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APIs · head to head

Formance vs TIBCO Mashery

Formance logo

Formance

APIs

Open source double-entry ledger and payment orchestration for money-moving software

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
TIBCO Mashery logo

TIBCO Mashery

APIs

Cloud-native API management for digital business

From
$2000/monthly
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Formance has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Formance formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.; TIBCO Mashery lack of support for open API standards requires workarounds
  • They diverge on capability: Formance covers Double-entry ledger, TIBCO Mashery covers Cloud-native Gateway.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Formance and TIBCO Mashery actually diverge.

Attributes where Formance and TIBCO Mashery differ
AttributeFormanceTIBCO Mashery
Starting priceFree$2000/monthly
Pricing modelOpen source, no licence feesubscription
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, APICloud, Hybrid, Multi-cloud
FoundedUnknown1997

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (APIs).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Formance

  • Double-entry ledger
  • Numscript transaction DSL
  • Multi-currency
  • Payments connectivity
  • Reconciliation
  • Self-hosted deployment
  • Cloud offering
  • API and SDKs

Only in TIBCO Mashery

  • Cloud-native Gateway
  • Developer Portal
  • API Analytics
  • TIBCO Cloud
  • AWS
  • Azure
  • GCP
  • Cloud support

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Formance

  • A marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditablenot TIBCO Mashery
  • A fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an auditnot TIBCO Mashery
  • A payments team that wants one normalised model across several PSPs so reconciliation is not written separately for eachnot TIBCO Mashery
  • A company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappearsnot TIBCO Mashery

TIBCO Mashery

  • API Developmentnot Formance
  • API Gatewaynot Formance
  • API Testingnot Formance
  • API Documentationnot Formance
  • Microservicesnot Formance

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Formance

  • Formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.
  • Numscript is a domain-specific language your team must learn, and while it makes complex splits expressible it also means transaction logic sits outside the languages your engineers already debug well.
  • Self-hosting a ledger that must never lose or duplicate a transaction is a serious operational commitment covering backups, upgrades and Postgres tuning, which is real cost the zero licence fee hides.
  • Enterprise pricing is not published, so the difference between the free path and the supported path cannot be evaluated without a sales conversation.
  • The company is much smaller than the incumbent alternatives, and while the MIT licence protects the code it does not protect the roadmap, so features on the hosted side may arrive slowly or change direction.

TIBCO Mashery

  • Lack of support for open API standards requires workarounds
  • Policy management is difficult and sometimes requires support intervention for configuration changes
  • Monetization and customization features are inadequate for some enterprise use cases
  • Delays under heavy load conditions; stability issues reported affecting performance
  • Logging and monitoring limitations; logs are hard to follow when calls cannot be filtered by keys

Pricing, plan by plan

Formance

Free
  • Open SourceFree
    • MIT licensed core ledger
    • Numscript transaction DSL
    • Multi-currency tracking
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Managed or private deployment
    • Payments connectivity and reconciliation
    • Support with response commitments

TIBCO Mashery

$2000/monthly
  • Standard$2000/monthly
    • API Gateway
    • Developer Portal
    • Standard support
  • Professional$5000/monthly
    • Advanced analytics
    • Multi-region
    • Priority support
  • Enterprise$undefined/monthly
    • Custom solutions
    • Dedicated support
    • Premium SLA

Which should you pick?

Choose Formance if

  • You need double-entry ledger.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API.
  • You also want numscript transaction dsl.
Formance review

Choose TIBCO Mashery if

  • You need cloud-native gateway.
  • You work on Cloud, Hybrid, Multi-cloud.
  • You also want developer portal.
TIBCO Mashery review

Questions people ask

Is Formance or TIBCO Mashery better?
Neither clearly leads. Formance starts at Free and TIBCO Mashery at $2000/monthly, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Formance or TIBCO Mashery?
Formance has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Formance and $2000/monthly for TIBCO Mashery.
Does Formance or TIBCO Mashery run on more platforms?
Formance runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API. TIBCO Mashery runs on Cloud, Hybrid, Multi-cloud.
Can I use Formance for free?
Yes. Formance has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. TIBCO Mashery starts at $2000/monthly.
What is Formance best used for?
Formance is most often used for a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable, a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit, a payments team that wants one normalised model across several psps so reconciliation is not written separately for each, a company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappears. Of those, a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable and a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit are not what TIBCO Mashery is typically brought in for.
What can Formance do that TIBCO Mashery cannot?
Formance covers Double-entry ledger, Numscript transaction DSL, Multi-currency, Payments connectivity. TIBCO Mashery covers Cloud-native Gateway, Developer Portal, API Analytics, TIBCO Cloud.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Formance: Is Formance really open source?

Yes. The core ledger is MIT licensed with full source access and no deployment restrictions.

TIBCO Mashery: What is TIBCO Cloud API Management (Mashery)?

TIBCO Cloud API Management, formerly known as TIBCO Cloud Mashery, is an enterprise platform delivering full lifecycle API management capabilities including API creation, productization, security, analytics, and support for API development, mediation, and event-driven initiatives.

Source
Formance: Does Formance move money?

No. It records and orchestrates movements; the actual payments happen at a PSP or bank you connect.

TIBCO Mashery: What is the pricing structure?

TIBCO Mashery pricing starts at $2000/monthly for cloud-hosted deployments based on capacity and throughput. Annual maintenance for on-premises perpetual licenses typically ranges from 18-22% of license cost. Custom plans are available based on customer requirements.

Source
Formance: What does the enterprise version cost?

Not published. It is an annual subscription quoted per customer.

TIBCO Mashery: Does Mashery support OpenAPI standards?

TIBCO Mashery supports native OpenAPI specifications. The platform provides contract-first modeling with native OpenAPI Spec support and native Node.js hosting of API implementations.

Formance: Do I have to use Numscript?

Yes for anything beyond the simplest transfers. It is how multi-party transactions are expressed atomically.

TIBCO Mashery: What's the current status of TIBCO Mashery?

Mashery, formerly sold as TIBCO Cloud API Management, has had its capabilities integrated into Boomi's enterprise platform. Users should verify current product status and support roadmap with TIBCO's sales team, as the product landscape has undergone significant changes.

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