TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    IBM Cognos Analytics

    Score7.7 out of 10
    N/AIBM 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

    SAP Business Data Cloud

    Score8.6 out of 10
    N/ASAP Business Data Cloud is a fully managed SaaS solution that unifies and governs all SAP data and seamlessly connects with third-party data—giving line-of-business leaders context to make even more impactful decisions.N/A
    Pricing
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    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 AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    Considered Both Products
    IBM
    No answer on this topic
    SAP
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    97%
    Would buy again
    92 Answers
    91%
    Would buy again
    39 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    79 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    28 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    91 Answers
    88%
    Happy with the feature set
    38 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    93%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    55 Answers
    80%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    24 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    96%
    Implementation went as expected
    64 Answers
    77%
    Implementation went as expected
    24 Answers
    Features
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    BI Standard Reporting
    Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.7
    138 Ratings
    6% below category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Pixel Perfect reports7.6129 Ratings00 Ratings
    Customizable dashboards8.0136 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report Formatting Templates7.5131 Ratings00 Ratings
    Ad-hoc Reporting
    Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.9
    138 Ratings
    1% below category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Drill-down analysis7.4136 Ratings00 Ratings
    Formatting capabilities8.3139 Ratings00 Ratings
    Integration with R or other statistical packages7.397 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report sharing and collaboration8.6133 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report Output and Scheduling
    Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    9.2
    136 Ratings
    11% above category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Publish to Web9.836 Ratings00 Ratings
    Publish to PDF8.2132 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report Versioning9.833 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report Delivery Scheduling8.2134 Ratings00 Ratings
    Delivery to Remote Servers9.918 Ratings00 Ratings
    Data Discovery and Visualization
    Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.4
    124 Ratings
    8% below category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)7.9121 Ratings00 Ratings
    Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization8.0114 Ratings00 Ratings
    Predictive Analytics6.7110 Ratings00 Ratings
    Pattern Recognition and Data Mining6.947 Ratings00 Ratings
    Access Control and Security
    Comparison of Access Control and Security features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.8
    130 Ratings
    8% below category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Multi-User Support (named login)7.5129 Ratings00 Ratings
    Role-Based Security Model7.5127 Ratings00 Ratings
    Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)7.4127 Ratings00 Ratings
    Report-Level Access Control8.257 Ratings00 Ratings
    Single Sign-On (SSO)8.6111 Ratings00 Ratings
    Mobile Capabilities
    Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    6.4
    109 Ratings
    19% below category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    Responsive Design for Web Access6.8104 Ratings00 Ratings
    Mobile Application6.390 Ratings00 Ratings
    Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile6.696 Ratings00 Ratings
    Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
    Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of IBM Cognos Analytics and SAP Business Data Cloud
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    9.2
    87 Ratings
    17% above category average
    SAP Business Data Cloud
    -
    Ratings
    REST API7.683 Ratings00 Ratings
    Javascript API7.779 Ratings00 Ratings
    iFrames9.912 Ratings00 Ratings
    Java API10.013 Ratings00 Ratings
    Themeable User Interface (UI)9.915 Ratings00 Ratings
    Customizable Platform (Open Source)9.99 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    Small Businesses
    Cyfe
    Score4 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Medium-sized Companies
    Qlik Cloud Analytics (Qlik Sense)
    Score8.1 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    Sisense
    Score6.9 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (158 ratings)
    8.6
    (37 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.4
    (31 ratings)
    8.2
    (5 ratings)
    Usability
    7.3
    (10 ratings)
    8.6
    (36 ratings)
    Availability
    8.6
    (4 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    1.0
    (9 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    8.7
    (4 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Online Training
    8.0
    (4 ratings)
    7.3
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    7.0
    (7 ratings)
    8.2
    (2 ratings)
    Configurability
    7.0
    (3 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.3
    (1 ratings)
    Data Sharing and Collaboration
    8.6
    (40 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Data Sources
    8.3
    (40 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    5.5
    (6 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    6.4
    (5 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Professional Services
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSAP Business Data Cloud
    Likelihood to Recommend
    IBM
    For Transaction monitoring, we build reports for executive management, providing insights into the number of alerts, the types or categories of detection scenarios, the risk profile, and a snapshot of high- or urgent-priority cases to be reported to AUSTRAC. Congos helps to build the report by ingesting alert data exported from SAS datasets. It joins with other data from Teradata and Customer Hub (Oracle).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    SAP Business Data Cloud is suited mainly for SAP data integration. We could able to easily consolidate the data from S4 and service cloud V2 system. SAP Business Data Cloud enables realtime data replications. We could able to leverage the AI core features. As my previous data warehousing skill is from SAP BW, I am missing some basic features comparing to BW. Master data manual maintenance, Time dependant masterdata, language independent text is also not straightforward.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    IBM
    • Enterprise reporting - Create, customise, and run reports on sales trends, consumer sentiment, etc.
    • Dashboard creation and data exploration & analysis - Using drag and drop feature to create ad-hoc visualisation. Additionally, using AI powered natural language query feature for data analysis and dashboard input (formation of pie, bar, line charts). It's useful for no-technical person to put queries around the spreadsheet data to get quick answers.
    • Building insights for accurate decision making - Package reports with data backed insights for stakeholders in pdf, and Excel format to support business ad-hoc cases, forecasting and strategic recommendations on relevant asks.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    • Support for AI/ML use cases with SAP Data bricks and without the need to physically transfer the data from datasphere environment.
    • Provide near realtime data for analytics from S4C public cloud via data products which was the primary business problem that our customers were concerned with
    • Provides support to use the best of both the worlds like SAP and Databricks
    • New releases that support for the zero-copy delta share via SAP Business Data Cloud connect to other products like snowflake, google big query and other products in roadmap
    • Moving towards the lakehouse architecture or similar architecture from the former warehouse architecture to meet the increasing demand for the data
    Incentivized
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    • Though SAP Business Data Cloud supports non-SAP data, integration is still not user friendly
    • Since it combines multiple services together, Cost is based on usage of the tool
    • Could be better if there is automated BW to SAP Business Data Cloud migration tool along with ABAP logic conversion support
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Read full review
    SAP
    In the new analytics world, BDC has been a game changer for SAP Analytics. Extending the SAP data for the usage in Databricks, snow flake, GCP has opened new doors for Analytics . Shift from traditional data warehousing to Business Data fabric adapting to the change in the analytics world is the need of the hour and Sap has managed to pulled it off with BDC
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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
    SAP
    SAP Business Data Cloud offers robust capabilities that enable me to analyze data and extract valuable business insights. It creates a single source of truth with seamless SAP integrations that enable faster, more reliable reporting. It has freed my team from complex engineering efforts by simplifying data analytics, giving us more time to focus on generating insights.
    Incentivized
    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
    Read full review
    SAP
    SAP Business Data Cloud has been highly available and reliable for our day-to-day activities. We have experienced very few disruptions, and the platform generally performs consistently. The reason for not awarding a perfect score is that occasional maintenance activities or cloud service issues can occur, as is common with any enterprise SaaS platform. Overall, availability has met our business needs very well.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Read full review
    SAP
    SAP Business Data Cloud provides solid overall performance, with pages and standard reports generally loading within an acceptable timeframe. The platform handles enterprise-scale data and analytics workloads effectively. While very large datasets, complex reports, or extensive integrations can occasionally impact response times, overall performance has been reliable and suitable for business operations.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    support team is generally responsive and knowledgeable, and most issues are addressed within acceptable timelines. Documentation and standard guidance are helpful for common scenarios.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Read full review
    SAP
    It will be more effective. Higher Engagement and Focus. we can ask questions and get the clarity on the spot. Better Knowledge Retention. Stronger Collaboration and Networking. Overall it will be a rich Communication. Sensitive or complex topics are often easier to discuss in person. Informal discussions during breaks often lead to valuable knowledge sharing.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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
    Read full review
    SAP
    One of the best training session I attended and they covered most of the topics and answered all our questions. participants joined from different regions, infact they all had a different questions and it was different thoughts from all of then and helped to learn better. Though I was on travel, I could able yo attend the session.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Read full review
    SAP
    I have done implementation of models in traditional bw and Using BDC. The integration of BDC with S4 hana for creating sap data products is seamless and reduces lot of implementation effort. The intelligent app feature is BDC also eases the implementation effort. If i have to compare the previous world with new BDC, implementation effort is largely saved
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    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.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    With a S4 backend a lot of core functionality is made simpler - authorization, data types, currency conversion. In particular if the front end choice is SAP Analytics Cloud. The lack of a good connection from Power BI to the datasphere application (instead of the underlying HANA cloud) is a major drawback in that scenario.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    IBM
    No answers on this topic
    SAP
    I would rate the contract terms and pricing structure of SAP Business Data Cloud as 7 out of 10. The pricing model is generally aligned with enterprise-scale deployments and provides flexibility for organizations looking to consolidate data, analytics, and governance capabilities on a single platform. The contract terms are comprehensive, and SAP offers multiple licensing options to support different business requirements and growth scenarios.The primary reason for this rating is that the pricing and licensing structure can be complex to understand, particularly when estimating long-term costs as data volumes, users, and workloads increase. Greater transparency around consumption-based charges, usage forecasting, and future scaling costs would make planning easier. I would also prefer simpler licensing bundles and more predictable pricing tiers. Overall, the model supports enterprise needs well, but additional simplicity and clarity would improve the customer experience and make budgeting more straightforward.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    IBM
    We rate IBM Cognos Analytics a 9 out of 10 for overall scalability. The platform handles large numbers of users, reports, and analytical workloads very reliably. We have experienced strong performance even in demanding enterprise environments with substantial data volumes. Its architecture provides sufficient flexibility to scale resources according to demand, making it well suited for large, business-critical deployments.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    SAP Business Data Cloud provides strong scalability for enterprise data management and analytics, supporting growth in data volumes, users, and business use cases. The platform's extensibility and integration capabilities make it adaptable across departments and sites. The reason I did not rate it higher is that large-scale deployments may require additional effort around governance, integration, and advanced customization to fully realize enterprise-wide adoption
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Professional Services
    IBM
    No answers on this topic
    SAP
    The professional services team demonstrated strong technical expertise and a solid understanding of data integration, analytics, governance, and cloud architecture. They provided valuable guidance during planning, implementation, and configuration phases, helping accelerate deployment and reduce potential risks. Their recommendations aligned well with best practices and supported a smooth transition to the platform.The reason I did not assign a higher rating is that some specialized requirements required additional consultation cycles and coordination between different teams, which occasionally extended timelines. In certain cases, deeper industry-specific examples or more tailored implementation guidance would have been beneficial. Despite these challenges, the team remained responsive, collaborative, and focused on achieving business outcomes. Overall, the professional services engagement added significant value and helped maximize the benefits of the SAP Business Data Cloud investment.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    IBM
    • The platform can be pretty pricey.
    • Convoluted contracts and they fine you for any breach during audits.
    • Things are changed between releases without any warning and break.
    • It is second to none at being able to customize list and crosstab type reports.
    • You can easily set up a report to be emailed out every day and even have it export the report to a shared folder.
    • On-prem environments can be scaled up pretty much as much as you would like.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    SAP
    • SAP Business Data Cloud has made it very simple for Dashboards and stories to be created using various features provided to users
    • Due to High maintenance and governance costs not many users are convinced to move from legacy systems like BOBJ.
    • Data fabric architecture has made it very simple and cost effective to bring various models onboard to SAP Business Data Cloud
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    IBM Cognos Analytics Screenshots

    Product screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshot