What users are saying about

IBM Cloudant vs Azure SQL Database

IBM Cloudant
Top Rated
120 Ratings
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Azure SQL Database
228 Ratings

IBM Cloudant

Top Rated
120 Ratings
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Score 9.1 out of 100

Based on 120 reviews and ratings

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Azure SQL Database

228 Ratings
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Score 8.4 out of 100

Based on 228 reviews and ratings

Feature Set Ratings

    NoSQL Databases

    8.9

    IBM Cloudant

    89%

    Azure SQL Database

    Feature Set Not Supported
    N/A
    IBM Cloudant ranks higher in 7/7 features
    IBM Cloudant ranks higher in 7/7 features

    Performance

    8.7
    87%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Availability

    9.1
    91%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Concurrency

    8.6
    86%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Security

    9.1
    91%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Scalability

    9.5
    95%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Data model flexibility

    7.5
    75%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Deployment model flexibility

    9.5
    95%
    18 Ratings
    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Database-as-a-Service

    IBM Cloudant

    Feature Set Not Supported
    N/A
    9.0

    Azure SQL Database

    90%
    Azure SQL Database ranks higher in 6/6 features
    Azure SQL Database ranks higher in 6/6 features

    Automatic software patching

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    8.9
    89%
    26 Ratings

    Database scalability

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    9.4
    94%
    28 Ratings

    Automated backups

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    9.0
    90%
    28 Ratings

    Database security provisions

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    9.1
    91%
    28 Ratings

    Monitoring and metrics

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    8.6
    86%
    27 Ratings

    Automatic host deployment

    N/A
    0 Ratings
    9.1
    91%
    23 Ratings

    Attribute Ratings

    • IBM Cloudant is rated higher in 1 area: Likelihood to Recommend
    • Azure SQL Database is rated higher in 2 areas: Likelihood to Renew, Support Rating

    Likelihood to Recommend

    9.1

    IBM Cloudant

    91%
    42 Ratings
    8.6

    Azure SQL Database

    86%
    28 Ratings

    Likelihood to Renew

    7.3

    IBM Cloudant

    73%
    1 Rating
    8.0

    Azure SQL Database

    80%
    1 Rating

    Usability

    7.7

    IBM Cloudant

    77%
    5 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Availability

    8.2

    IBM Cloudant

    82%
    2 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Performance

    8.2

    IBM Cloudant

    82%
    2 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Support Rating

    8.6

    IBM Cloudant

    86%
    6 Ratings
    9.0

    Azure SQL Database

    90%
    10 Ratings

    Online Training

    7.3

    IBM Cloudant

    73%
    2 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Implementation Rating

    8.2

    IBM Cloudant

    82%
    8 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Product Scalability

    8.6

    IBM Cloudant

    86%
    21 Ratings

    Azure SQL Database

    N/A
    0 Ratings

    Likelihood to Recommend

    IBM Cloudant

    Our organization found Cloudant most suitable if One, a fixed pricing structure would make the most sense, for example in a situation where the project Cloudant is being used in makes its revenue in procurement or fixed retainer — thus the predictability of costs is paramount; Two, where you need to frequently edit the data and/or share access to the query engine to non-engineers — this is where the GUI shines.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 42 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    Your upcoming app can be built faster on a fully managed SQL database and can be moved into Azure with a few to no application code changes. Flexible and responsive server less computing and Hyperscale storage can cope with your changing requirements and one of the main benefits is the reduction in costs, which is noticeable.

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    Niloofar Keshvari Nia | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Niloofar Keshvari Nia
    View all 28 answers on this topic

    Pros

    IBM Cloudant

    • For us, performance and scalability is the key, and Cloudant DB backed by CouchDB is scalable and performant.
    • IBM Cloudant dB is very easy to provision for sandbox, development, QA as well as production.
    • Support for Java for CouchDB app server analytics enables a greater control for over developers.
    • Schema free oriented very easy to program and build applications on it.
    • We love it!!

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    Naresh Jasotani | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Naresh Jasotani
    View all 42 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    • Maintenance is always an issue, so using a cloud solution saves a lot of trouble.
    • On premise solutions always suffer from fragmented implementations here and there, where several "dba's" keep track of security and maintenance. With a cloud database it's much easier to keep a central overview.
    • Security options in SQL database are next level... data masking, hiding sensitive data where always neglected on premise, whereas you'll get this automatically in the cloud.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 28 answers on this topic

    Cons

    IBM Cloudant

    • It was only after we went with the cloud-based solution that IBM rolled out an on-premise version.
    • We found that a 3rd-party ODBC driver was required for a few applications that needed to pull data out of Cloudant.
    • The sales process was difficult because the salesperson we used was not as versed on Cloudant as I had hoped.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 42 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    • One needs to be aware that some T-SQL features are simply not available.
    • The programmatic access to server, trace flags, hardware from within Azure SQL Database is taken away (for a good reason).
    • No SQL Agent so your jobs need to be orchestrated differently.
    • The maximum concurrent logins maybe an unexpected problem.
    • Sudden disconnects.
    • The developers and admin must study the capacity and tier usage limits https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-subscription-service-limits otherwise some errors or even transaction aborts never seen before can occur.
    • Only one Latin Collation choice.
    • There is no way to debug T-SQL ( a big drawback in my point of view).

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    Arthur Zubarev | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Arthur Zubarev
    View all 28 answers on this topic

    Pricing Details

    IBM Cloudant

    General

    Free Trial
    Yes
    Free/Freemium Version
    Yes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    Yes
    Entry-level set up fee?
    No

    Starting Price

    $0 20 reads/second ; 10 writes/second ; 5 global queries / second ; 1 GB of storage capacity

    IBM Cloudant Editions & Modules

    Edition
    LiteFree1
    Standard$752
    StandardIncluded3
    Standard$14
    1. 20 reads/second ; 10 writes/second ; 5 global queries / second ; 1 GB of storage capacity
    2. per month 100 reads/second ; 50 writes/second ; 5 global queries/second
    3. per month 20 GB of storage
    4. per month per GB of storage above the included 20 GB
    Additional Pricing Details
    —

    Azure SQL Database

    General

    Free Trial
    —
    Free/Freemium Version
    —
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    —
    Entry-level set up fee?
    No

    Starting Price

    $0.5,044 Per Hour

    Azure SQL Database Editions & Modules

    Edition
    2 vCORE$0.50441
    6 vCORE$1.51311
    10 vCORE$2.521
    1. Per Hour
    Additional Pricing Details
    —

    Likelihood to Renew

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 7.3
    Based on 1 answer
    the flexibility of NoSQL allow us to modify and upgrade our apps very fast and in a convenient way. Having the solution hosted by IBM is also giving us the chance to focus on features and the improvement of our apps. It's one thing less to be worried about

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    victor pease solano | TrustRadius Reviewer
    victor pease solano
    View all 1 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    Azure SQL Database 8.0
    Based on 1 answer
    This is best solution as a DBA one could expect from a service provider and as a cloud service, it removes all your hassles.

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    Zimran Azim | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Zimran Azim
    View all 1 answers on this topic

    Usability

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 7.7
    Based on 5 answers
    It's mostly just a straight forward API to a data store. I knock one off for the full text search thing, but I don't need it much anyways. Also, the dashboard UI they give is pretty nice to use. It provides syntax-highlighting for writing views and queries are easy to test. I wish other DBs had a UI like this.

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    Bryan Redeagle | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Bryan Redeagle
    View all 5 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Reliability and Availability

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 8.2
    Based on 2 answers
    it is a highly available solution in the IBM cloud portfolio and hence we have never had any issues with the data base being available - we also do continuous replication to be on the safer side just in case some thing goes awry. We also perform twice a year disaster recovery tests.

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    Shiv Shivakumar | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Shiv Shivakumar
    View all 2 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Performance

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 8.2
    Based on 2 answers
    very easy to get started and is very developer friendly given that it uses couchDB analytics. It is a cloud based solution and hence there is no hardware investment in a server and staging the server to get started and the associated delays/bureaucracy involved to get started. Good documentation is also available.

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    Shiv Shivakumar | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Shiv Shivakumar
    View all 2 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Support Rating

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 8.6
    Based on 6 answers
    Very happy by the commitment given by the team which has been really good over the last 7 years of usage.

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    Nicolas Peeters | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Nicolas Peeters
    View all 6 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    Azure SQL Database 9.0
    Based on 10 answers
    We give the support a high rating simply because every time we've had issues or questions, representatives were in contact with us quickly. Without fail, our issues/questions were handled in a timely matter. That kind of response is integral when client data integrity and availability is in question. There is also a wealth of documentation for resolving issues on your own.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 10 answers on this topic

    Online Training

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 7.3
    Based on 2 answers
    online resources are good enough to understand but there is nothing like testing. In our case, we discovered some not documented behavior that we take in count now. Also, the experience in NodeJs is critical. Also, take in count that most of the "good practices" with cloudant are not in online courses but in blogs and pages from independent developers

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    victor pease solano | TrustRadius Reviewer
    victor pease solano
    View all 2 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Implementation Rating

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 8.2
    Based on 8 answers
    • Test the architecture on CouchDB helped us to address initial design flaws.
    • The migration to Cloudant as such was very painless.
    • We have migrate our replication system to Cloudant Android Sync for mobile devices.
    • We have regular informal contact with the Cloudant leadership to discuss our use cases and implementation strategies.

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    Nicolas Peeters | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Nicolas Peeters
    View all 8 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Alternatives Considered

    IBM Cloudant

    The feature-set, including security, is very comparable. Overall, IBM's services added to the product are mature and stable, although product support and engineers could be a little better. Global availability is improving, and Disaster Recover Capabilities are great. Overall, it's very comparable to MongoDB as a DBaaS offer, available globally and with great documentation.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 42 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    We moved away from Oracle and NoSQL because we had been so reliant on them for the last 25 years, the pricing was too much and we were looking for a way to cut the cord. Snowflake is just too up in the air, feels like it is soon to be just another line item to add to your Azure subscription. Azure was just priced right, easy to migrate to and plenty of resources to hire to support/maintain it. Very easy to learn, too.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 28 answers on this topic

    Scalability

    IBM Cloudant

    IBM Cloudant 8.6
    Based on 21 answers
    The service scales incredibly well. As you would expect from CloudDB and IBM combination. The only reason I wouldn't score it a 10 is the fact that document trees can get nested and nested very quickly if you are attempting to do very complex datasets. Which makes your code that much more complex to deal. Its very possible we could find a solution to this problem with better database planning to begin with, but one of the reasons we chose a service over a self-hosted solution was so we could set it up quick and forget about it. So we weren't going to dedicate a team to architecture optimization.

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    Wes Wilson | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Wes Wilson
    View all 21 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    No score
    No answers yet
    No answers on this topic

    Return on Investment

    IBM Cloudant

    • IBM Cloudant is very secure and we never have to worry about losing data/unauthorized access
    • It is one of the best data backup system and works well
    • Global availability means it is easy to connect to the nearest data center and this reduces load time which is great.

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    Paul Daniels | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Paul Daniels
    View all 42 answers on this topic

    Azure SQL Database

    • Perfect for small and medium databases, being very cost effective.
    • As a Platform as a Service, there is no concern about patches, upgrades and end of life.
    • Be aware of security and network capabilities. The service cannot run in the VNET as Azure Virtual Machines do.

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    Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
    Verified User
    View all 28 answers on this topic

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