Switch to Orkes: A modern alternative to BPMN tools

Built on the open-source Conductor by Netflix, Orkes enables seamless workflow automation across modern architectures.

From legacy BPMN to modern workflows—without the rewrite

Import your existing .bpmn (or XML) definitions and instantly convert them into native Conductor workflows.

Fast migration – Import your existing .bpmn or XML definitions, and Conductor instantly converts them into native workflows.
Preserve your process logic – Tasks, gateways, and control flows map 1:1 to native Conductor constructs.
Zero-downtime cutover – Run BPMN and Conductor in parallel, then switch over when you’re ready.

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Used by 1,000’s of Organizations Globally

Why switch to Orkes Conductor?

Orkes Conductor

Legacy BPMN Tools

Architectural approach

Designed for modern, cloud-native distributed environments offering:

Optimized performance in microservices, serverless and event-driven architectures
Seamless scaling for millions of workflow executions in the above enviornments
Lower infrastructure complexity and costs

Built for monolithic, on-prem architectures and lacks native support for distributed systems.
Require additional middleware to adapt to cloud environments, increasing complexity and creating performance bottlenecks.

Development methodology

Developer-first approach

Integrates smoothly with modern development
practices (CI/CD, GitOps)
Supports multiple programming languages,
enhancing flexibility
Reduces the learning curve for technical teams
already familiar with cloud technologies

Rely heavily on proprietary visual modeling language and may not integrate well with modern development workflows.

Scalability and performance

Designed for high-performance, high-volume scenarios:

Elastic scaling based on demand
Handles millions of concurrent workflows
effortlessly
Battle tested at Netflix scale

Struggle with high-volume scenarios, often requiring costly infrastructure investments to scale.
Scaling processes are manual, leading to performance issues during peak loads

Integration capabilities

In today's API-driven world, Orkes shines with:

Native support for APIs and microservices
Seamless integration with cloud services and
modern tools
Language-agnostic design, supporting true
polyglot environments

Integration capabilities can be less flexible and more complex to implement in a microservices architecture.

Customization

Orkes offers deep technical customization, allowing developers to implement complex logic and integrations through code, APIs, and plugins, without being limited by visual tools

Traditional BPM tools are often limited by their visual modeling paradigms or proprietary scripting languages, restricting customization

Development and deployment speed

With its modern architecture and developer-
friendly approach, Orkes enables:

Rapid prototyping and deployment of workflows
Easier collaboration between development and
operations teams
Quicker adaptation to changing business
requirements

The rigid structure and complex modeling requirements of many BPM tools slow development and deployment, as changes often involve multiple layers of modeling and testing, hindering agility.

Cost-effectiveness

No proprietary experience needed to get started and maintain the platform
Way lower TCO as compared to legacy BPMN tools

Proprietary experience needed with high up-front investment and high TCO

Developer Playground FAQs

How can I convert BPMN files into Orkes Conductor workflows?

Converting BPMN to Orkes is simple. Using the Orkes UI, you can import .bpmn XML files directly, either by uploading them, dragging and dropping, or pasting the raw XML. The system automatically translates BPMN diagrams into executable Orkes workflows that are version-controlled, editable, and ready to run in production.

Why should I migrate from legacy BPMN to modern workflow orchestration?

Moving from BPMN to Orkes brings transformative benefits: elastic scaling in the cloud, seamless DevOps and CI/CD integration, and simplified microservices orchestration. Orkes also supports agentic workflows that autonomously adapt to real-time events, improving agility and resilience. This shift lowers infrastructure costs, avoids vendor lock-in, and accelerates enterprise innovation.

Does Orkes support BPMN standards for workflow import?

Yes. Orkes Conductor supports BPMN 2.0 XML imports, ensuring organizations can transition existing BPMN-based processes without losing prior investments. Once imported, workflows can be extended with Orkes’ advanced orchestration capabilities, including dynamic routing, event triggers, and AI-driven decision-making.

How can I migrate from BPMN to Orkes Conductor without downtime?

Orkes supports zero-downtime migration by allowing enterprises to run legacy BPMN systems in parallel with Conductor during the transition. This incremental approach ensures business continuity while workflows are gradually modernized. Teams can test, validate, and optimize new agentic workflows in Conductor before fully switching over, minimizing risk and disruption.

Can Orkes modernize BPMN workflows for digital transformation initiatives?

Absolutely. Orkes enables organizations to import legacy BPMN workflows and enhance them with advanced orchestration features such as event-driven triggers, intelligent task routing, and autonomous agentic execution. This modernization process future-proofs legacy processes, reduces technical debt, and accelerates digital transformation by making workflows adaptable, scalable, and enterprise-grade.

"I can't stress enough how much Orkes Cloud has helped us over the past year to get our microservices efforts off the ground and accelerate this process. And our development teams love Orkes because they can quickly make the microservices they need. Our development teams can automate anything they want. It's very empowering,"

Andy French,

AVP of Platform Automation, United Wholesale Mortgage

“Orkes has been instrumental in increasing developer agility, creating cost efficiencies, and building highly reliable and secure applications. We’re so impressed with the results that we are migrating more workflows from other platforms to Orkes and initiating all flows on Orkes.”

Thisara Alawala,

Lead Architect, Foxtel

“Thanks to Orkes Conductor, we can continue to focus on building our workflows. And because it’s all hosted in Orkes Cloud, we don’t have to think about building and maintaining the orchestration engine ourselves. We can focus on creating an exceptional customer experience and optimizing our margins,”

Chintan Shah,

VP of engineering, Collective

“We didn't want data management; we wanted a powerful microservice orchestration engine. After a careful analysis, Normalyze chose Conductor delivered by Orkes Cloud.”

Ravi Ithal,

Founder & CTO, Normalyze

“One of the things that really attracted me to Orkes Conductor is that the infrastructure is already in place. As a CTO, I want my team to build very specific tasks and applications rather than spend the time building infrastructure, which Orkes Conductor allows them to do.”

Andres Garcia,

CTO, Florence Healthcare

“Prompt engineering is at the heart of agent behavior. It’s not just about instructing agents on what actions to take, it’s about clearly defining their boundaries, constraints, and what they should actively avoid. The fact that Orkes Conductor treats prompts as first-class citizens shows us you’re serious about building for real-world AI orchestration.”

Mehdi Fassaie,

AI lead, Naveo Commerce

"Orkes Conductor empowers Tafi to design, orchestrate, and scale workflows with remarkable speed and reliability, enabling us to deliver innovative fintech solutions to our customers faster."

Ruben Abadi,

Co-Founder, TAFI

"At Summation, we use Orkes Conductor as the backbone of our workflow engine to orchestrate financial modeling workloads. It gives us the reliability and flexibility needed to maintain our Business Data Platform. What stands out is how seamlessly it handles long-running tasks, retries, and data lineage orchestration, helping us build a resilient, auditable, and high-performance planning platform."

Ramachandran R,

Co-Founder, CTO, Summation

"Orkes has been a great partner—very responsive and supportive in resolving issues quickly. Their robust platform and collaborative team have helped us accelerate project delivery."

Kishore Pocham,

Engineer, Software III, Quest Diagnostics

"What I love most about Orkes is how it adapts to us. It’s so flexible that we don’t have to change the way we do business to fit the technology. Our use cases range from managing human tasks, to generating contracts, to handling financial transactions—and even with our complex, niche institutional rules, Orkes just works. Other major software vendors force us to either compromise our business rules or build custom scripts to patch things together, adding cost, risk, and technical debt. With Orkes, it’s simple to make workflows match how we operate."

AJ Blosser,

Senior Application Developer, West Virginia University

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