TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS) vs. Apache Kafka vs. IBM Event Automation

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Amazon SQS

    Score8.7 out of 10
    N/AAmazon Web Services (AWS) Provides the Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS), a managed message queue service which supports the safe decoupling and distribution of different components in a cloud infrastructure and cloud applications.

    $0

    per GB

    Apache Kafka

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AApache Kafka is an open-source stream processing platform developed by the Apache Software Foundation written in Scala and Java. The Kafka event streaming platform is used by thousands of companies for high-performance data pipelines, streaming analytics, data integration, and mission-critical applications.N/A

    IBM Event Automation

    Score8.1 out of 10
    N/AIBM Event Automation enables businesses to accelerate their event-driven efforts. The event streams, event endpoint management and event processing capabilities help lay the foundation of an event-driven architecture for unlocking the value of events.N/A
    Pricing
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Editions & Modules
    All Data Transfer In
    $0.00
    per GB
    Standard Queue
    $0.00000004
    per request
    FIFO Queue
    $0.00000005
    per request
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Free Trial
    NoNoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesNoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Considered Multiple Products
    Amazon AWS
    Chose Amazon SQS
    To be blunt: Amazon SQS was the simplest to implement given our requirements. Other services in this space work just as well, and SQS does not have any benefits outside of being the easiest to implement when using an otherwise fully AWS stack. AWS itself even has other …
    Incentivized
    Chose Amazon SQS
    Amazon SQS stacks up with the best of them as most of their products do. The only issue comparatively that I’ve had with this service, in particular, is the silently failing messages and then allocation of time to dedicate to debugging when the issue of why a message got stuck …
    Incentivized
    Apache
    Chose Apache Kafka
    It has very minimal overhead and doesn't have a steep learning curve.
    Incentivized
    Chose Apache Kafka
    - The biggest advantage of using Apache Kafka is that it is cloud agnostic - It handles super high volume, is fault tolerance, high performance
    Incentivized
    Chose Apache Kafka
    I used other messaging/queue solutions that are a lot more basic than Confluent Kafka, as well as another solution that is no longer in the market called Xively, which was bought and "buried" by Google. In comparison, these solutions offer way fewer functionalities and respond …
    Incentivized
    IBM
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    94%
    Would buy again
    16 Answers
    92%
    Would buy again
    11 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    16 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    12 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    94%
    Happy with the feature set
    16 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    12 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    13 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    17 Answers
    89%
    Implementation went as expected
    8 Answers
    Best Alternatives
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Small Businesses
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    Apache Kafka
    Score8.9 out of 10
    IBM MQ
    Score9 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    Apache Kafka
    Score8.9 out of 10
    TIBCO Messaging
    Score7.7 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.1
    (7 ratings)
    8.0
    (19 ratings)
    8.1
    (14 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.0
    (2 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    8.4
    (4 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.9
    (9 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Amazon SQSApache KafkaIBM Event Automation
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Amazon AWS
    If you are looking to build something that just requires a simple queue service (as the name implies) this is great for it. You might look elsewhere though if you get into more complicated needs. This is also very well suited if you are already using other services with AWS and intend to fully build whatever you are building in AWS. If you are looking for a mixed environment -- SQS is not for you
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    Apache Kafka is well-suited for most data-streaming use cases. Amazon Kinesis and Azure EventHubs, unless you have a specific use case where using those cloud PaAS for your data lakes, once set up well, Apache Kafka will take care of everything else in the background. Azure EventHubs, is good for cross-cloud use cases, and Amazon Kinesis - I have no real-world experience. But I believe it is the same.
    Read full review
    IBM
    IBM Event Streams is well suited for companies developing event driven Microservices. One of the biggest challenger with microservices is that your data gets distributed into little silos - event streaming (or better known as event sourcing) allows you to get a central source of truth in your event store. We are taking this approach with IBM Event Streams and it is well suited for building an event streaming / sourcing architecture.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Amazon AWS
    • It provides an always-available serverless queue for workflows or mission-critical processes.
    • Is extremely low cost and overall costs to our environments have been negligible.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    • Really easy to configure. I've used other message brokers such as RabbitMQ and compared to them, Kafka's configurations are very easy to understand and tweak.
    • Very scalable: easily configured to run on multiple nodes allowing for ease of parallelism (assuming your queues/topics don't have to be consumed in the exact same order the messages were delivered)
    • Not exactly a feature, but I trust Kafka will be around for at least another decade because active development has continued to be strong and there's a lot of financial backing from Confluent and LinkedIn, and probably many other companies who are using it (which, anecdotally, is many).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    • It is adaptive and helps us create more engaging experiences on our platforms.
    • The Key metrics dashboard is rich with insights.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Amazon AWS
    • Almost all of the functionality has been covered by SQS, but they could improve the throughput time.
    • Also, they could provide built-in Cloud Watch, so that we can easily configure it without any external efforts.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    • Sometimes it becomes difficult to monitor our Kafka deployments. We've been able to overcome it largely using AWS MSK, a managed service for Apache Kafka, but a separate monitoring dashboard would have been great.
    • Simplify the process for local deployment of Kafka and provide a user interface to get visibility into the different topics and the messages being processed.
    • Learning curve around creation of broker and topics could be simplified
    Read full review
    IBM
    • Provide Capabilities to connect the Event Streams via REST Proxy.
    • Schema Registry to handle Avro Formats.
    • Provide Kafka Connect Sink & Source Connectors.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Amazon AWS
    No answers on this topic
    Apache
    Kafka is quickly becoming core product of the organization, indeed it is replacing older messaging systems. No better alternatives found yet
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Amazon AWS
    No answers on this topic
    Apache
    Apache Kafka is highly recommended to develop loosely coupled, real-time processing applications. Also, Apache Kafka provides property based configuration. Producer, Consumer and broker contain their own separate property file
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    The product was very user friendly and extremely easy to get started with. The documentation is excellent and the free tier makes it very easy to get started with without having to make deep or long term financial commitments.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Amazon AWS
    Online blogging and documentation for SQS is great. There are many examples of implementing it and if you look hard enough, more than likely there are examples that meet the exact case with which you are working
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    Support for Apache Kafka (if willing to pay) is available from Confluent that includes the same time that created Kafka at Linkedin so they know this software in and out. Moreover, Apache Kafka is well known and best practices documents and deployment scenarios are easily available for download. For example, from eBay, Linkedin, Uber, and NYTimes.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    I met with the support team and they have deep technical and development understanding of the needs and the problems which IBM Event Streams addresses. If you are looking for a product backed by a highly technical support team then IBM Event Streams is probably the best choice. I was specifically impressed by the level of technical understanding my support team demonstrated.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Amazon AWS
    The most comparable products are RabbitMQ, and perhaps ActiveMQ. Until recently, AWS did not offer a managed ActiveMQ product. Running RabbitMQ will never be to my team's competitive advantage; we wanted a managed service.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    I used other messaging/queue solutions that are a lot more basic than Confluent Kafka, as well as another solution that is no longer in the market called Xively, which was bought and "buried" by Google. In comparison, these solutions offer way fewer functionalities and respond to other needs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    In Event Streams, applications send data by creating a message and sending it to a topic. To receive messages, applications subscribe to a topic. High availability and reliability. Event Streams offers a highly available and reliable Apache Kafka service running on IBM Cloud. Event Streams. Event Streams stores three replicas of your data to ensure the highest level of resilience across three availability zones.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Amazon AWS
    • Positive impact - time allocation towards different features
    • Negative impact - too many resources dedicated towards debugging
    • Positive impact - less manual labor during testing
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Apache
    • Positive: Get a quick and reliable pub/sub model implemented - data across components flows easily.
    • Positive: it's scalable so we can develop small and scale for real-world scenarios
    • Negative: it's easy to get into a confusing situation if you are not experienced yet or something strange has happened (rare, but it does). Troubleshooting such situations can take time and effort.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    IBM
    • In using downstreams, the minimal features and the rate of releases were slow, makes us feel that there's no upgrades and other than that there's poor marketing of the product.
    • The adoption around the service is low, requires focused marketing.
    • Lack of visibility into topic depth , Monitoring capabilities
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots