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IBM Db2 Warehouse vs Snowflake comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 26, 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 Db2 Warehouse
Ranking in Data Warehouse
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Snowflake
Ranking in Data Warehouse
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
103
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (1st), AI Synthetic Data (1st), Database Management Systems (DBMS) (5th), AI Software Development (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of IBM Db2 Warehouse is 3.2%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Snowflake is 10.4%, down from 15.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Warehouse Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Snowflake10.4%
IBM Db2 Warehouse3.2%
Other86.4%
Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Sherpard  Muzuva - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Technical Manager- IBM Enterprise Systems at SYSTEMS INTEGRATED LTD (SYMPHONY)
Advanced features enhance business intelligence, but complex management calls for improved user guidance
While my experience with IBM Db2 Warehouse is somewhat limited, when compared to other databases such as Oracle, there are areas for improvement. They need to enhance the database to make it more user-friendly and easier to master. They should implement a more comprehensive graphical user interface with additional features. For instance, when users encounter problems, the system should provide better guidelines and troubleshooting directions, except for hardware-related issues. They need to implement tools that would help users perform basic troubleshooting rather than solely relying on support. Other databases have features where users can investigate specific issues using error codes. From my experience, many minor issues could be resolved before escalating to support.
SunilPatil1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong
Have prioritized security while managing multi-agent data migration and cloud adoption
We utilize Time Travel with Snowflake because this is a very useful feature. Everyone finds it crucial because in conventional data platforms, it's very difficult to handle these kinds of things. This feature is essential, though I don't have the use cases currently; it is just there for implementation. Regarding Snowflake's automated scaling and suspension features, this auto-scaling is very significant. We had a comparison with Databricks and Snowflake a few months back, and this auto-scaling takes an edge within Snowflake; that's what our observation reflects.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The standout feature of IBM Db2 Warehouse, which is particularly valuable for large enterprises, is its ability to handle big data."
"Provides good security and reliability."
"IBM Db2 Warehouse is more resilient when dealing with business intelligence applications."
"Some of the best features are stored procedures, parallelism, and different indexing strategies."
"It can be mounted on the cloud, which is a huge plus. If the client, for example, starts small with on-premise deployment and then it rapidly needs to grow, we can transfer this to the cloud easily."
"The solution is stable."
"It can scale effectively as long as resources are available."
"IBM Db2 Warehouse is more resilient when dealing with business intelligence applications."
"Snowflake has evolved significantly over time; initially, they started with scalability, but more recently, they have introduced streaming capabilities, real-time and dynamic tables, along with various connectors."
"The most valuable feature is the snapshot database. In one second, you can just take a snapshot of the database for test purposes."
"The most valuable feature is the clone copy."
"The solution speeds up the process of onboarding."
"A user-friendly and reliable solution."
"It is a highly scalable solution. There is no limit on storage or computing."
"The technical support is pretty good, particularly if you are a more technical user."
"The most valuable feature of Snowflake is it's an all-in-one data warehousing solution."
 

Cons

"The biggest challenge anyone could have with Db2 Warehouse is their references or online resources and documentation. They are very, very, very limited on the web."
"It takes a long time to have a new version or release, similar to Oracle."
"The primary challenges customers face with IBM Db2 Warehouse are related to its complexity in usage. It requires highly skilled professionals who understand Db2, and both training and support are challenging to obtain."
"The biggest problems we have is when the backup solution is failing or slow and we run out of log space, which has happened probably a couple of times in the last four years."
"In terms of improvement, IBM Db2 Warehouse should be more scalable."
"The primary challenges customers face with IBM Db2 Warehouse are related to its complexity in usage. It requires highly skilled professionals who understand Db2, and both training and support are challenging to obtain."
"Lacks sufficient documentation and particularly in Spanish."
"There were some initial challenges with IBM Db2 Warehouse about eight months ago when I worked in this environment. When I coordinated with IBM support, they mentioned that the memory was insufficient for our needs. Our business environment required significantly more memory than the previous cluster could provide. Consequently, we have worked closely with on-site IBM technical personnel to address this issue."
"The price could be improved."
"If more connectors were brought in and more visibility features were added, particularly around cost tracking in the FinOps area, it would be beneficial."
"The addition of more AI capabilities in Snowflake would help us more."
"There could be better ELT tools that are appropriate for Snowflake. We decided on Matillion and it seemed to be the only one. There need to be better choices, it would be great if Snowflake provided an ELT solution that people could use. Additionally, if there was a pure cloud-based ELT tool it would be useful."
"There are some challenges with loading unstructured data and integrating some message queues or brokers. In one project, we had a problem connecting to one of the message queues and we had to take a different route altogether on Microsoft Azure."
"I see room for improvement when it comes to credit performance. The other thing I'd like to be improved is the warehouse facility."
"The UI could improve because sometimes in the security query the UI freezes. We then have to close the window and restart."
"Currently there isn't end-to-end or B2B sharing of data."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In a traditional on-prem database, in a data warehouse, the solution is probably on the expensive side."
"We use Snowflake pretty heavily. We pay a significant amount of money for the tool. I'd say we pay $300k to $400K every year."
"It's expensive."
"The pricing is economical as compared to traditional solutions like Oracle and competitive pricing."
"The product's price range falls between average to a bit expensive range. I think the tool is worth the money if you use it properly."
"Snowflake is cost-effective. However, the cost can depend on how it's being used and how efficiently the code is written. If engineers don't write efficient code and usage is billed based on processing, it can become costly. If they write optimal code and choose the best solution, it can reduce costs in comparison to other options, such as Oracle."
"On average, with the number of queries that we run, we pay approximately $200 USD per month."
"It is pay-as-you-go. Its cost is in the medium range."
"Pricing is based on usage. It is the most expensive of our data tools."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
30%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
6%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise58
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Db2 Warehouse?
The pricing for medium and large environments is almost the same as Oracle. I rate the pricing as six out of ten.
What needs improvement with IBM Db2 Warehouse?
While my experience with IBM Db2 Warehouse is somewhat limited, when compared to other databases such as Oracle, there are areas for improvement. They need to enhance the database to make it more u...
What is your primary use case for IBM Db2 Warehouse?
The main advantages of IBM Db2 Warehouse become apparent when dealing with business intelligence applications. I worked with it when it was installed for one of our customers, a utilities company, ...
What do you like most about Snowflake?
The best thing about Snowflake is its flexibility in changing warehouse sizes or computational power.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Snowflake?
It is complicated to understand how requests impact warehouse size. Unlike competitors such as Microsoft and Databricks ( /products/databricks-reviews ), Snowflake lacks transparency in estimating ...
What needs improvement with Snowflake?
Snowflake is currently stable, but it can be improved further. They have a couple of information schemas that can track account usage. If more connectors were brought in and more visibility feature...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

InfoSphere Warehouse, IBM InfoSphere Warehouse
Snowflake Computing, Snowflake Data Cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Alameda County Social Services Agency, Sui Southern Gas Company Limited
Accordant Media, Adobe, Kixeye Inc., Revana, SOASTA, White Ops
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Db2 Warehouse vs. Snowflake and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.