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IBM Security Guardium Data Protection vs Protegrity’s Data Protection Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 28, 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 Security Guardium Data ...
Ranking in Database Security
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Protegrity’s Data Protectio...
Ranking in Database Security
10th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Data Governance (30th), Data Masking (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Database Security category, the mindshare of IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is 26.4%, down from 33.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Protegrity’s Data Protection Platform is 2.6%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Database Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Security Guardium Data Protection26.4%
Protegrity’s Data Protection Platform2.6%
Other71.0%
Database Security
 

Featured Reviews

DP
Chief Executive Officer at Kipustec
Ensures data security and compliance with reliable alerts and protections
The manuals should be clearer. There needs to be an online course or tutorial for faster management training. The maintenance was slightly complicated. I had to read the manuals carefully and even failed the Guardium certification exam due to insufficient information or time. Improving the tool learning process would be beneficial.
Vinoth Raj Prabhakaran - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Data Architect at Tata Consultancy Services
Beneficial data security, good support, and straightforward initial setup
The initial setup of Protegrity Data Security was straightforward. However, we had a few problems, it's not multi-tenanted. It does not have a hierarchy of roles and differential priorities. To have the initial sandbox version of Protegrity Data Security up and running, took approximately one week. However, it needed to be set up in a resilient way because if it fails, then it is going to be a challenge bringing back the lost information. We have to be particular in terms of architecting it correctly which is taking us a bit of time. We are anticipating anywhere between four to six weeks to be finished.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature I have found is the performance of client monitoring. The other competitors are unable to do this."
"The reporting side is also very, very good, especially its flexibility which allows you to tailor the reports to whatever information you want."
"The tech support is very knowledgeable."
"Satisfies audit requests, to give us an idea if anybody is accessing our privileged user IDs without our knowledge."
"The most valuable feature is using the capture operation mode “S-TAP/K-TAP agent”, because all activities in the database are captured, including direct access to the database server by privileged users. This is useful because, even if the database server logs were deleted, the Guardium Collector has already stored such data to enable traceability of access."
"The possible number of databases and database servers which can be monitored by Guardium is high. For me, this is a differentiator of IBM."
"I think IMB's technical support is good."
"The solution supports a lot of databases."
"The solution’s pricing is moderate."
"Its technical support team is helpful."
"The most valuable feature of Protegrity Data Security is the reduction of information being exposed."
"The product is stable."
 

Cons

"The one thing that I would like to see improved, but I don't think it's going to be in the next release, is its reporting capabilities. I think that's been offloaded to another third-party product that I think IBM actually endorses for that."
"Sometimes the performance is not good, and also sometimes we have sudden bugs causing difficulties."
"IBM should add more database security features to Guardium. They could add user profiling, anomaly detection, and machine learning. IBM has user profiling, but they need to strengthen it. It should make sense for the users. It should remove most of the false positives."
"The technical support is very poor."
"The main issue I have with IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is the support. It's not good."
"The biggest complaint that I hear from customers and users is that using this solution requires database skills, yet it is a security and monitoring tool."
"We've had some issues recently that we're working through, on the agent software that runs on the databases."
"Guardium could be improved in the area of data encryption."
"Protegrity is using a different OS which has some bugs. Sometimes it's causing an initialization error."
"Protegrity Data Security could improve by having more integration."
"The solution's UI could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"One of the deployments that I know of had three databases, and the yearly fees are approximately $50,000 USD."
"It is not an expensive product. We purchase its yearly license."
"IBM solutions have fair price strategy, and operates on a yearly basis. If it's a SaaS solution, then you can opt for yearly basis."
"Guardium is most suitable for large scale enterprises because the pricing model is better if you are implementing a large number of databases."
"Its cost is good. With the new metric of licensing, such as PDO not being available now, customers are expecting a good price for the solution."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"Guardium won mostly because of our scope and scale. It was able to perform at the scale that we wanted to use it. ​"
"For IBM Guardium, licensing is very simple and straightforward. There are no issues I can speak of."
"We pay for a few additional services apart from its licenses."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
26%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
33%
Insurance Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise45
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How does IBM Guardium Data Protection compare with Imperva SecureSphere Database Security?
IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is a solution for database security from IBM that gives complete visibility, control, and analysis to secure sensitive data and comply with regulations. IBM S...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Guardium Data Protection?
I don't remember the exact prices, but Guardium is an expensive tool because it is targeted towards corporate enterprises.
What do you like most about IBM Security Guardium Data Protection?
The features I like are the robust policies, which allow us to create customized monitoring based on specific activities.
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Also Known As

InfoSphere Guardium, Guardium, IBM Guardium
Protegrity Data Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
A $4 billion retail conglomerate and holding company
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security Guardium Data Protection vs. Protegrity’s Data Protection Platform and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.