This IDC study provides a detailed description of IDC's software market taxonomy. It serves as the foundation for classification and sizing of the worldwide software market. For 2025, the taxonomy includes 79 individual functional markets grouped within a hierarchy of 20 secondary markets, which in turn aggregate into three primary segments: applications, application development and deployment, and systems infrastructure software. Each of the functional markets is described, with a sample list of representative software vendors and products."IDC's software taxonomy represents a comprehensive classification of the worldwide software marketplace," said Rasmus Andsbjerg, vice president, Public Cloud Services and Software Trackers at IDC. "It continues to be the premier source for defining and categorizing commercial software and the basis for IDC market sizing and forecast data products such as trackers and spending guides."
IDC's Worldwide Software Taxonomy
Software Taxonomy Changes for 2025
- Renames
- Additions
- Recategorizations
Taxonomy Overview
- Hierarchy of Software Markets
Definitions
- Applications Market Definitions
- Collaborative Applications
- Conferencing and Virtual Event Applications
- Web Conferencing Applications
- Virtual Event Applications
- Email Applications
- Enterprise Community Applications
- Team Collaboration Applications
- Content Workflow and Management Applications
- Content Services Applications
- Enterprise Content Management Applications
- Content Sharing and Collaboration Applications
- Capture Applications
- Document Applications
- Persuasive Content Management Applications
- Website Software
- Digital Asset Management Applications
- Product Content Management Applications
- Content Marketing Applications
- Video Platforms
- Digital Adoption Platform
- Creative Applications
- eDiscovery and Forensics Applications
- Enterprise Portals and Digital Workspaces
- Multi-Audience Portals
- Integrated Employee Workspaces
- Enterprise Resource Management Applications
- Financial Applications
- Financial and Accounting Applications
- Accounts Payable Applications
- Accounts Receivable Applications
- Treasury and Risk Management Applications
- Travel and Expense Management Applications
- Corporate Tax Management Applications
- Human Capital Management Applications
- Core Human Resources Applications
- Talent Management Applications
- Workforce Management Applications
- Payroll Management Applications
- Procurement Applications
- Order Management and Orchestration Applications
- Enterprise Performance Management Applications
- Project and Portfolio Management Applications
- Asset Life-Cycle Management Applications
- Supply Chain Management Applications
- Logistics and Transportation Management Applications
- Supply Chain Planning Applications
- Warehousing and Inventory Management Applications
- Production and Operations Applications
- Production and Grid Management Applications
- Service Industry and Public Sector Operations Applications
- Other Operations Applications
- Engineering Applications
- Computer-Aided Design Applications
- Computer-Aided Engineering Applications
- Computer-Aided Manufacturing Applications
- Collaborative Product Data Management Applications
- Other Engineering Applications
- Building Information Modeling Applications
- Electronic Design Automation Applications
- Engineering Support Applications
- Customer Relationship Management Applications
- Advertising Applications
- Advertising Placement
- Advertising Measurement
- Marketing Campaign Management Applications
- Digital Commerce Applications
- Sales Force Productivity and Management Applications
- Sales Intelligence Applications
- Sales Enablement Applications
- Revenue Intelligence and Operations Applications
- Configure, Price, Quote Applications
- Sales Performance Management Applications
- Partner Relationship Management Applications
- Sales Engagement Applications
- Customer Service Applications
- Contact Center Applications
- Application Development and Deployment Market Definitions
- Analytics and Business Intelligence Software
- Business Intelligence Software
- Advanced and Predictive Analytics Software
- Location and Geospatial Data Management and Analytics Software
- Artificial Intelligence Platforms
- AI Life-Cycle Software
- Data Labeling Software
- AI Build Software
- MLOps and Foundation Model Ops Software
- Trustworthy AI Software
- AI Software Services
- Conversational AI Software Services
- Computer Vision AI Software Services
- Generative AI Software Services
- Document AI Software Services
- Anomaly Detection AI Software Services
- Personalize AI Software Services
- Forecast AI Software Services
- Search and Knowledge Discovery Software
- Data Management Software
- Database Management Systems
- Relational Database Management Systems
- Low-Code Database Management Systems
- Navigational Database Management Systems
- Fixed Record Database Management Systems
- Object-Oriented Database Management Systems
- Multivalue Database Management Systems
- Non-Schematic Database Management Systems
- Document-Oriented Database Systems
- Key-Accessible Database Systems
- Graph Database Management Systems
- In-Memory Shared Data Managers
- Data Lake Management Systems
- Database Administration and Development Tools
- Database Administration
- Database Replication
- Data Modeling
- Database Development and Optimization
- Data Integration and Intelligence Software
- Data Ingestion and Transformation Software
- Dynamic Data Movement Software
- Data Quality Software
- Data Access Infrastructure Software
- Composite Data Framework Software
- Master Data Intelligence Software
- Metadata Management Software
- Data Archiving and Information Life-Cycle Management
- Integration and Orchestration Software
- Business-to-Business Middleware
- B2B Gateway Middleware
- B2B Collaboration Networks and B2B Managed Services
- Managed File Transfer
- Integration Software
- API Management Software
- API Gateway Software
- Integration Platforms
- Connectivity Adapters and Plug-In Software
- Event Stream Processing Software
- Messaging Middleware
- Stream Processing Software
- Functions Software
- IoT Application Platforms
- Application Development Software
- Development Languages, Environments, and Tools
- Software Construction Components
- Business Rules Management Systems
- Object Modeling Tools
- Business Process Modeling Tools
- Enterprise Architecture Tools
- Process Mining and Insights Software
- Software Quality and Life-Cycle Tools
- Automated Software Quality Tools
- Software Change, Configuration, and Process Management Software
- Application Platforms
- Deployment-Centric Application Platforms
- Application Server Software Platforms
- Cloud Deployment-Centric Application Platforms
- Transaction Processing Monitors
- Model-Driven Application Platforms
- Robotic Process Automation Software
- Systems Infrastructure Software Market Definitions
- System and Service Management Software
- IT Operations Management
- IT Automation and Configuration Management
- Workload Management
- Datacenter System and Application Control
- IT Service Management
- Network Software
- Network Infrastructure Software
- Application Delivery Controller Software
- Software-Defined Networking Software
- Network Management Software
- Network Performance Management
- Network Operations Management
- Security Software
- Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform
- Identity and Access Management Software
- Endpoint Security Software
- Network Security Software
- Security Analytics Software
- Information and Data Security Software
- Information Protection
- Digital Trust
- Governance, Risk, and Compliance Software
- Storage Software
- Data Protection Software
- The submarkets that are part of the data protection functional market are discussed in the sections that follow.
- Backup and Recovery Software
- Backup and Recovery Reporting Software
- Storage Replication Software
- Host or Hypervisor-Based Replication Software
- Systems and Data Migration Software
- Fabric and Appliance-Based Replication Software
- Array-Based Replication Software
- Replication Management Software
- Archiving Software
- Email Archiving Software
- File and Other Archiving Software
- Storage Infrastructure and Device Management Software
- Storage Resource Management and Heterogeneous SAN Management Software
- Storage Resource Management and Homogeneous SAN Management Software
- Storage Device Management Software
- Virtualization and Federation Software
- Host-Based File Systems and Volume Management Software
- Storage Access and Path Management Software
- Automated Storage Tiering Software
- Storage Acceleration Software
- Other Storage Management and Infrastructure Software
- Software-Defined Storage Controller Software
- Block-Based Software-Defined Storage Controller Software
- File-Based Software-Defined Storage Controller Software
- Object-Based Software-Defined Storage Controller Software
- Hyperconverged Software-Defined Storage Controller Software
- Endpoint Management Software
- Output Management Tools
- Device Management
- Print Management
- Digital Fax Management
- Enterprise Output Management
- Production Printing Management
- Client Endpoint Management Software
- Unified Endpoint Management
- IoT Device Management Software
- PC Life-Cycle Management
- Physical and Virtual Computing Software
- Operating System Environments
- Core Operating Systems
- Client Operating Systems
- Embedded/Industrial Operating Systems
- Software-Defined Compute
- Virtual Machine Software
- Container Infrastructure Software
- Cloud System Software
- Virtual Client Computing
- Other Computing and Storage Software
- Remote Desktop Control Software
- Container Data and Infrastructure Management Software
Related Markets
Learn More
- Related Research
- Synopsis
