the same time."
"The most valuable feature of Oracle SOA Suite is all the platform's capabilities."
 

Cons

"New users will need at least six months to get comfortable with IBM BPM, at least initially. So, there's a learning curve."
"The configuration is not that easy, and the initial deployment took three months."
"I would like to see more inclusion of RPA technologies. If we have more manual processes, we can use robotic process automation and integrate that in with the solution."
"Initial setup is very complex. Too many steps need to be done at the database and server levels, and complex configurations. From what I see, a lot of these steps can be and should be automated."
"IBM BPM needs to have a better and modified interface."
"UI is an area with a shortcoming that needs improvement."
"The solution has scalability issues; on a scale, I would rate it at eight out of ten."
"We had a weird problem that whenever the database would go down, even for a few seconds, it broke the connection. It would not come back up as it was supposed to. However, working with IBM, we were able to figure out a fix, then it came back up, even after an interruption of the database."
"The technical support is good, we have premier support which costs extra."
"The solution’s initial setup is complex and could be improved."
"The Maven integration in JDeveloper is very basic and might be enhanced to allow the proper use of Maven."
"It's also not developer-friendly."
"One area that could be better is the human task feature. It could be improved to provide more functionality and customization options because it has limited options available."
"The product is not user-friendly."
"An important area that can be improved is the product's data monitoring. When we use the solution for interfacing or end-to-end data monitoring, we want to know exactly where the data is going and exactly where it is failing, or where there is an issue."
"Various parts of SOA, BPEL, and so on, each have their own consoles which need to be accessed individually with different logins. It would be better from an admin perspective if all the consoles were accessible via a single login."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Due to its extensive features and capabilities, the product pricing is more aligned with medium—to large enterprises."
"The price is good but could be a little lower."
"It has a low cost to implement. You'll get your money back in the same year that you complete the project."
"The pricing is quite high, I would rate it two out of five."
"IBM BPM cannot be considered a cheaply priced product. IBM BPM is a really expensive product compared to other companies. One needs to opt for the perpetual licensing model offered by IBM."
"It should provide more flexibility to connect with external systems, and there should be in-built services that can be used to integrate with other systems quickly."
"Our customers do see ROI. They'll identify some particularly painful or uncoordinated processes to start with, then build out from there, picking off low hanging fruit."
"I already compared some solutions related to business process management, and I saw that the cost of IBM BPM is more expensive compared with that of Camunda, for example."
"Oracle pricing is expensive. Support is based on your license. AWS is much better than Oracle in this regard."
"It is necessary to evaluate the requirement regarding the platform usage and what the main operation area of the platform will be."
"This product is WebLogic based, hence it can be both resource hungry as well as expensive from a licensing point of view."
"The pricing is not very high as compared to its competitors."
"The product is moderately priced."
"Based on my knowledge, Oracle SOA Suite doesn't have user-based licensing. It has a system-based licensing model, so you pay for whole systems. Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution, so it's a four out of ten for me."
"Oracle SOA Suite is an expensive solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
29%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
9%
Performing Arts
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise71
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise40
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better, IBM BPM or IBM Business Automation Workflow?
We researched both IBM solutions and in the end, we chose Business Automation Workflow. IBM BPM has a good user interface and the BPM coach is a helpful tool. The API is very useful in providing en...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM BPM?
Once it is installed, maintaining it is not a big issue.
What do you like most about Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution's XSLT or XSL Transformation feature was very useful.
What needs improvement with Oracle SOA Suite?
The solution’s initial setup is complex and could be improved. A big challenge for Oracle SOA Suite is that you don't get too many technical resources.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

WebSphere Lombardi Edition, IBM Business Process Manager, IBM WebSphere Process Server
SOA Suite
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Barclays, EmeriCon, Banca Popolare di Milano, CST Consulting, KeyBank, KPMG, Prolifics, Sandhata Technologies Ltd., State of Alaska, Humana S.A., Saperion, esciris, Banco Espirito Santo
7-Eleven, Arcor SAIC, Banca Transilvania, Eaton Corporation, Emdeon, Ferrovial, Griffith University, National Instruments, Pella Corporation, Vodafone Group Plc,
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM BPM vs. Oracle SOA Suite and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
866,218 professionals have used our research since 2012.