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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    IBM Confluent

    Score8.6 out of 10
    N/AIBM Confluent helps enterprises stream, connect, process, govern and serve real-time data across hybrid environments.

    $385

    per month

    IBM MQ

    Score9.2 out of 10
    N/AIBM MQ (formerly WebSphere MQ and MQSeries) is messaging middleware.N/A
    Pricing
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Editions & Modules
    Basic
    $0
    Standard
    Starting at ~$385
    per month
    Enterprise
    Starting at ~$1,150
    per month
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsConfluent monthly bills are based upon resource consumption, i.e., you are only charged for the resources you use when you actually use them: Stream: Kafka clusters are billed for eCKUs/CKUs ($/hour), networking ($/GB), and storage ($/GB-hour). Connect: Use of connectors is billed based on throughput ($/GB) and a task base price ($/task/hour). Process: Use of stream processing with Confluent Cloud for Apache Flink is calculated based on CFUs ($/minute). Govern: Use of Stream Governance is billed based on environment ($/hour). Confluent storage and throughput is calculated in binary gigabytes (GB), where 1 GB is 2^30 bytes. This unit of measurement is also known as a gibibyte (GiB). Please also note that all prices are stated in United States Dollars unless specifically stated otherwise. All billing computations are conducted in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).—
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Considered Both Products
    IBM
    No answer on this topic
    IBM
    Chose IBM MQ
    IBM MQ is very stable and a proven product compared to other Messaging platforms available. Performance was better than WSO2 product and also the RabbitMQ. Though Kafka and IBM MQ is not directly comparable, Kafka is more suited for event based systems and also where there is …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    94%
    Would buy again
    17 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    43 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    14 Answers
    98%
    Delivers good value for the price
    41 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    94%
    Happy with the feature set
    17 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    43 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    86%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    12 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    33 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    88%
    Implementation went as expected
    15 Answers
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    40 Answers
    Best Alternatives
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Small Businesses
    Amazon SNS
    Score8.8 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    Amazon SNS
    Score8.8 out of 10
    Apache Kafka
    Score8.9 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Google Cloud Pub/Sub
    Score8.8 out of 10
    Apache Kafka
    Score8.9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.6
    (18 ratings)
    10.0
    (49 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Usability
    7.4
    (16 ratings)
    8.9
    (8 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.5
    (29 ratings)
    Support Rating
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.1
    (27 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    IBM ConfluentIBM MQ
    Likelihood to Recommend
    IBM
    Very reliable product and help with streaming messages without fail which is a significant confidence booster as an SRE leader. Would recommend the product considering the fact that now it is backed by IBM in addition to all IBM Confluent was doing well before the acquisition. Has been a game changer for our organization
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    It is well known that IBM MQ is extremely robust, reliable and high performing, but some of the newer features are the rising stars for me. Streaming of messages has been a welcome addition for many reasons. We regularly use this for problem investigations and on occasion for replicating messages to test applications before they go live. Connection options to IBM Event Streams (Kafka) has allowed us to stream messages from IBM MQ aware apps to apps using Kafka. And not to forget one of the best traditional reasons of being able to connect to apps running on all platforms from Linux, AIX, z/OS, Windows and iSeries, and more.
    Read full review
    Pros
    IBM
    • It works really well in providing data context for our customers.
    • It is helpful in real time data streaming.
    • It is really wonderful tool for doing data validations and massaging the data.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    • Security and Data Encryption: IBM MQ provides robust security features, including data encryption and authentication mechanisms, to protect messages during transmission.
    • Message Routing: It excels at routing messages to the appropriate destinations based on criteria like message content, destination availability, or message priority.
    • Message Transformation: IBM MQ can be used to transform messages as they move through the system. For example, it can convert messages from one format to another, such as translating XML to JSON, making it valuable for integrating different systems with varying data formats
    • Reliable Message Delivery: IBM MQ ensures that messages are delivered reliably and once-only, even in the presence of network failures or system crashes. It stores messages in a queue until the receiving application is ready to process them. This reliability is crucial in financial transactions, healthcare systems, and other applications where data integrity is paramount.
    Incentivized
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    Cons
    IBM
    • Iit needs to improve in AI agents usage.
    • It needs to be more user friendly.
    • It is too complicated for beginners.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    • There is limitation on number of svrconn connections you can have to MQ on the mainframe which has been an major issue for us. This has been an issue for us for over 4 years and still no fix although I am aware IBM have been working on a solution over the last year.
    • When upgrading to MQ V9.3 on our MQ appliances there is no fall-back option. This was the same for MQ V9.2 upgrade from MQ V9.0. For production upgrades this I believe is not acceptable.
    • AMS is not supplied as part of the standard mainframe MQ licence. You need an extra licence. IBM tell customers how important security and protecting data is yet they still want to charge for this software. The cost of MQ on the mainframe is not cheap so I would expect AMS to be part of the base product.
    Incentivized
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    Usability
    IBM
    Kafka and Schema Registry are the rock solid fully managed offerings from IBM Confluent Cloud. Other than that the rest of the offerings do not work as expected.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    I give it a nine because it has significantly improved my team's data reliability and operational efficiency. Its great security features give us peace of mind, knowing our sensitive data is well protected. While the setup might initially be complex, I believe the long-term benefits far outweigh this hurdle.
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    IBM
    No answers on this topic
    IBM
    The messages are delivered instantly with this software and it integrates with our technology stack, in terms of availability we only had one failure when we were doing some testing and integration with third parties, the features of this software make it always available and its deployment is easy for the company, it does not generate expenses due to failures
    Incentivized
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    Support Rating
    IBM
    The support from the Confluent platform is great and satisfying. We have been working with Confluent for more than a year now. They sent out resident architects to help us set up Confluent cluster on our cloud and help us troubleshoot problems we have encountered. Overall, it has been a great experience working with the Confluent Platform.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    There are very specific things that must be elevated to more specialized areas of support, but the common support is very agile when receiving questions or when we leave concerns in real time. I recommend the support of the program in this regard.
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    IBM
    For our use case it was very important that the technology we were working with fit into our Azure architecture, and met our data processing size requirements to stream data within certain SLAs. Confluent more than met our performance requirements and compared to the others scale options and cost to run it was more than financially viable as a platform solution to our global operations.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    We found IBM MQ very easy to get started and quick to learn by the new users with a short learning curve and seamlessly integrates with IBM products, and quick to perform self-service analytics and make informed business decisions. IBM MQ is also very straightforward in creating simple and best reports, which are very profitable and productive.
    Incentivized
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    Return on Investment
    IBM
    • IBM Confluent helps us get data moving from system to system at near real time.
    • IBM Confluent makes pushing data into a data lake easy - analytics, targeted deals, etc
    • The RBAC and ACL setup helps us govern and secure our data, even between teams/applications.
    Incentivized
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    IBM
    • Positive- Message Reliability and Reduced downtime, increases the ROI many times.
    • Positive- Increased stability and enhanced customer experience
    • Negative- cost is very high - Both licensing and integration cost
    • Negative- Learning and training cost of IBM MQ is high as its complex to use and integrate
    Incentivized
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