IBM Cognos Analytics vs. IBM DataStage

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
IBM Cognos Analytics
Score 7.4 out of 10
N/A
IBM Cognos is a full-featured business intelligence suite by IBM, designed for larger deployments. It comprises Query Studio, Reporting Studio, Analysis Studio and Event Studio, and Cognos Administration along with tools for Microsoft Office integration, full-text search, and dashboards.
$11.25
per month per user
IBM DataStage
Score 7.8 out of 10
N/A
IBM® DataStage® is a data integration tool that helps users to design, develop and run jobs that move and transform data. At its core, the DataStage tool supports extract, transform and load (ETL) and extract, load and transform (ELT) patterns. A basic version of the software is available for on-premises deployment, and the cloud-based DataStage for IBM Cloud Pak® for Data offers automated integration capabilities in a hybrid or multicloud environment.N/A
Pricing
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
Editions & Modules
On Demand - Standard
USD 11.25
per month per user
On Demand - Premium
USD 44.90
per month per user
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
Considered Both Products
IBM Cognos Analytics
IBM DataStage
Chose IBM DataStage
It's obvious since they both are from the same vendors and it makes it easier and can get better rates for licensing. Also, sales rapes are very helpful in case of escalations and critical issues.
Chose IBM DataStage
DataStage offers better integration capabilities without the need to write code manually. It also has a native ETL engine whereas MSIS requires a SQL Server. It has better integration capabilities with data quality, data profiling and data governance tools. The main drawback of …
Features
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
7.6
132 Ratings
7% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Pixel Perfect reports7.5122 Ratings00 Ratings
Customizable dashboards7.8128 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates7.6124 Ratings00 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
7.5
132 Ratings
7% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Drill-down analysis6.8129 Ratings00 Ratings
Formatting capabilities7.8131 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages7.493 Ratings00 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration8.2125 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
5.8
130 Ratings
34% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Publish to Web6.428 Ratings00 Ratings
Publish to PDF7.8124 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Versioning3.627 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling8.4126 Ratings00 Ratings
Delivery to Remote Servers2.713 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
7.0
119 Ratings
13% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)7.7114 Ratings00 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization7.5109 Ratings00 Ratings
Predictive Analytics6.5105 Ratings00 Ratings
Pattern Recognition and Data Mining6.242 Ratings00 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
7.4
124 Ratings
14% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Multi-User Support (named login)7.0121 Ratings00 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model7.1120 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)6.7119 Ratings00 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control7.949 Ratings00 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)8.2103 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
6.3
104 Ratings
20% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
Responsive Design for Web Access6.698 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile Application6.588 Ratings00 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile6.594 Ratings00 Ratings
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
7.4
83 Ratings
4% below category average
IBM DataStage
-
Ratings
REST API7.180 Ratings00 Ratings
Javascript API7.377 Ratings00 Ratings
iFrames8.39 Ratings00 Ratings
Java API6.911 Ratings00 Ratings
Themeable User Interface (UI)7.110 Ratings00 Ratings
Customizable Platform (Open Source)7.87 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Source Connection
Comparison of Data Source Connection features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
-
Ratings
IBM DataStage
8.0
11 Ratings
4% below category average
Connect to traditional data sources00 Ratings8.111 Ratings
Connecto to Big Data and NoSQL00 Ratings7.810 Ratings
Data Transformations
Comparison of Data Transformations features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
-
Ratings
IBM DataStage
7.7
11 Ratings
5% below category average
Simple transformations00 Ratings8.011 Ratings
Complex transformations00 Ratings7.411 Ratings
Data Modeling
Comparison of Data Modeling features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
-
Ratings
IBM DataStage
7.1
11 Ratings
10% below category average
Data model creation00 Ratings6.98 Ratings
Metadata management00 Ratings5.010 Ratings
Business rules and workflow00 Ratings7.210 Ratings
Collaboration00 Ratings7.211 Ratings
Testing and debugging00 Ratings6.611 Ratings
Data Governance
Comparison of Data Governance features of Product A and Product B
IBM Cognos Analytics
-
Ratings
IBM DataStage
5.4
10 Ratings
39% below category average
Integration with data quality tools00 Ratings5.410 Ratings
Integration with MDM tools00 Ratings5.410 Ratings
User Ratings
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
Likelihood to Recommend
7.7
(149 ratings)
6.1
(11 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.1
(30 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.3
(9 ratings)
8.0
(4 ratings)
Availability
8.6
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
9.0
(5 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
1.0
(9 ratings)
9.6
(3 ratings)
In-Person Training
8.7
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
8.0
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
7.0
(7 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Configurability
7.0
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
5.7
(5 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
2.7
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
7.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
7.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
IBM Cognos AnalyticsIBM DataStage
Likelihood to Recommend
IBM
Well suited: Financial reporting - It can handle complex, pixel perfect, muti-page reports with scheduled delivery to stakeholders (like sales report by region on quarterly periodicity) Operational dashboard across departments - It can combine multiple data sources (ERP, CRM, excels etc) with filters, and embedded AI insights Less appropriate: Live dashboards - As stated earlier as well, IBM Cognos Analytics doesn't suit well for live dashboards or event driven data. For ex: live web traffic data or IOT device data, etc Data science - Although IBM Cognos Analytics is great tool for data exploration but it should not be used as a substitute for Python or R, which has edge over advanced modelling and stats based workflows like predictive modelling or clustering
Read full review
IBM
DataStage is somewhat outdated for an ETL. I guess that's what makes it a bit lagged behind its competitors. It can be used for data processing, sure, but its performance seems to be lagging behind or quite slow given the server it is running from. I won’t depend on this application if it's handling a lot of mission-critical banking and business data.
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Pros
IBM
  • We can make dozens of dispatchers all focusing on different types of workloads.
  • Friendly user interface, without the need for coding or complicated editing.
  • Highly functionality reporting tools.
  • We can easily create trigger when a certain threshold are met sending reports or alerts to needed parties.
Read full review
IBM
  • Connect to multiple types of data-sources including Oracle, Teradata, Snowflake, SQl Server.
  • Powerful tool to load large volumes of data.
  • Transformation stages allow us to reduce the amount of code needed to create ETL scripts.
  • Allow us to synchronize and refresh data as much as needed.
Read full review
Cons
IBM
  • IBM Cognos Analytics enables customer data segmentation, which is essential for marketing, improving and streamlining purchasing behavior and preferences. This helps companies create more targeted and effective marketing campaigns.
  • Our clients Through data analysis, we can identify and observe trends in the behavior of other clients, allowing us to anticipate needs and adjust strategies to avoid consequences.
Read full review
IBM
  • Technical support is a key area IBM should improve for this product. Sometimes our case is assigned to a support engineer and he has no idea of the product or services.
  • Provide custom reports for datastage jobs and performance such as job history reports, warning messages or error messages.
  • Make it fully compatible with Oracle and users can direct use of Oracle ODBC drivers instead of Data Direct driver. Same for SQL server.
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Likelihood to Renew
IBM
For an existing solution, renewing licenses does provide a good return on investment. Additionally, while rolling out scorecards and dashboards with little adhoc capabilities, to end users, cognos is very easily scalable. It also allows to create a solution that has a mix of OLAP and relational data-sources, which is a limitation with other tools. Synchronizing with existing security setup is easy too.
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Usability
IBM
We have a strong user base (3500 users) that are highly utilizing this tool. Basic users are able to consume content within the applied security model. We have a set of advanced users that really push the limits of Cognos with Report and Query Studio. These users have created a lot of personal content and stored it in 'My Reports'. Users enjoy this flexibility.
Read full review
IBM
Because it is robust, and it is being continuously improved. DS is one of the most used and recognized tools in the market. Large companies have implemented it in the first instance to develop their DW, but finding the advantages it has, they could use it for other types of projects such as migrations, application feeding, etc.
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
IBM
Reports can typically be viewed through any browser that can access the server, so the availability is ultimately up to what the company utilizing it is comfortable with allowing, though report development tends to be more picky about browsers and settings as mentioned above. It also has an optional iPad app and general mobile browsing support, but dashboards lack the mobile compatibility. What keeps it from getting a higher score is the desktop tools that are vital to the development process. The compatibility with only Windows when the server has a wide range of compatibility can be a real sore point for a company that outfits its employees exclusively with Mac or Linux machines. Of course, if they are planning on outsourcing the development anyways, it's a rather moot point
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Performance
IBM
Overall no major complaints but it doesn't handle DMR (Dimensionally Modeled for Relational) very well. DMR modelling is a capability that IBM Cognos Framework Manager provides allowing you to specify dimensional information for relational metadata and allows for OLAP-style queries. However, the capability is not very efficient and, for example, if I'm using only 2 columns on a 20-column model, the software is not smart enough to exclude 18 columns and the query side gets progressively larger and larger until it's effectively unusable.
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IBM
It could load thousands of records in seconds. But in the Parallel version, you need to understand how to particionate the data. If you use the algorithms erroneously, or the functionalities that it gives for the parsing of data, the performance can fall drastically, even with few records. It is necessary to have people with experience to be able to determine which algorithm to use and understand why.
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Support Rating
IBM
Why is their web application not working as fast as you think it should? They never know, and it is always a a bunch of shots in the dark to find out. Trying to download software from them is like trying to find a book at the library before computers were invented.
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IBM
IBM offers different levels of support but in my experience being and IBM shop helps to get direct support from more knowledgeable technicians from IBM. Not sure on the cost of having this kind of support, but I know there's also general support and community blogs and websites on the Internet make it easy to troubleshoot issues whenever there's need for that.
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In-Person Training
IBM
Onsite training provided by IBM Cognos was effective and as expected. They did not perform training with our data which was a bit difficult for our end-users.
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Online Training
IBM
The online courses they offer are thorough and presented in such a way that someone who isn't already familiar with the general design methodologies used in this field will be capable of making a good design. The training environments are provided as a fully self contained virtual machine with everything needed already to create the environments. We've had some persisting issues with the environments becoming unavailable, but support has been responsive when these issues arise and straightening them out for us
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
IBM
Make sure that any custom tables that you have, are built into your metadata packages. You can still access them via SQL queries in Cognos, but it is much easier to have them as a part of the available metadata packages.
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
IBM
Power BI is stronger for quick ad-hoc analysis and dashboards, but IBM Cognos Analytics is better when consistency, precision, and mass distribution matter. Tableau is best for interactive analysis, while IBM Cognos Analytics is better for standardized, repeatable enterprise reporting. Sigma shines for customizable dashboards and drill-down analysis while IBM Cognos Analytics holds an edge in data discovery and visualization.
Read full review
IBM
With effective capabilities and easy to manipulate the features and easy to produce accurate data analytics and the Cloud services Automation, this IBM platform is more reliable and easy to document management. The features on this platform are equipped with excellent big data management and easy to provide accurate data analytics.
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Scalability
IBM
The Cognos architecture is well suited for scalability. However, the architecture must be designed with scalability in mind from day one of the implementation. We recently upgraded from 10.1 to 10.2.1 and took the opportunity to revamp our architecture. It is now poised for future growth and scalability.
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IBM
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
IBM
  • We use the tool for data modeling as it helps in predictive data analysis for complex data, which is very similar to real-life scenarios.
  • Options of customizing & scheduling reports as per our requirements basis.
  • Has mobile application which works seamless.
  • API integration is not upto the mark with very limited options.
  • Licensing & Maintenance can go from cheap to expensive depending on the scope.
Read full review
IBM
  • It’s hard to say at this point, it delivers, but not quite as I expected. It takes a lot of resources to manage and sort this out (manpower, financial).
  • Definitely, I don’t have the exact numbers, but given the data it processes, it is A LOT. So props to the developer of this application.
  • Again, based on my experience, I’d choose other ETL apps if there is one that's more user-friendly.
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ScreenShots

IBM Cognos Analytics Screenshots

Screenshot of a natural language query, used in IBM Cognos Analytics to get AI-powered insights from data.Screenshot of AI-generated insights and forecasts that can be added with just a click of a button.Screenshot of a dashboard that can be generated automatically using IBM Cognos Analytics by uploading or selecting data.Screenshot of an AI-generated dashboard from a spreadsheet that was just uploaded. This offers a great starting point for the creative process.Screenshot of where to import data to IBM Cognos Analytics from CSV files and spreadsheets. Users can connect to cloud or on-premises data sources, including SQL databases, Google BigQuery, Amazon, and Redshift.Screenshot of Cognos Analytics Dashboard