IBM MQ vs Redis comparison

IBM and RedisLabs are both solutions in the Message Queue (MQ) Software category. Additionally, 94% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of RedisLabs users who would recommend it.

IBM MQ

Read 170 IBM MQ reviews

5,468 Views
2,525 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Redis

Read 22 Redis reviews

1,106 Views
742 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM MQ

Redis

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between IBM MQ and Redis based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Message Queue (MQ) Software solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM MQ vs. Redis Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ vs. Redis

June 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 860,168 peers since 2012

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 MQ

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

170

Ranking in other categories

Business Activity Monitoring (1st), Message Queue (MQ) Software (1st), Message Oriented Middleware (MOM) (1st)

Redis

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

NoSQL Databases (7th), In-Memory Data Store Services (1st), Vector Databases (4th)

Featured Reviews

Md Al-Amin

Senior System Analyst at Thakral

Reliable and secure performance consistently enhances message transfer

IBM MQ is more reliable and secure than other software. There is a saying that for the last 30 years IBM MQ has never been hacked. It is more secure and reliable. Whenever the configuration is done, I do not have to touch it again. It works fine, it is stable, and its communication is to the point and accurate. All performance-related aspects are better. Performance-wise, it is scalable, and other features such as DR, DC, replication, and active passive mode are complex to configure, but it remains scalable. The pricing model for IBM MQ could be more flexible for clients.

Read full review

Yaseer Arafat

.Net Developer at Freelance

Unmatched Performance and Scalability for Modern Applications

Redis has room for improvement in a few areas. Enhanced tools for managing and monitoring clusters would be beneficial, as would built-in security mechanisms like advanced encryption and granular access controls. Simplifying setup and configuration could make Redis more accessible to new users. Introducing more enterprise-grade features, such as better multi-tenancy support and improved backup and restore capabilities, would also be advantageous. For the next release, it would be great to see enhanced cluster management tools, native multi-region supports for better data redundancy, integrated analytics for deeper insights, AI and ML integration features, and improved developer experience through enhanced SDKs and tools.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We have found the MQ messaging topologies valuable."

"The clusterization which results in persistence is the most valuable feature."

"The solution is easy to use and has good performance."

"This initial setup is not complex at all. Deploying it was very easy."

"IBM MQ is more reliable and secure than other software."

"Assists with our apps and has great message processing."

"The thing that I like about MQ most is its reliability. It's one of those types of products that just works. You don't have to tinker around with it too much."

"The most valuable features are RDQM and queue sharing."

More IBM MQ pros

"Redis provides an easy setup and operation process, allowing users to quickly connect and use it without hassle."

"The performance of Redis is very fast."

"The solution's technical support team is good...The solution's initial setup process was straightforward."

"Redis is a simple service that does what it promises."

"Redis acts as an in-memory search tool that improves the speed of operations."

"It makes operations more efficient. The information processing is very fast, and very responsive. It's all about the technology."

"The online interface is very fast and easy to use."

"What I like best about Redis is its fast and easy use. It has interesting algorithms like HyperLogLog and provides useful features. It's also good for implementing scalable rate limiting."

More Redis pros

Cons

"You should be able to increase the message size. It should be dynamic. Each queue has a limitation of 5,000."

"IBM MQ's pricing is higher than its competitors'."

"If they could have some front-end monitoring tool that could be easily available for the team to use, that could be great."

"I don’t like legacy view of MQ."

"The licensing fees should be more cost-effective so that we can better pitch the product to our clients. With the pricing as it is, they tend to move away from IBM products."

"The initial setup is difficult. Creating your own cluster is difficult. Working with cluster repositories is difficult. Issue management with IBM MQ is difficult."

"The customer service or technical support from IBM is not as good as we expected; it could be better. They don't meet our standards due to the timing to get a person with knowledge."

"It could provide more monitoring tools and some improvement to the UI. I would also like to see more throughput in future versions."

More IBM MQ cons

"The initial setup took some time as our technical team needed to familiarize themselves with Redis."

"There is a lack of documentation on the scalability of the solution."

"It's actually quite expensive."

"In future releases, I would like Redis to provide its users with an option like schema validation. Currently, the solution lacks to offer such functionality."

"For the PubSub feature, we had to create our own tools to monitor the events."

"Sometimes, we use Redis as a cluster, and the clusters can sometimes suffer some issues and bring some downtime to your application."

"The development of clusters could improve. Additionally, it would be helpful if it was integrated with Amazon AWS or Google Cloud."

"The tool should improve by increasing its size limits and handling dynamic data better. We use the client ID or associate it with a key for static content. The solution will not be easy for a beginner. Unless you understand SQL data, it will be difficult to understand and use Redis. It also needs to be user-friendly."

More Redis cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's super expensive, so ask them if they can consolidate some other licensing costs. But, IBM is IBM, so I guess we'll pay for it."

"IBM MQ is an expensive solution compared to other solutions. However, if you pay less you will not receive the same experience or features."

"It is a very expensive product compared to the open source products in the market."

"Use the new and lightweight version (Liberty) to lower licensing costs. It is also easier to upgrade/maintain."

"I think IBM needs to look at its pricing. The prices of IBM products should be simple. The old way of pricing should now be moving on to the cloud to be pay as you go, a plan-based kind of pricing."

"IBM products, in general, have high licensing costs and support costs are too high."

"The price of IBM MQ could improve by being less expensive."

"There is real money involved here. As compared to RabbitMQ, IBM MQ is on the higher side in terms of cost."

More IBM MQ pricing and cost advice

"We saw an ROI. It made the processing of our transactions faster."

"Redis is an open-source solution. There are not any hidden fees."

"Redis is not an overpriced solution."

"The tool is open-source. There are no additional costs."

"Redis is an open-source product."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

36%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

23%

Computer Software Company

13%

Educational Organization

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What is MQ software?

Hi As someone with 45+ years of experience in the Transaction and Message Processing world, I have seen many "MQ" solutions that have come into the market place. From my perspective, while each pro...

See all answers

What are the differences between Apache Kafka and IBM MQ?

Apache Kafka is open source and can be used for free. It has very good log management and has a way to store the data used for analytics. Apache Kafka is very good if you have a high number of user...

See all answers

How does IBM MQ compare with VMware RabbitMQ?

IBM MQ has a great reputation behind it, and this solution is very robust with great stability. It is easy to use, simple to configure and integrates well with our enterprise ecosystem and protocol...

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What do you like most about Redis?

Redis is better tested and is used by large companies. I haven't found a direct alternative to what Redis offers. Plus, there are a lot of support and learning resources available, which help you u...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Redis?

There are a few areas where Redis could improve. The pub-sub capabilities could be optimized to handle network sessions better, as there are challenges with maintaining sessions between clients and...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Redis?

We use Redis ( /products/redis-reviews ) for several purposes, including ranking, counting, saving, sharing, caching, and setting time-to-live notifications. These functionalities are employed acro...

See all answers

Comparisons

ActiveMQ vs IBM MQ

Compared 42% of the time

MuleSoft Anypoint Platform vs IBM MQ

Compared 9% of the time

Apache Kafka vs IBM MQ

Compared 8% of the time

Red Hat AMQ vs IBM MQ

Compared 7% of the time

Avada Software Infrared360 vs IBM MQ

Compared 2% of the time

More IBM MQ Competitors

Oracle Coherence vs Redis

Compared 11% of the time

Chroma vs Redis

Compared 11% of the time

Red Hat Data Grid vs Redis

Compared 10% of the time

Amazon SQS vs Redis

Compared 6% of the time

ScyllaDB vs Redis

Compared 5% of the time

More Redis Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ

June 2025

Download IBM MQ product report

Buyer's Guide

Redis

June 2025

Download Redis product report

Also Known As

WebSphere MQ

Redis Enterprise

Overview

IBM MQ is a middleware product used to send or exchange messages across multiple platforms, including applications, systems, files, and services via MQs (messaging queues). This solution helps simplify the creation of business applications, and also makes them easier to maintain. IBM MQ is security-rich, has high performance, and provides a universal messaging backbone with robust connectivity. In addition, it also integrates easily with existing IT assets by using an SOA (service oriented architecture).

IBM MQ can be deployed:

On-premises
In the cloud
Hybrid cloud

IBM MQ supports the following APIs:

MQI (Message Queue Interface)
REST
.NET
MQTT
JMS
IBM MQ Light

IBM MQ Features

Some of the most powerful IBM MQ features include:

High availability
Stability and scalability
Flexible deployment options
Uniform clusters
Automated and intelligent workload balancing
Broad language, API, and messaging protocol support
Administrative features that simplify messaging management
Open standards development tools
Simple management tools

IBM MQ Benefits

Some of the benefits of using IBM MQ include:

Multi-style messaging: IBM MQ supports simple multi-style messaging, making it easy to connect diverse systems with support for message queuing, transactions, and more.
Reduced risk: With IBM MQ you will never lose a message, and messages are never delivered more than once.
Cloud-native: Because IBM MQ has a minimal infrastructure, it is suitable to be cloud-native, and therefore has the capability to always remain on.
Available anywhere: Using IBM MQ, you have access to secure messaging anywhere, at any time.
Secure: IBM MQ makes sure to keep your data safe by using TLS secured communications, providing access identity management, message-level security, and more measures to protect your information.
Easy for application programmers: To use IBM MQ, application programmers do not need to have any knowledge of communications programming.
Technical support: IBM MQ has a large user community and also provides support 24/7 as needed.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by IBM MQ users who are currently using the solution.

PeerSpot user Sunil S., a manager at a financial services firm, explains that they never lose messages are never lost in transit, mentioning that he can store messages and forward them as required: "Whenever payments are happening, such as incoming payments to the bank, we need to notify the customer. With MQ we can actually do that asynchronously. We don't want to notify the customer for each and every payment but, rather, more like once a day. That kind of thing can be enabled with the help of MQ."

Another PeerSpot reviewer, Luis L. who is a solutions director at Thesys Technologies, says that IBM MQ is a valuable solution and is "A stable and reliable software that offers good integration between different systems."

The head of operations at a financial services firm notes that "I have found the solution to be very robust. It has a strong reputation, is easy to use, simple to configure in our enterprise software, and supports all the protocols that we use."

In addition, a Software Engineer at a financial services firm praises the security benefits of it and states that “it has the most security features I've seen in a communication solution. Security is the most important thing for our purposes."

IBM

Redis is a high-performance, scalable, and easy-to-use caching solution that improves application performance. It is also used for session management, real-time analytics, and as a message broker.

Redis's valuable features include its ability to handle large amounts of data quickly, its simplicity and straightforward setup process, and its support for various data structures, providing flexibility for different use cases.

RedisLabs

Sample Customers

Deutsche Bahn, Bon-Ton, WestJet, ARBURG, Northern Territory Government, Tata Steel Europe, Sharp Corporation

1. Twitter 2. GitHub 3. StackOverflow 4. Pinterest 5. Snapchat 6. Craigslist 7. Digg 8. Weibo 9. Airbnb 10. Uber 11. Slack 12. Trello 13. Shopify 14. Coursera 15. Medium 16. Twitch 17. Foursquare 18. Meetup 19. Kickstarter 20. Docker 21. Heroku 22. Bitbucket 23. Groupon 24. Flipboard 25. SoundCloud 26. BuzzFeed 27. Disqus 28. The New York Times 29. Walmart 30. Nike 31. Sony 32. Philips

Buyer's Guide

IBM MQ vs. Redis

June 2025

Free Report: IBM MQ vs. Redis

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM MQ vs. Redis and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

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