I use ESB to do integrations for a company called Pelindo. Pelindo is a company that's a terminal operator. They are involved in logistics, have many partners, and require transaction detection and a payment gateway.
System Integration Engineer at ILCS
A lightweight Java-based enterprise service bus with fast and good technical support
Pros and Cons
- "I like that Mule ESB provides fast and good technical support."
- "I like that Mule ESB provides fast and good technical support."
- "Mule ESB could be more user-friendly. I think users must learn about the architecture before they start coding. The price could be better. In the next release, I would like to see an EDIFACT integration."
- "Mule ESB could be more user-friendly. I think users must learn about the architecture before they start coding."
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
I like that Mule ESB provides fast and good technical support.
What needs improvement?
Mule ESB could be more user-friendly. I think users must learn about the architecture before they start coding. The price could be better. In the next release, I would like to see an EDIFACT integration.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Mule ESB since 2013, so nine years.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Mule ESB is stable, but sometimes the traffic is unstable because the transaction rate increases and the server is obsolete.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support is fast and good.
How was the initial setup?
I think the initial setup was straightforward.
What about the implementation team?
I have experience installing this solution for my company. I can also maintain Mule ESB by myself.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I think the price is very high. If you use TIBCO BW, the license is for the CPU usage, then the IPS, and support. I also think the license for the product is a one-time expense.
What other advice do I have?
On a scale from one to ten, I would give Mule ESB an eight.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Software Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Easy connectivity which allows for fast integration; lacking some connectors
Pros and Cons
- "Easy connectivity and easy integration."
- "The best feature for me was the easy connectivity and easy integration."
- "Lacking some connectors that could be included."
- "I think there are some connectors that are not available that should be included."
What is our primary use case?
I used the free trial account to test the product, it allows 10 days free trial.
I'm a software engineer and a user of Mule ESB.
What is most valuable?
The best feature for me was the easy connectivity and easy integration. In comparison, if you go through code license for APN, it will require more configuration or more code but if you're going to Anypoint Studio and using Mule ESB, you just drag and drop the connectors, configure the credentials and complete your process as per your requirements. The product helps me a lot to integrate quickly.
What needs improvement?
I think there are some connectors that are not available that should be included. Supports like Salesforce Connector that are available in APN could be included. It's possible that this requires more configuration in our system. I've also found that running Mule Anypoint Studio ESB can slow things down.
They have good documentation but it's better to have a video explanation for some of the demos, something basic that runs for 10 minutes or so. If you have that and combine it with the documentation, it would simplify the learning process.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used the solution for one year. Really helpful tool for integration with multiple system.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
This is a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is scalable.
How are customer service and support?
I haven't used technical support, I tend to check the documentation when there are problems. It's actually quite good. There is a video which explains integration in only three minutes, and that helped me understand the documents.
How was the initial setup?
I used some of the notes and YouTube tutorials that explain the setup. They've simplified the process with the latest version which is a good thing.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. partner
Buyer's Guide
Mule ESB
April 2026
Learn what your peers think about Mule ESB. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2026.
893,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Director at Pixel Studio PTY
Programmer-friendly solution that offers good value for money
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature is that it's programmer-friendly, so it's very easy to develop APIs."
- "The most valuable feature is that it's programmer-friendly, so it's very easy to develop APIs."
- "In order to meet the new trend of active metadata management, we need intelligent APIs that can retrieve new data designs and trigger actions over new findings without human intervention."
- "In order to meet the new trend of active metadata management, we need intelligent APIs that can retrieve new data designs and trigger actions over new findings without human intervention."
What is our primary use case?
My primary uses are asset maintenance and data management.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature is that it's programmer-friendly, so it's very easy to develop APIs.
What needs improvement?
In order to meet the new trend of active metadata management, we need intelligent APIs that can retrieve new data designs and trigger actions over new findings without human intervention.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using this solution for almost three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's very stable and reliable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
This solution is scalable.
How are customer service and support?
The technical support is reliable and quick to resolve any block we have.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is straightforward and only takes a day, but it looks at many data sources, so you have to be specific about what you need.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
This product is expensive, but it does offer value for money.
What other advice do I have?
I would give this product a rating of ten out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Solutions Architect at Persistence System
Easy and intuitive tool for developers but should have more customization capabilities
Pros and Cons
- "This tool has exceptional API management and integration connectors in addition to multiple out of the box connectors."
- "It’s a pretty good tool to have when you try to go with a microservices type of an architecture where you want to decouple your systems and where you want all the systems to talk to each other, share that knowledge, and create those experiences that you want as part of your digital transformation journey."
- "We would like the ability to use our own code. This would allow us to develop customizations with ease. Additionally, it would be nice to have more analytics or insights on the exchanged information between databases."
- "We would like the ability to use our own code. This would allow us to develop customizations with ease."
What is our primary use case?
I am a solution architect where I design solutions by leveraging integration tools, low-code platforms, and BPM platforms. We are using Mule EBS for transformation purposes.
How has it helped my organization?
Mule allows us to transform our data into our desired outcome and then translate it. This allows it to be moved forward for further processing.
What is most valuable?
This tool has exceptional API management and integration connectors in addition to multiple out of the box connectors.
The UI is good. From a development perspective, it's pretty easy and pretty intuitive for the developers to work with. We have fresh graduates who have started picking up MuleSoft. Its user interface is pretty intuitive.
What needs improvement?
We would like the ability to use our own code. This would allow us to develop customizations with ease. Additionally, it would be nice to have more analytics or insights on the exchanged information between databases.
For how long have I used the solution?
I am working on my third project that utilizes Mule.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is quite stable. We have not experienced any stability related issues as of now.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We have not had any issues regarding up-scaling and other things. We are in the process of increasing the usage of Mule so that it can take up to two thousand requests per unit minute.
How are customer service and support?
The last time I raised a ticket with them where we needed additional guidance, they were pretty good and responsive. On one of my previous projects that I worked with where we needed some information or we needed some additional guidance from them, we were able to collaborate with them and solve the issue pretty quickly.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward as we chose to go with the Mule cloud where the infrastructure was taken care of by them. We only needed to ensure connectivity between on-premise databases/systems and Mule cloud.
Because it's their cloud, the setup is much easier. It would be interesting to see what the setup is like for an on-premise or hybrid environment. It might be a completely different setup. It would probably be more complex because you have to go through certain process to ensure the compliance and the security standards of the organization are met, and that the connectivity is established.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We looked in to using Apache Camel and TIBCO.
What other advice do I have?
It’s a pretty good tool to have it when you try to go with a microservices type of an architecture where you want to decouple your systems and where you want all the systems to talk to each other, share that knowledge, and create those experiences that you want as part of your digital transformation journey. This tool perfectly fits that. It's a good tool to have as part of your digital transformation journey.
I would rate it a seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Other
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Co Founder - Data Engineering Head at Sadeeem Knowledge
Great increased our development and improves our time to market
Pros and Cons
- "The solution has a good graphical interface."
- "The solution has helped us to develop more quickly and improve our time to market."
- "Community editions need more attention."
- "Community editions need more attention."
What is our primary use case?
We use this solution for payment integration. We are customers of Mule ESC and I'm a co-founder and the data engineer head.
How has it helped my organization?
The solution has helped us to develop more quickly and improve our time to market.
What is most valuable?
I like the graphical interface and the number of connectors. The solution is easy to maintain.
What needs improvement?
I'd like to see more attention given to the community editions.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using this solution for 10 years.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is scalable and stable.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup wasn't that complex, we did it ourselves.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We're using the open-source version.
What other advice do I have?
I rate the solution nine out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Exceptional cloud features, good exception handling, and stable
Pros and Cons
- "The cloud and integration abilities are most useful allowing us to use applications such as Salesforce and DataWeave."
- "We have experienced zero downtime since moving to this solution."
- "In an upcoming release, I would like to see more additional concept for exception handling, batch processing, and increased integration with other application."
- "In an upcoming release, I would like to see more additional concept for exception handling, batch processing, and increased integration with other application."
What is our primary use case?
We normally use the API-led connectivity approach. We get the architecture and follow the basic rules and principles that Mule has.
How has it helped my organization?
We have had our research analysis team do six months of work looking into if this solution was going to benefit our organization and they determined it fit perfectly into our business.
What is most valuable?
The cloud and integration abilities are most useful allowing us to use applications such as Salesforce and DataWeave. Additionally, the exception handling is good. We have experienced zero downtime since moving to this solution.
What needs improvement?
In an upcoming release, I would like to see more additional concept for exception handling, batch processing, and increased integration with other application.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using the solution for the past five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is very stable we have not had any issues
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability is good. We have a banking application running worldwide through the solution which attracts many users.
How was the initial setup?
The installation is straightforward.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Mule ESB a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer. Partner
Senior Consultant at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
Well performing and easy to use solution
Pros and Cons
- "What Mule provides out-of-box is a sufficient product."
- "The features that I have found most valuable are that the product is updated regularly and Mule's framework."
- "There are limitations with the subscription model that comes with the product."
- "There are limitations with the subscription model that comes with the product."
What is our primary use case?
We implemented the Mule solution for our orchestration. We use it to follow up with the customer so the online order gets orchestrated to the target automated system.
What is most valuable?
The features that I have found most valuable are that the product is updated regularly and Mule's framework. Overall the performance is good.
For our current solution, I think what Mule provides out-of-box is a sufficient product.
What needs improvement?
As for what can be improved, in my experience the SMPT connectors need some improvement.
It definitely takes some amount of integration knowledge but it is still pretty easy to learn. But I would request that the documentation be more informative. That would help the development community to understand the solution better, to deal with whatever challenges they face and ensure they'll be able to solve them on their own.
The integrations are complicated so maybe that aspect of the solution should also be made simpler to use so that it wouldn't require such experienced resources to build a more complex integration.
Additionally, there are limitations with the subscription model that comes with the product. If you subscribe to the platinum subscription, you get more benefits. Now there are limitations in keeping the logs and the ability to handle the max of 30 days. They could improve that.
Lastly, they could provide us a bit more coding features.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Mule ESB for past one and a half years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
In terms of stability, we did found some bugs which we reported to Mule support, but overall I would say it's good.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Mule ESB's scalability is pretty good. It performs well.
In terms of numbers of people using the solution, actually Mule ESB plays an integrated role, so none of the users directly use it. But otherwise if you ask the production team and the development team, I would say close to 20 members are using this platform.
We definitely plan on increasing usage for Mule ESB because our customer is starting to do more AP's on the platform.
How are customer service and technical support?
I think customer support is good. The support team responds to us, but due to some challenges in the product core, we are still waiting for them to respond to some issues.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward.
What about the implementation team?
I know that the setup is straightforward, but I did not do it myself. One person from our team did it. Everything is straightforward and pretty easy, including the deployment and the promotion from one level to another level.
What other advice do I have?
I would definitely recommend Mule ESB for others to evaluate when they are choosing a product.
On a scale of one to ten, I would definitely rate Mule ESB an eight.
For it to be a higher rating they would need to improve the recording logs and encoding feature.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Manager- Integration Services & BPM at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Lightweight and everything runs in Java, but I have had issues with instability
Pros and Cons
- "Everything runs in Java, which is a useful feature."
- "Mule ESB is quite lightweight."
- "There are some issues with both stability and scalability."
- "There are some issues with both stability and scalability."
What is our primary use case?
Mule ESB acts as an intermediary that assists with integration between multiple layers.
What is most valuable?
Mule ESB is quite lightweight.
Everything runs in Java, which is a useful feature.
What needs improvement?
There are some issues with both stability and scalability.
I have experienced some issues with clustering.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Mule ESB for probably three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability of this product can be improved.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I have had a couple of issues with scalability. Our use case has traffic that depends a lot on the SDK, so there are a lot of users.
How are customer service and technical support?
The LAN team has been in contact with technical support.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Prior to Mule ESB, we were using an IBM solution that was pretty good. Mule ESB is cheaper but I would choose the IBM product instead.
How was the initial setup?
The installation and setup had been completed before I joined the company.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
This product is cheaper than some offered by other vendors, although there is a problem because you have to pay for some third-party adapters.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate this solution a six out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Updated: April 2026
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