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    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

    Spotfire

    Score7.8 out of 10
    N/ASpotfire, formerly known as TIBCO Spotfire, is a visual data science platform that combines visual analytics, data science, and data wrangling, so users can analyze data at-rest and at-scale to solve complex industry-specific problems.N/A
    Pricing
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
    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 AnalyticsSpotfire
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
    Additional Details—For Enterprise engagements, contact Spotfire directly for a custom price quote.
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
    Considered Both Products
    IBM
    Chose IBM Cognos Analytics
    We actually selected Cognos, but had to switch to another BI tool due to cost reasons.
    Incentivized
    Cloud Software Group
    Chose Spotfire
    IBM Cognos plays a bigger role at our company and Spotfire is still catching up to it in terms of automation, security, etc.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Spotfire is easier to use and a report can be created in a lot less time. While there are quite a bit more formatting and visualizations available in Cognos it takes more mastery of the tool and time to create a custom report.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    This tool was selected in my organization around 10 years back. It was suggested to be one of the best and it proved to be. My users are also satisfied with the performance of the tool, but we had some setbacks with SharePoint online and the Azure SQL database. Hopefully, if …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    As someone who has knowledge of various coding languages, Spotfire is amazing because I can create anything without having to worry about UI or other limitations, however other tools have a much better self service strategy as it is much easier for non technical users to create …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Spotfire was chosen by the company.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    • Enterprise functionality
    • R engine
    • Speed and reliability
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    I find it more userfriendly and powerful than Tableau and Excel.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    None, I do not have much experience with other software. In my company Spotfire was used to replace IBM Cognos. But I have no idea which one is better. My experience with Spotfire is good. I like it but I can not compare it with other software.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    We evaluated on Mobility, Dashboarding, Web Based User Interface and Analytical capability. At the forefront was the user experience which accounted for just over half of our evaluation criteria. No platform was a 10/10 in all four categories - SAS Visual Analytics excelled in …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    We have tried IBM's Cognos and it was too much and too difficult for what we wanted. We also tried Tableau and although we did like the visual capabilities, it did not seem to give as much in-depth "meat on the bone" as Spotfire did. Ultimately Spotfire was the perfect …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    It was my organization's decision.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Compared to Cognos the Spotfire platform is much faster in every way. This is my my personal experience.
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    97%
    Would buy again
    92 Answers
    92%
    Would buy again
    46 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    79 Answers
    98%
    Delivers good value for the price
    39 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    91 Answers
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    48 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    93%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    55 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    32 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    96%
    Implementation went as expected
    64 Answers
    94%
    Implementation went as expected
    33 Answers
    Features
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
    BI Standard Reporting
    Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.7
    138 Ratings
    6% below category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.9
    138 Ratings
    1% below category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    9.2
    136 Ratings
    11% above category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.4
    124 Ratings
    8% below category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    7.8
    130 Ratings
    8% below category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    6.4
    109 Ratings
    19% below category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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 Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    9.2
    87 Ratings
    17% above category average
    Spotfire
    -
    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
    Platform Connectivity
    Comparison of Platform Connectivity features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    -
    Ratings
    Spotfire
    7.2
    8 Ratings
    15% below category average
    Connect to Multiple Data Sources00 Ratings7.88 Ratings
    Extend Existing Data Sources00 Ratings7.48 Ratings
    Automatic Data Format Detection00 Ratings7.88 Ratings
    MDM Integration00 Ratings6.05 Ratings
    Data Exploration
    Comparison of Data Exploration features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    -
    Ratings
    Spotfire
    9.1
    8 Ratings
    8% above category average
    Visualization00 Ratings9.08 Ratings
    Interactive Data Analysis00 Ratings9.28 Ratings
    Data Preparation
    Comparison of Data Preparation features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    -
    Ratings
    Spotfire
    7.4
    8 Ratings
    10% below category average
    Interactive Data Cleaning and Enrichment00 Ratings7.28 Ratings
    Data Transformations00 Ratings8.08 Ratings
    Data Encryption00 Ratings7.05 Ratings
    Built-in Processors00 Ratings7.55 Ratings
    Platform Data Modeling
    Comparison of Platform Data Modeling features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    -
    Ratings
    Spotfire
    7.6
    8 Ratings
    11% below category average
    Multiple Model Development Languages and Tools00 Ratings7.57 Ratings
    Automated Machine Learning00 Ratings8.55 Ratings
    Single platform for multiple model development00 Ratings7.68 Ratings
    Self-Service Model Delivery00 Ratings6.76 Ratings
    Model Deployment
    Comparison of Model Deployment features of IBM Cognos Analytics and Spotfire
    Feature
    IBM Cognos Analytics
    -
    Ratings
    Spotfire
    7.4
    7 Ratings
    14% below category average
    Flexible Model Publishing Options00 Ratings7.87 Ratings
    Security, Governance, and Cost Controls00 Ratings7.07 Ratings
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    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
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    Cyfe
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    Score8.9 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Qlik Cloud Analytics (Qlik Sense)
    Score8.1 out of 10
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    Score8.8 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Sisense
    Score6.9 out of 10
    IBM Watson Studio
    Score10 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.0
    (158 ratings)
    8.4
    (351 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.4
    (31 ratings)
    9.6
    (30 ratings)
    Usability
    7.3
    (10 ratings)
    8.0
    (27 ratings)
    Availability
    8.6
    (4 ratings)
    9.0
    (14 ratings)
    Performance
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    7.1
    (14 ratings)
    Support Rating
    1.0
    (9 ratings)
    8.7
    (27 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    8.7
    (4 ratings)
    8.3
    (52 ratings)
    Online Training
    8.0
    (4 ratings)
    9.0
    (55 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    7.0
    (7 ratings)
    8.4
    (17 ratings)
    Configurability
    7.0
    (3 ratings)
    7.1
    (3 ratings)
    Data Sharing and Collaboration
    8.6
    (40 ratings)
    8.5
    (36 ratings)
    Data Sources
    8.3
    (40 ratings)
    9.3
    (36 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    5.5
    (6 ratings)
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    6.4
    (5 ratings)
    7.0
    (4 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    7.0
    (1 ratings)
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    IBM Cognos AnalyticsSpotfire
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    A high level of data integration is available here it supports various data sources and so on. Collaborating features allow users to give access to the dashboard and merge data analytics with other team members. It can meet the demands of both small and large size business enterprises. A customized dashboard and reports are provided to meet the specific needs and get support of extensibility through APIs and customized scripts.
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    • It has the best coding integration (python, R) of any BI product
    • The ability to work with very large datasets (10 mil+) is better than competitors
    • Export options are more complete and have better functionality
    • The data canvas is the best tool to join and transform data vs. competitors
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    • The donut chart is I guess a powerful illustrations but I hope it should be done quite simple in Spotfire. But in Spotfire there are lots of steps involve just to build a simple donut chart.
    • Table calculation (like Row or Column Differences) should be made simple or there should be drag and drop function for Table Calculation. No need for scripting.
    • Information Link should be changed. If new columns are added to the table just refreshing the data should be able to capture the new column. No need extra step to add column
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    -Easy to distribute information throughout the enterprise using the webplayer. -Ad hoc analysis is possible throughout the enterprise using business author in the webplayer or the thick client. -Low level of support needed by IT team. Access interfaces with LDAP and numerous other authentication methods. -Possible to continually extend the platform with JavaScript, R scripts, HTML, and custom extensions. -Ability to standardize data logic through pre-built queries in the Information Designer. Everyone in the enterprise is using the same logic -Tagging and bookmarking data allows for quick sharing of insights. -Integration with numerous data sources... flat files, data bases, big data, images, etc. -Much improved mapping capability. Also includes the ability to apply data points over any image.
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    Basic tasks like generating meaningful information from large sets of raw data are very easy. The next step of linking to multiple live data sources and linking those tables and performing on the fly analysis of the imported data is understandably more difficult.
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    Even though, it's a rather stable and predictable tool that's also fast, it does have some bugs and inconsistencies that shut down the system. Depending on the details, it could happen as often as 2-3 times a week, especially during the development period.
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    Generally, the Spotfire client runs with very good performance. There are factors that could affect performance, but normally has to do with loading large analysis files from the library if the database is located some distance away and your global network is not optimal. Once you have your data table(s) loaded in the client application, usually the application is quite good performance-wise.
    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
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    Cloud Software Group
    Support has been helpful with issues. Support seems to know their product and its capabilities. It would also seem that they have a good sense of the context of the problem; where we are going with this issue and what we want the end outcome to be.
    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
    Cloud Software Group
    The instructor was very in depth and provided relevant training to business users on how to create visualizations. They showed us how to alter settings and filter views, and provided resources for future questions. However, the instructor failed to cover data sources, connecting to data, etc. While it was helpful to see how users can use the data to create reports, they failed to properly instruct us on how to get the dataset in to begin with. We are still trying to figure out connections to certain databases (we have multiple different types).
    Incentivized
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    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
    Cloud Software Group
    The online training is good, provides a good base of knowledge. The video demonstrations were well-done and easy to follow along. Provided exercises are good as well, but I think there could be more challenging exercises. The training has also gone up in price significantly in the last 3 years (in USD, which hurts us even more in Canada), and I'm not sure it is worth the money it now costs (it is worth how much it cost 3 years ago, but not double that.)
    Incentivized
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    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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    Cloud Software Group
    The original architecture I created for our implementation had only a particular set of internal business units in mind. Over the years, Spotfire gained in popularity in our company and was being utilized across many more business units. Soon, its usage went beyond what the original architectural implementation could provide. We've since learned about how the product is used by the different teams and are currently in the middle of rolling out a new architecture. I suggest:
    • Have clearly defined service level agreements with all the teams that will use Spotfire. Your business intelligence group might only need availability during normal working hours, but your production support group might need 24/7 availability. If these groups share one Spotfire server, maintenance of that server might be a problem.
    • Know the different types of data you will be working with. One group might be working with "public" data while another group might work with sensitive data. Design your Library accordingly and with the proper permissions.
    • Know the roles of the users of Spotfire. Will there only be a small set of report writers or does everyone have write access to the Library?
    • ALWAYS add a timestamp prompt to your reports. You don't want multiple users opening a report that will try and pull down millions of rows of data to their local workstations. Another option, of course, is to just hard code a time range in the backing database view (i.e. where activity_date >= sysdate - 90, etc.), but I'd rather educate/train the user base if possible.
    • This probably goes without saying, but if possible, point to a separate reporting database or a logical standby database. You don't want the company pounding on your primaries and take down your order system.
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    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
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    Cloud Software Group
    Spotfire is significantly ahead of both products from an ETL and data ingestion capability. Spotfire also has substantially better visualizations than Power BI, and although the native visualizations aren't as flexible in Tableau, Spotfire enables users to create completely custom javascript visaualizations, which neither Tableau or Power BI has. Tableau and Power BI are likely only superior to Spotfire with respect to embedded analysis on a website.
    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
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    Cloud Software Group
    In an enterprise architecture, if Spotfire Advanced Data services(Composite Studio),data marts can be managed optimally and scalability in a data perspective is great. As the web player/consumer is directly proportional to RAM, if the enterprise can handle RAM requirement accomodating fail over mechanisms appropraitely, it is definitely scalable,
    Incentivized
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    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
    Cloud Software Group
    • It is costly, so not suitable for small scale implementations.
    • Dashboards are as good as the developer, so need experience to get most out of it
    • You need to be on Spotfire 11 at least to implement out of the box visualizations
    • Integration with Python and R is a game changer, it comes very handy to onboard data scientists without much hassle
    • performance is exceptionally well.
    • Secure
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    IBM Cognos Analytics Screenshots

    Product screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshotProduct screenshot

    Spotfire Screenshots

    Screenshot of Smart Visual AnalyticsScreenshot of Geospatial AnalyticsScreenshot of Intelligent Data WranglingScreenshot of Point-and-click Data ScienceScreenshot of Real-time Streaming Analytics