Mule ESB Reviews

We primarily provide services using the Mule ESB. We use it to integrate multiple systems.

The connectivity the solution provides is excellent. There are often too many systems that we have to integrate and this helps with that.

The platform itself is very good.

I'm not sure of any areas Mule ESB needs to improve.

The price of the solution is a little bit high. It would be helpful if different sized businesses had access to different plans.

The solution isn't as stable as we'd like it to be. There are some ongoing issues and therefore Mule has to provide frequent patches. Mule's core IP should be more stable overall.

I've been familiar with the solution for two years.

We had a bit of an issue with stability when it came to running some large files. We kept getting an error. In the end, we had to divide the files and process it via multiple files because of the way we implemented them. Large file processing also seems to take up more memory.

The technical support has been very good. It depends on the account we're working on, however. Good accounts get prompt responses in regards to queries.

We didn't previously use a different solution. We've only been working with MuleSoft.

The initial setup was straightforward. We haven't faced any issues with implementation. They've recently simplified the processes. I recall, earlier it was not that easy to set up.

Deployment doesn't take too much time. Sometimes it can be done in minutes. It shouldn't take more than an hour.

I'm unsure of the licensing costs. I believe the total price is less than IBM, but it's still rather expensive.

We're partners of MuleSoft. We provide the solution's service to our clients.

The solution would be useful for large organizations. If there are more than three or four systems, and if there is an expansion, it would work best. Small or medium enterprises with two or three systems, may find the solution a little bit unorganized.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. If the stability were more reliable, I'd rate it higher.

We use Salesforce to store the most valuable information in our system. We have many clients that request this data, and we send it to them using the Mule ESB solution.

The most valuable feature is the Salesforce integration.

The drag and drop feature makes it very easy for transformation, and to use the Anypoint platform.

It is very easy to manage the flow using Anypoint.

I would like to see the transformation component improved such that they can support the integration of more datatypes. For example, in version 3.7 they do not support the Excel format, and some companies using that version cannot do transformation with Excel input. As a workaround, they have to manually write Java code to do it.

The Anypoint platform consumes a lot of memory, and it would be great for developers if it were more lightweight.

It would be great if they extended the free trial of the API designer to two months.

The version that I am using, 3.8, is quite stable. My understanding of version 4 is that it is not stable, yet, because it is new, and it will take some time.

This solution is very scalable, and we can use it however we like. It can connect to every kind of system.

There are approximately two hundred people using the system, directly and indirectly.

We have used technical support for some issues that we could not figure out by ourselves. They are fast and don't take a long time to respond.

We started with Mule ESB.

The Anypoint platform is based on Eclipse, so anyone who has worked in Java will find it easy.

I performed the installation myself.

The various features and components for this solution are no longer free.

I will soon be migrating to version 4 of Mule ESB, although we are also interested in the WSO2 solution because it seems to be very complete.

Using Mule ESB does not require somebody to be a Java developer, although there are some Java concepts that you need to know. For example, some people use JSON, and I find that they are scared of Mule ESB because it is based on Java. But really, it isn't a problem if they don't know it.

This solution has good performance and support, but not everybody can use it because many of the features are expensive. Especially for application management, it is expensive compared to solutions such as WSO2. It is limiting for small and medium-sized companies.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

I'm a consultant in a bank in Kuwait. I suggest good products for companies that are seeking my advice.

One of the important features of Mule ESB as an enterprise architect is that it should be scalable. It should be customizable for different kinds of clients. 

For client A, we need only two products. For client B, I need to group one and three. The product must be customizable for each. 

The product should be able to identify who is calling and what the components are. We need to return them to the calling point. Mule ESB covers most of these requirements.

Last month, the Guardian had a post saying that Mule is one of the best products for enterprise applications.

The most valuable feature of Mule ESB is data transformation, i.e. our interacting with different systems and orchestrating for our business needs. 

For example, a customer has liabilities in loans and credit cards, maybe some other mortgages, like four liabilities which are split into four systems. 

I need to expose an API that can tune the data from four systems and expose it into one single API. For that, I have to call our services and complex security policies.

Mule ESB loads complex web service security policies. Sometimes, we have some FLAC files or maybe some messaging services. We need to consume those components and expose them as an API, which is nothing but some adjacent format, i.e. a REST API.

Technically, there are mainly two API standards. One we call SOAP and the other one is the REST API. SOAP is nothing but fully external. It's very old, but huge complex enterprise companies are still using SOAP-based web services. In the mobile smartphone era, most of the hand-held devices are using REST APIs. 

Mule ESB is more into the latest REST APIs, not much into the SOAP web services. Developing is all about web services and not easy with Mule. That is one of the disadvantages of Mule. In next-gen products, Mule is in a good position.

Normally, if you're declaring a parameter or a variable, you can have visibility until it's not operating the variable. As an architect, programmer, or developer, you know when it's available. Graphically, that's not been available until this tool appeared.

It is this kind of enhancement that I'm looking for from MuleSoft. Two weeks ago or a month back, they had a big release. With this package, they are saying that APIs are your products. 

You can sell your API to different organizations and the developers can register on their portal. It's available this fall. These are the best features I am looking for now. 

My product is an API. I need to market it through the internet. I can have my portal with all of the tools built-in. This kind of feature I didn't see with the competitors currently in the market.

Mule ESB is very stable. I didn't face any issues. Recently I got a new version. I faced some other components issues, but not critical, i.e. easy to identify and rectify.

I moved from Mule 4.1 to 4.2 and it was really easy if you are migrating only one or two applications. It's very fast. I'm doing some experiments on my workspace for around 20-25 applications. 

I'm opening all of my applications in one shot, and it is scaling for me. I didn't update them as a bulk application. I worked by importing them one by one and it was fine.

I'm not into any official technical support. Their forum is pretty good and it's very active, but I cannot assure you that you will get a response within a day or two.

WebMethod is very expensive, but their support is awesome. I closely work with the operating technical support team. For retrieving the code from our bank, they are working with us very closely. Sometimes they are flying over here for conducting demos. 

Especially in the Middle East, MuleSoft is not doing like that. They are not doing much marketing in the industry. Maybe they are more focusing on South America or Asia. I'm not seeing much in the Middle East.

Mule ESB is one of the best. It is easy to use and setup. You just need to install their Anypoint Studio. It's very safe for all this. It's in a good rank just for the setup.

We evaluated Oracle, AG webMethods, and Red Hat OpenShift. The final one was MuleSoft. I'm very impressed with MuleSoft because of the pricing and license.

You have to implement several components. Sometimes, according to your needs, you have to buy several licenses for each component. Those are the things we compared.

My opinion is that Mule ESB depends on the business and the continuity of their enrollment. If you are a system that has not much left to repair, then your products and your APIs are assets within your organization. 

Here in the bank, we are facing different kinds of issues when we are integrating different systems:

• We are communicating with different card carriers like Mastercard and Visa. 
• Their standards are different according to the client requirements, i.e. exactly what kind of card they're looking for.
• They can get the products according to their requirements as well as their budget. 

I would rate Mule ESB with 7.5 or 8 out of 10. 

1. It's really easy to implement.
2. It's supporting our platforms: Windows, Linux, and Mac.
3. The performance.
4. It's free.

I'm looking for an API platform that supports the whole technology as well as the next-gen. 

Mule ESB is lacking for self-support, self-training, and documentation. The documentation of the product is less because they're selling the training.

You have to enroll for the training, then you'll get the full documentation. If you're an advanced user, you will not get much information from the public documentation.

Our primary use for this solution is API driven related management and lightweight message processing.

The most powerful feature is DataWeave, which is a powerful language where data can be transformed from one form into another. 

This solution could be improved by making it more flexible, and more user-friendly.

I would like to see support for BPM in the next release of this solution.

This solution is very good, and it is stable.

In terms of scalability, it is very good.

Technical support for this solution is very good, and very interactive. If I have any questions then I reach out to them and they respond very quickly.

We were using a variety of technologies, but we use this solution because it is a very lightweight message processing system.

I would say that this initial setup was moderate.

Our DevOps handled the implementation.

We looked at other options, but this one is what our vendor recommended.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

• API integration with many backend systems, deployment options, testing. 
• It helps me to manage API as well.

• For API creation and integrations in agile mode.
• Reduces the development cost and time as we work in agile mode.

Connectors: It has many connectors and components that really help to complete the development very quickly.

• Support, and with respect to licensing cost.
• Many of the customers feel that the licensing cost is much.

The integration of an ERP system with a payment system in order to improve accounting information and invoice management.

We have seen a significant improvement in our processes: Response time decreased significantly and integration of services became faster.

The architecture based on events: It has several connectors which allow integration from external and internal applications of the company.

• The payment system
• The accounting and financial areas
• The provisioning and enrollment system, because the response time was short.  

• Routing
• Enrichment
• DataWeave
• Choice of connectors
• Light weight containers
• Packaging and deploying
• API management
• Scalability and load balancing

• Ability to integrate disparate systems with a seamless movement of data on-premises and in the cloud
• Gives the power to make decisions and quick market penetration
• Provides the time to build and release new features
• Has Agile driven builds

• Limitation on external subscribers to listen to the messages on the bus.
• VM queues and memory/thread management need more stability.

I have been using this solution for over five years.

Not major issues but there are some rare version compatibility issues with connectors.

We did not encounter any stability issues.

No issues with scalability. Especially the Cloud deployments can scale on demand and are seamless and reliable.

Customer SLAs are one of the top priorities at MuleSoft and they have been supportive in every situation.

I found technical support to be very resourceful and experts are at hand.

We switched because this solution was found to be cost effective, freely available for community edition, and an easy transition from any programming background.

The initial setup was pretty straightforward with few easy steps.

In-house

Get your basics right about your requirements and plan ahead especially w.r.t volumes, any premium connectors to be purchased and a rough estimate on integration touch points to get some idea on the overall cost.

Plan your licensing model (cloud or on-premises or hybrid) that will allow seamless integration with new partners.

We looked at Apache Camel, Fuse ESB, Dell Boomi, and TIBCO.

Plan your use cases and set your expectations on the features that need to be implemented.

It is an ESB that can deploy seamlessly on-premises and in the cloud with strong API management and governance and has a strong integration with open source products like JBPM and Drools if these features are part of your requirements.

• We can use Java expressions anywhere in the flow
• Provides API support out-of-the-box
• API management can be done using RAML

It is very easy to learn and implement. We were able to meet project deadlines on time.

It needs more samples. Also, the dependency on Maven should be removed.

I have used Mule ESB for one year.

We had issues in Munit but rarely any stability issues.

We have not had stability issues.

We have not had scalability issues.

We had few guys from their support team.

They were excellent.

I would give technical support a rating of 8/10.

Firstly, the project architecture team decided to go with Mule.

Secondly, the project was from scratch and we want only microservices exposed over API hence, Mule was a promising deal.

However, in my next project we weren't able to go with as it much pricier than its competitors. Actually, from all the other vendors.

The setup was complex, as I came from a different background (IBM products). However, it became smoother down the line.

We went for a training first and then it was in-house after that.

This is expensive. In my next project, we had to go to other vendor.

Apparently, this is the most expensive ESB solution out there as there is no more Community Edition.

We looked at IBM IB and webMethods.

Go for it, but first read their sample exercises.

It is a one stop solution and it is an amazing product.
However,

1. It is an expensive product

2. Expensive support