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IBM Open Liberty vs IIS comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 8, 2026

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 Open Liberty
Ranking in Application Server
7th
Average Rating
10.0
Reviews Sentiment
2.8
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IIS
Ranking in Application Server
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
61
Ranking in other categories
Application Infrastructure (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Application Server category, the mindshare of IBM Open Liberty is 4.4%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IIS is 8.0%, up from 5.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Server Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IIS8.0%
IBM Open Liberty4.4%
Other87.6%
Application Server
 

Featured Reviews

FABIO LUIS VELLOSO DA SILVA - PeerSpot reviewer
Partner at SouJava
Has enabled flexible deployment of modular services with high availability and smooth dynamic updates
The best features of IBM Open Liberty are the implementation of MicroProfile and Jakarta EE, along with fault tolerance and high availability. It's easy to use and deploy new features. The profile is easy to configure and set up features. For example, using fault tolerance from MicroProfile or using servlets or JAX-RS allows for easy configuration and creation of modular applications. The configuration is modular. The main point for us in this project was high availability, high performance, and the implementation of MicroProfile and Jakarta EE. We utilized the modular architecture of IBM Open Liberty by creating different microservices using different environments. We created different configurations for different services using the configuration of IBM Open Liberty. This was very beneficial. We created different environments only by changing the configuration, depending on the functionality we needed. It was good and very flexible for us. I used the dynamic updates feature of IBM Open Liberty and different configurations in different services and servers, based on the functionality we provided for our clients. The flexibility to create different services in different environments using IBM Open Liberty was important. The high availability is guaranteed by the architecture of IBM Open Liberty, Java, and MicroProfile. The architecture guaranteed high availability, and the flexibility comes from being able to configure needed features. There's no need to load all WebSphere or functionalities in all environments. I can configure it and create a more highly available and scalable process. I implemented monitoring tools for IBM Open Liberty using Grafana and OpenTracing using the functionalities from MicroProfile and IBM Open Liberty. The monitoring tools helped with managing system performance.
Frederic Hautecoeur - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Integrations Architect at bs-team
Integrated web hosting has simplified secure services and has supported long-term growth
To be honest, I do not see any major areas for improvement. Perhaps something simple and minor. It should not go more complex than it is at the moment. The only disadvantage I see is that the documentation is a bit difficult to find. There is a lot of configuration that is very hard to get information about.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a stable solution compared to other vendors."
"The flexibility to create different services in different environments using IBM Open Liberty was important."
"The most valuable feature of IIS is that it's free, and it works."
"I think that the IIS includes most features that are required by web applications so that they can run smoothly on Windows operating system."
"This is definitely a stable solution."
"IIS is a stable solution for .NET applications."
"IIS has a very simple and user-friendly interface, which helps a lot in effective and efficient management."
"IIS is easy to configure in terms of websites and other solutions."
"The initial setup of this solution is very easy."
"The product's initial setup phase is straightforward."
 

Cons

"To improve IBM Open Liberty, more integration with Kafka and message systems, and asynchronous messaging would be beneficial."
"Its support documentation could have detailed information on database integration."
"The customer service and support team can be improved."
"It lacks a few performance improvement tools."
"IIS needs to improve its security. Its support needs to be faster and clear. The tool's licensing could be cheaper as well."
"This solution needs to be easier for cases where you want to have an IIS cluster."
"IIS could improve the error logging. There are times we are not able to see the errors."
"Sometimes if you are using IIS in large-scale scenarios, meaning that if you are deploying an application within IIS service and you are expecting a large number of users to use this application, you can sometimes find some problems, meaning that the service can shut down by itself unexpectedly if you don't configure your IIS with the correct configuration that can handle this number of users."
"It should be more user-friendly because unless you know how IIS works as a Microsoft product, a system admin cannot just manage it."
"The first level of support is not very good because by the time we speak with them, we are already past that point."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is less costly than one of its competitors."
"IIS is expensive."
"We pay a yearly licensing fee for the solution."
"IIS's pricing is not expensive."
"The yearly licensing cost is very high. The solution is very expensive."
"The solution provides multiple licensing options."
"It is licensed with your Windows installation which makes it relatively cheap if you already have a Windows Server sitting around."
"The price is good."
"I think it's part of the Windows Server, so you won't have any other costs to add in order to use the IIS service."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
37%
Insurance Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Construction Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business30
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise22
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Open Liberty?
To improve IBM Open Liberty, more integration with Kafka and message systems, and asynchronous messaging would be beneficial. Having more integration with Kafka, Mongo, and middleware systems that ...
What is your primary use case for Open Liberty?
I used IBM Open Liberty for an application for financial services using IBM Open Liberty and MicroProfile to process data for financial services work.
What advice do you have for others considering Open Liberty?
I used IBM Open Liberty in the past in a project, but today I'm not using it anymore. I had a good experience working with it in a financial services company. This was very beneficial. My review ra...
Which is better - IIS or NGINX Plus?
IIS is a flexible, secure, and manageable web server to host anything on the web. IIS’s scalable and open architecture can handle the most demanding tasks. From media streaming to web applications,...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IIS?
For the pricing, setup cost, and licensing for IIS, as a Microsoft product, I didn't think much about separately purchasing an IIS product as it is part of Microsoft Windows. We bought a developmen...
What needs improvement with IIS?
I see that IIS has maintained the same interface for a long time, so they could potentially use more automation or integrate Copilot into it to make it easier to use. I have not accessed or checked...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Windows Server IIS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Erste Bank Group, NJVC, Samsung Electronics, Sheraton Hotels and Resorts, Tata Steel Europe, Urban Software Institute
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Open Liberty vs. IIS and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.