Anaplan vs Microsoft Power BI

Anaplan

Sales performance management, various finance scenarios - Anaplan is good for automating calculations. It is less appropriate for very complex business cases.

Read full review

Szilvia Havasreti

PPS EMEA CEP Sales Coverage Program Manager

HPInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

Microsoft Power BI

Power BI is great for power Excel users and what I call “data archeologists” or people who dig up old data and clean it up for modern usage. It strings many files together and lets you customize the connections and format of the data. It does not work well with large data set or pull data from large databases, you will find it timing out unless you limit the data set first with a SQL View or Tabular Model before going after it. Also, large data sets take forever to refresh and update, so if you have a lot if iterations, you will spend a lot of time going out for coffee while the data reloads. Other BI tools allow you to localize the data with the first load (Qlik QVD’s) so you can refresh quicker. Comparatively, a refresh of SQL data on Power BI took 45 minutes, the exact same data set would refresh in 30 seconds using Qlik Sense.

Read full review

Verified User

Manager in Finance and Accounting

Consumer Goods Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 52 answers on this topic

Feature Rating Comparison

Anaplan

7.4

Microsoft Power BI

—

Long-term financial planning

7.4

—

Financial budgeting

8.1

—

Forecasting

7.7

—

Scenario modeling

6.5

—

Management reporting

7.6

—

Anaplan

6.5

Microsoft Power BI

—

Financial data consolidation

7.7

—

Journal entries and reports

6.6

—

Multi-currency management

6.2

—

Intercompany Eliminations

5.9

—

Minority Ownership

6.0

—

Local and consolidated reporting

7.1

—

Detailed Audit Trails

6.1

—

Anaplan

7.6

Microsoft Power BI

—

Financial Statement Reporting

7.0

—

Management Reporting

8.3

—

Excel-based Reporting

6.9

—

Automated board and financial reporting

8.0

—

Anaplan

6.7

Microsoft Power BI

—

Personalized dashboards

5.3

—

Color-coded scorecards

6.0

—

KPIs

7.0

—

Cost and profitability analysis

7.0

—

Key Performance Indicator setting

7.4

—

Benchmarking with external data

7.2

—

Anaplan

8.3

Microsoft Power BI

—

Flat file integration

8.3

—

Excel data integration

8.3

—

Direct links to 3rd-party data sources

8.2

—

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

8.1

Pixel Perfect reports

—

7.8

Customizable dashboards

—

8.5

Report Formatting Templates

—

8.0

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

8.2

Drill-down analysis

—

8.4

Formatting capabilities

—

8.2

Integration with R or other statistical packages

—

8.0

Report sharing and collaboration

—

8.3

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

7.9

Publish to Web

—

8.9

Publish to PDF

—

7.9

Report Versioning

—

7.7

Report Delivery Scheduling

—

7.7

Delivery to Remote Servers

—

7.5

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

8.2

Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)

—

8.6

Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization

—

8.7

Predictive Analytics

—

7.5

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

8.0

Multi-User Support (named login)

—

8.2

Role-Based Security Model

—

7.3

Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)

—

7.9

Single Sign-On (SSO)

—

8.4

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

8.0

Responsive Design for Web Access

—

8.1

Dedicated iOS Application

—

8.0

Dedicated Android Application

—

8.0

Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile

—

8.0

Anaplan

—

Microsoft Power BI

7.2

REST API

—

7.7

Javascript API

—

7.5

iFrames

—

7.1

Java API

—

6.5

Themeable User Interface (UI)

—

7.4

Customizable Platform (Open Source)

—

6.9

Pros

Real - time - the cloud based technology allows all changes & its impact is visible in real time.

Read full review

Szilvia Havasreti

PPS EMEA CEP Sales Coverage Program Manager

HPInformation Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

Price: The biggest advantage of Power BI is its price. All other data visualization tools can cost thousands of dollars per year, but Power BI would cost way less than $100/month. Most companies have Power BI in their agreement with Microsoft, so it might be even free for most of you.
It's a Microsoft tool: Well, all of us are used to Microsoft Excel, right? So, the learning curve to use Power BI is not steep since we are all used to how Microsoft organizes their software, especially compared to other tools such as Tableau.
Powerful cloud: Running a lot of data can be an expensive task for many computers. Since Power BI is cloud-based, all the processing power is done on powerful servers, so you can run complicated graphs and tool will handle super well and fast!
Add-ins: Power BI has a good stand library of standard features. However, if you need more advanced graphs, such as heat maps, correlation charts, and Sankey charts, they are all available for free.

Read full review

Gabriel Chiararia

Marketing Consultant

Brigham Young University Marriott School of BusinessConsumer Electronics, 201-500 employees

View all 52 answers on this topic

Cons

The dashboard functionality is basic therefore, we have to bring in Tableau to provide a more professional view of the outputs as well as to allow management to more easily slice and dice data.
There is an Anaplan learning center however, I have not found it useful when I have questions. We are fortunate to have Aviana Global guiding us through the initial phases of our process. Without our consultants, learning Anaplan would be overwhelming.
The Anaplan Connect needs to be improved. We are considering a third party ETL, but we prefer that Anaplan have this capability built into its platform.

Read full review

Tara Kirby

Senior Director, Planning & Analysis

Schneider Electric SoftwareIndustrial Automation, 10,001+ employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

Connectivity with non-Microsoft tools: Power BI is great to integrate with other MS tools, but if you want to connect it with statistical or machine learning tools (R, Python, Mathlab, JMP, etc.) you might get in trouble. Tableau, for example, has an easy integration with R and Python.
Not all features are available in the online version: If you want to use more advanced features, you will probably need to download the desktop version of Power BI.
No desktop version for Mac: So, I use a Mac and I needed to use some extra features on Power BI. When I tried to download the more complete desktop version, I realized that there's no desktop version of Power BI for Mac! I had to borrow a PC from a colleague to run the analysis I wanted.

Read full review

Gabriel Chiararia

Marketing Consultant

Brigham Young University Marriott School of BusinessConsumer Electronics, 201-500 employees

View all 52 answers on this topic

Likelihood to Renew

Anaplan8.2

Based on 3 answers

I don't think we could function without the collaboration capabilities built into Anaplan that replaced disparate Excel files in the workforce planning model

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 3 answers on this topic

Microsoft Power BI10.0

Based on 1 answer

I find it helpful and easy to use

Read full review

jim paroly

Freelance Photographer

j. paroly photoGraphic Design, 1-10 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

Usability

Anaplan8.2

Based on 2 answers

There is a dependency in this rating - in that I find Anaplan extremely easy to use, but I've spent the necessary time developing a strong understanding of the platform. Once you understand how to use it, the platform is flexible, easy to use, and fun to use.

Read full review

Chris Friederich

Director, Financial Planning & Analysis

Cherwell SoftwareComputer Software, 201-500 employees

View all 2 answers on this topic

Microsoft Power BI8.8

Based on 3 answers

PBI is very easy to use because of its similarity with power pivot and excel. DAX is the basic foundation language to be mastered to quickly build reports. Custom measures have been introduce to write instant DAX functions (But doesnt work all the time and need a understanding of DAX to debug). Easy to chart multiple charts and also third party charts

Read full review

Rohit Acharya

Business Intelligence Manager

ZALORA GroupInternet, 1001-5000 employees

View all 3 answers on this topic

Reliability and Availability

Anaplan10.0

Based on 1 answer

In nearly 3 years, I have only had 1 issue of being unable to access my model for an unplanned maintenance. Even planned maintenance windows are handled during low traffic hours on the weekend.

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Performance

Anaplan9.0

Based on 1 answer

Everything is calculated in memory in the cloud. It's nearly instantaneous updates when you make changes. The only time things get a little slow is when you have a massive model with very intricate calculations...but "slow" for Anaplan is not what I would call "slow" for something like Hyperion. We used to have Hyperion calcs that ran for 60 mins before you could use data. The equivalent would be 60 seconds in Anaplan.

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Support

Anaplan8.0

Based on 2 answers

I feel like the support team is a little lacking in product knowledge. Several times I have contacted them to get help, and ended up finding a solution to my own problem before the team could get back to me with anything useful. I have also submitted a few bugs, and never got updates to when they were fixed in later releases.

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 2 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

In-Person Training

Anaplan3.0

Based on 1 answer

The in-person training is simply not worth the cost. After a few weeks of playing in Anaplan, I went to the basic training and knew more than the person teaching it. a year down the road, I was the first person to complete the advance training, and again could have been teaching the class better than the person running the session. Spend some time on your own trying out different things and you will get all the understanding you need to be successful.

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Online Training

Anaplan5.0

Based on 1 answer

I'm giving this a 5 simply for the anapedia outline of calculations. The online videos and trainings leave a lot to be desired, but having anapedia around to help you understand calculations has been helpful. The drawback to anapedia is the depth they go into for calculations, it is lackluster at times. Because of that, I have been working through a much more in-depth look at each calculation on my website for users to reference: http://www.anaplanguru.com/formulas/

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Implementation

Anaplan6.8

Based on 12 answers

Implementation using Anaplan's internal customer success team left much to be desired. We've found much better success with outside consultants

Read full review

Christopher Pope

Manager

Seagate TechnologyComputer Hardware, 10,001+ employees

View all 12 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Alternatives Considered

Modeling and what I call the "brains" is much better in Anaplan. You can create several different model types that can all feed into a single budget or plan.What Anaplan really lacks is the ad-hoc ability that is in Hyperion. You can't identify your dimensions and find the data sitting in that spot, the data just isn't setup that way in Anaplan. This makes answering some detail questions more difficult than it would be in Hyperion. for that reason, we are using Anaplan for the modeling, and Hyperion for the data storage. It would be nice to be able to sunset Hyperion though....

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

I am an just a business analyst

Power BI is used by someone like me in a scenario where I want to bypass IT (which can take transaction data and slice it in SQL or HALO) but at the same time could never replace Anaplan or Excel where the raw data is small enough to be handled by those platforms. So the situation for me has to be just right to bring Power BI into the fold......an extremely large amount of untouched raw data.

In other words there really is no "other" for Power BI. if the situation is just right, then Power BI is the only way.

Read full review

Verified User

Analyst in Finance and Accounting

Retail Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 52 answers on this topic

Lines of Business and Business Impact

We are early in our implementation therefore, Anaplan's impact is not fully measurable. It will cut one to two days off of our revenue forecasting by eliminating individual spreadsheets and through use of the data hub that feeds the spoke models. We have not yet measured the impact it has on our sales ops team, but we expect that it will cut at least a half day from central sales ops and hours of time across multiple regional sales ops teams each week.

Read full review

Tara Kirby

Senior Director, Planning & Analysis

Schneider Electric SoftwareIndustrial Automation, 10,001+ employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Selection Process

Adaptive and Host Analytics

Read full review

More flexible and able to handle more data.

Read full review

Tommy Bettles

Sr. Manager, Finance

AtlassianComputer Software, 1001-5000 employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Microsoft Power BI8.2

Based on 49 answers

I can speak to formatting only here and like I stated before, simple formatting takes too many steps. I guess I am used to Excel, where formatting icons are right there in front of you and you can figure out what works best by clicking through them. In Power BI, I have to go to another screen to create columns (edit queries), or rename a column. Yes it's easy to do, but it's not always a one click away or right click away. I wish I had enough experience in report distribution. From what I've seen and know, creating/editing a report is too difficult to massage. There was a guy in Audit that had created several reports and sent it out to the masses. To me the charts and graphs were too high level to mean anything. It was hard to see the context of the graphs and the message in the data. That probably wasn't Power BIs fault but it gave me a poor taste in my mouth about what a Power BI report could look like. I think with more time, I can create a report entirely in Power BI and have the axis and data points make immediate sense from first or second glance to the audience. But then I haven't had the time or need to use Power BI enough to have to learn that. If we are talking about something other than transaction data or better yet transaction data that has already been touched or massaged in any way somewhere else, Power BI will remain a luxury that requires some more understanding.

Read full review

Verified User

Analyst in Finance and Accounting

Retail Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 49 answers on this topic

Data Integration

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Microsoft Power BI8.3

Based on 48 answers

It is seamless. For me, I connect Power BI the HALO. And you can switch from the production environment to testing environment fairly quickly. Sometimes the live connects can slow down HALO, but that is HALO's fault (their cubes aren't broken down and separated out properly). Once the HALO team goes in and isolates the HALO cube better, then Power BI resumes its magic without any more connectivity issues.

Read full review

Verified User

Analyst in Finance and Accounting

Retail Company, 10,001+ employees

View all 48 answers on this topic

Scalability

Anaplan7.0

Based on 1 answer

It's going to handle most of what you can throw at it. The problem lies in the sparsity of some datasets. When you have over 5ish dimensions of sparse data, the size of the model gets bloated for not much value. In several cases, I have had to adapt my model to account for sparsity in a way that minimized use of space, but also made interacting with the data more cumbersome.

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 1 answers on this topic

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

Ask the community to sound off

Return on Investment

Workforce Planning efficiency - so much easier than excel to maintain sensitive information planning
Long range plan lead time - the old excel model took weeks to update. The Anaplan model takes hours

Read full review

Joe Bradbury

Manager, Financial Systems

Research NowMarket Research, 1001-5000 employees

View all 100 answers on this topic

It's a good start for setting up customized dashboards.
Available for all users based on Office 365 platform we have in place.
Doesn't really allow depth of report - specifically customization of visual displays.

Read full review

Mark Metz

Enterprise Services Consultant

Bristol-Myers SquibbPharmaceuticals, 10,001+ employees

View all 52 answers on this topic

Pricing Details

Anaplan

General

Free Trial

—

Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Yes

Entry-level set up fee?

Optional

Additional Pricing Details

Request a personal demo: https://www.anaplan.com/request-demo/ Free trial for existing customers for any app in the App Hub: https://apphub.anaplan.com/

Anaplan vs Microsoft Power BI

Microsoft Power BI<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring#question3' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>Customer Verified: Read more.</a>

Microsoft Power BI<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring#question3' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'>Customer Verified: Read more.</a>

Add comparison

Likelihood to Recommend

Anaplan

Microsoft Power BI

Feature Rating Comparison

Long-term financial planning

Financial budgeting

Forecasting

Scenario modeling

Management reporting

Financial data consolidation

Journal entries and reports

Multi-currency management

Intercompany Eliminations

Minority Ownership

Local and consolidated reporting

Detailed Audit Trails

Financial Statement Reporting

Management Reporting

Excel-based Reporting

Automated board and financial reporting

Personalized dashboards

Color-coded scorecards

KPIs

Cost and profitability analysis

Key Performance Indicator setting

Benchmarking with external data

Flat file integration

Excel data integration

Direct links to 3rd-party data sources

Pixel Perfect reports

Customizable dashboards

Report Formatting Templates

Drill-down analysis

Formatting capabilities

Integration with R or other statistical packages

Report sharing and collaboration

Publish to Web

Publish to PDF

Report Versioning

Report Delivery Scheduling

Delivery to Remote Servers

Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)

Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization

Predictive Analytics

Multi-User Support (named login)

Role-Based Security Model

Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)

Single Sign-On (SSO)

Responsive Design for Web Access

Dedicated iOS Application

Dedicated Android Application

Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile

REST API

Javascript API

iFrames

Java API

Themeable User Interface (UI)

Customizable Platform (Open Source)

Pros

Cons

Likelihood to Renew

Usability

Reliability and Availability

Performance

Support

In-Person Training

Online Training

Implementation

Alternatives Considered

Lines of Business and Business Impact

Selection Process

Collaboration and Sharing

Data Integration

Scalability

Return on Investment

Screenshots