Appian is a low-code development and business process management platform. It features drag-and-drop design for app building, automated work processes, unified data management, and cloud-based deployment.
$0
Power Apps
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
PowerApps is a low code / rapid application development product from Microsoft that allows users to quickly build apps.
$20
per month per user
ProcessMaker
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
ProcessMaker is a process automation platform that helps organizations optimize and scale their business operations. By combining workflow automation, AI-driven decision-making, and advanced analytics, ProcessMaker empowers businesses to streamline complex processes, improve efficiency, and enhance customer experiences.
N/A
Pricing
Appian
Power Apps
ProcessMaker
Editions & Modules
Appian Community Edition
$0
Application - Input-Only
$2
per month per user
Application - Infrequent
$9
per month per user
Application - Standard
$75
per month per user
Platform
Custom Quote Priced per user with unlimited apps.
minimum 100 users, no maximum
Unlimited
Custom Quote Priced per development with unlimited apps.
unlimited
Platform
Custom Quote Priced per user with unlimited apps.
Minimum 100, no maximum
Unlimited
Custom Quote Priced per development with unlimited apps.
Appian surpasses Microsoft PowerApps because of how much easier it is to code. I found Appian easier to code than the competitor because of how you could access the code behind the scene (SAIL). This allowed for even greater customization and helps with debugging when you have …
I think Appian has all major features and my Manager gives this 2 tools to choose one from that. I found Power Apps is easy to learn and develop, but I feel Appian is realy complex. I strugles to learn something in Appian but that didn;t works well. Power Apps gives me …
Power Apps is great for rapid app development and internal business solutions. It helps build user-friendly applications quickly and is a great, cost-effective option for existing Microsoft customers like us. Even non-developers can get started on using Power Apps without much …
Appian works great for automating manual processes and integrating multiple systems through its toolset. It gives great flexibility for establishing rules for approvals, routings, escalations, and the like. Because of the low code toolset, it's very easy to deploy and make changes as needed as processes evolve and as the organization learns to utilize the system better. Minimal maintenance is required to support the applications build on the platform. Some of the automated testing integration with tools like Jenkins is limited so that may be an issue for some.
Power Apps is ideal for scenarios that are neither too complex nor too large. It is easy to begin development in Power Apps, as it is one of the best tools for low-code development. Power Apps can be implemented for complex scenarios as well, provided there is strong knowledge of the tool and ample time for planning. Our applications benefit from Power Apps' cross-platform support, making it easy to use on any device, including desktops, laptops, and mobile devices.
The task mining component is well suited for processes where there are a lot of steps performed in a variety of systems, particularly by a single individual on a team. It also requires a robust activity ID to be able to track an activity. It is not well suited when trying to track a process where the content is in an email.
Allows at a glance workflow documentation which assists in the need we have for information readiation.
Drag and drop interface for workflow development greatly speeds our apps time to market.
Using the advanced features of Appian, we are able to create working sites in a fraction of the time it would take to do so using "traditional" development.
Power Apps has formats that are pre-built that don't require any coding which makes it easier to achieve your vision. This does become a challenge if your App needs don't fit into that format.
We deal with a ton of data so the fact that you can connect to any data source in addition to their pre-stablished data connections makes the process a breeze.
The online learning resources and tutorials are helpful as well for those who are tech savvy.
User interface. It is clean and easy to understand. You won't get overwhelmed the second you log in.
The workflow maker. With a drag and drop interface, you can easily visualize and implement what you want on the screen. Out of all the programs we tested, this one had the easiest process maker and designer.
Ease of understanding. My biggest recommendation would be that this program is easy to access for anyone. There are complications (see negatives) but this program can be implemented quickly and efficiently, and nearly anyone can learn to use it. You will not feel like you are in the dark with it.
Search issues when type ahead and database search are used in the same field.
Buttons implementation where user is require[d] to click on the button description - if clicks on the button outside that text - button will not work.
Problems with using certain off-the-shelf performance tools like WebLoad or Neoload. That is because of different dynamic variables being used internally in Appian - which these tools are unable to correlate. We are still investigating using other tools like Jmeter to overcome dynamic correlation problem for performance testing.
Sometimes the cost of solutions is greater than the benefit. Licensing is expensive relative to the scope of some business user-created personal or team-level solutions.
While there is a starter-kit for Governance, it is complicated to stand up and requires dedicated resources to provide on-going governance operations. Many organizations are not going to be able to dedicate resources to governance and this causes the sprawl, solution duplication, silos, unneeded and unplanned licensing expenses, and a general "wild wild west" environment.
There needs to be better direction and best practices given around Power Platform Environment utilization and optimization.
The accessibility to the platform and ease for business partners to independantly create solutions is both a benefit and a negative. When the business outcome needed is a good fit for PowerApps it is a quick win, but when not a good fit it becomes a frustration for the business partner attempting to make the platform do something it is not well-suited for. The business partner entangles tech teams in the effort which drains resources and provides a lack-luster solution. All of this to say, it would be beneficial to have some tools that business partners could leverage to determine\understand if the type of business outcome they need is well suited to PowerApps or not.
Complications when you get to the more advanced pieces. When trialing, I found that the more advanced a process got, the more complicated it got for me in coding. When you begin using the more advanced features, you will find that you need to have a basic knowledge of coding - otherwise you won't go any further. This was my sole issue. Unfortunately, it was one that would have brought the school to a grinding halt if they were to ever get more complicated than they were.
We recently renewed our license with Appian. We are convinced that its flexibility, relative ease of use, the support they provide, there mobile advancements and their general willingness and desire to see us succeed all contributed to our reason to renew our agreement with Appian
Appian is a low code environment, because of this, a very good visual interface is required. Appian is providing a feature-rich dashboard [that] we can use for building the dashboards and other interfaces. Appian also provides patches and releases to enhance these features. A developer can start off development just by going through a basic course from the Appian learning community.
PowerApps is a great solution and I have spent the last year familiarizing myself with the platform and building custom applications to complete a whole range of tasks such as asset management, custom invoice generation, and item restriction tracking. We as a company have barely begun to scratch the surface of what can be achieved with PowerApps.
I gave this overall rating for ProcessMaker due to its overall flexibility, design and ease of use for most. Examples of this from us include it being an excellent and trustworthy tool for automating processes, the abilities and capabilities for real-time process tracking and the web-based accessibility and implementation which allows for easy access and management of the tool.
Appian is one of the leading low code business automation platforms that support RPA, decision rules, case management, workflow automation, and machine learning all in a single bundle. But it is also harder to implement and replace the traditional business process.
The community forums are extremely responsive to questions asked, there is a good body of online documentation and many community posts to draw from. Although the platform has changed, which means some of the posts are out of date and the solutions provided aren't relevant. Of relevance, I read over 400 articles plus documentation to get this first app built in SharePoint, move it to SQL and make it work exactly the way it should.
As analyst I participated in a developer boot camp. At times it was hard to keep up but most of the time it made sense. Trainer took the time to explain and slowed pace down to answer questions etc.
Appian has enormously transformed and keeps on updating the product every quarter to meet the latest needs of the world with new innovations & technologies being integrated within the platform. What gives more pleasure than a product that keeps on continuous[ly] improv[ing]?
1. PowerApps functionality comes with E1 over E3 License without adding extra costs 2. For Nintex you pay (at the beginning) for each workflow, so my intention would be, to do no workflows to prevent additional costs, but I want a platform with a fair price that allows me to create workflows without thinking about the price for each workflow and we use only some workflow and relative easy workflows and forms as a medium-sized company. 3. PowerApps provides a lot of functionality without needing to invest in premium features directly.
Before making the decision to get ProcessMaker, we assessed different and best options in the market, which are also quite competitive. KiSSFLOW, Blueworks Live, and Bizagi, being the most relevant and ADONIS, to mention the ones we consider the most relevant and capable of meeting our needs. In the end, we went for ProcessMaker because of mainly three things as described before: 1. Real-time process status tracking. 2. Metrics and dashboards. 3. Ease of use for constructing diagrams.
The capability is robust and quite industry agnostic. It would benefit significantly with some out of the box models - e.g. procure to pay on SAP and similar. They could also develop industry specific examples which could kickstart the implementation for organizations.
I believe it has negatively impacted our release dates. There may have been a misunderstanding as to the learning curve, even though it is "low code."
The look and feel of the applications created using Appian have uniformity and it's easier to have "reuse" between applications.
There is less developer control when it comes to features. I think this mainly has to do with the amount of plugins available. I would think there should be many more available plugins. But again, our use case is probably different than most others.
I'm using Communication edition to introduce BPMN in my organization. I can build the first process in a short time, make my boss more confident with my job.
But, with ProcessMaker, we need more time to design code to handle the process, and without PHP/Javascript Programmer, it seems hard to work with more and more processes online.
However, IE Browser is not well supported, somewhat let the user confuse.
