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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Microsoft Access

    Score7.5 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft Access is a database management system from Microsoft that combines the relational Microsoft Jet Database Engine with a graphical user interface and software-development tools.

    $139.99

    per PC

    Microsoft BI (MSBI)

    Score8.5 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft BI is a business intelligence product used for data analysis and generating reports on server-based data. It features unlimited data analysis capacity with its reporting engine, SQL Server Reporting Services alongside ETL, master data management, and data cleansing.

    $14

    per month per user

    Pricing
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Editions & Modules
    Microsoft Access
    $139.99
    per PC
    Power BI Pro
    $14
    per month per user
    Power BI Premium
    $24
    per month per user
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoYes
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Considered Both Products
    Microsoft
    Chose Microsoft Access
    It is a program that is compatible with many others, which is an excellent advantage considering that the most used package in the company is Microsoft Office. thus a savings for the company.

    Incentivized
    Microsoft
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Microsoft BI is much cheaper.
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    The other programs listed are excellent. I have always been a fan of Google products because they are user-friendly and easily accessible by most. They also produce excellent data outputs. Google is still great for companies of any size but I believe Microsoft BI is an even …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Microsoft BI is very well suited to implement reporting and visualization within departments. Choosing Microsoft BI over tools like Tableau is the variety of third party apps it extracts data from. This functionality is limited in Tableau as it digests data from large data …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    97%
    Would buy again
    29 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    15 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    97%
    Delivers good value for the price
    29 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    15 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    93%
    Happy with the feature set
    28 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    15 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    86%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    19 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    13 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    91%
    Implementation went as expected
    21 Answers
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    11 Answers
    Features
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Relational Databases
    Comparison of Relational Databases features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    7.7
    3 Ratings
    5% below category average
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    -
    Ratings
    ACID compliance7.02 Ratings00 Ratings
    Database monitoring8.02 Ratings00 Ratings
    Database locking8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
    Encryption7.02 Ratings00 Ratings
    Disaster recovery7.73 Ratings00 Ratings
    Flexible deployment8.02 Ratings00 Ratings
    Multiple datatypes8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
    BI Standard Reporting
    Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    9.0
    53 Ratings
    10% above category average
    Pixel Perfect reports00 Ratings8.546 Ratings
    Customizable dashboards00 Ratings9.653 Ratings
    Report Formatting Templates00 Ratings8.951 Ratings
    Ad-hoc Reporting
    Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.5
    53 Ratings
    6% above category average
    Drill-down analysis00 Ratings8.548 Ratings
    Formatting capabilities00 Ratings8.253 Ratings
    Integration with R or other statistical packages00 Ratings8.342 Ratings
    Report sharing and collaboration00 Ratings8.953 Ratings
    Report Output and Scheduling
    Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.5
    52 Ratings
    3% above category average
    Publish to Web00 Ratings9.348 Ratings
    Publish to PDF00 Ratings9.148 Ratings
    Report Versioning00 Ratings7.444 Ratings
    Report Delivery Scheduling00 Ratings8.547 Ratings
    Delivery to Remote Servers00 Ratings8.426 Ratings
    Data Discovery and Visualization
    Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.7
    52 Ratings
    9% above category average
    Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)00 Ratings9.651 Ratings
    Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization00 Ratings8.748 Ratings
    Predictive Analytics00 Ratings7.745 Ratings
    Pattern Recognition and Data Mining00 Ratings8.76 Ratings
    Access Control and Security
    Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    9.3
    53 Ratings
    9% above category average
    Multi-User Support (named login)00 Ratings9.449 Ratings
    Role-Based Security Model00 Ratings9.347 Ratings
    Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)00 Ratings8.949 Ratings
    Report-Level Access Control00 Ratings9.36 Ratings
    Single Sign-On (SSO)00 Ratings9.431 Ratings
    Mobile Capabilities
    Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.0
    42 Ratings
    3% above category average
    Responsive Design for Web Access00 Ratings8.239 Ratings
    Mobile Application00 Ratings8.030 Ratings
    Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile00 Ratings7.839 Ratings
    Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
    Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Microsoft Access and Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    Feature
    Microsoft Access
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft BI (MSBI)
    8.5
    24 Ratings
    9% above category average
    REST API00 Ratings9.221 Ratings
    Javascript API00 Ratings8.821 Ratings
    iFrames00 Ratings8.820 Ratings
    Java API00 Ratings8.718 Ratings
    Themeable User Interface (UI)00 Ratings8.021 Ratings
    Customizable Platform (Open Source)00 Ratings7.319 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Small Businesses
    Amazon RDS
    Score8.1 out of 10
    Cyfe
    Score4 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    SingleStore
    Score8.2 out of 10
    Qlik Cloud Analytics (Qlik Sense)
    Score8.1 out of 10
    Enterprises
    SAP IQ
    Score5.4 out of 10
    Sisense
    Score6.9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.4
    (102 ratings)
    8.9
    (77 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    10.0
    (15 ratings)
    8.0
    (25 ratings)
    Usability
    7.6
    (8 ratings)
    8.9
    (19 ratings)
    Availability
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.5
    (2 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    Support Rating
    6.4
    (5 ratings)
    8.9
    (15 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    6.9
    (3 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.5
    (2 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.6
    (7 ratings)
    Configurability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    Data Sharing and Collaboration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.5
    (42 ratings)
    Data Sources
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.4
    (41 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Microsoft AccessMicrosoft BI (MSBI)
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Microsoft
    As a Material Purchasing/Planning/inventory tracking application, Microsoft Access serves its purpose well. It's presentation is clean, data entry is simple and the ability to customize search fields is welcome. It does, however, come with some caveats; namely, when setting search filters and the need arises to back up a step or two, with Microsoft Access you have to reset, or "clear all", adding extra steps/time to a query.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    Microsoft BI has a lot of features and is a very powerful tool, especially if you have folks on your team that know how to utilize all of its capabilities. To truly unlock all that it can do, it does require people to have a deep understanding of its capabilities. That's where the software really shines. If you are looking for a simpler, more basic reporting tool, there are other programs available that do not require such a steep learning curve.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Microsoft
    • Very easy to create entity-relationship diagrams for various tables and designing mock layouts.
    • Really easy to navigate as it hold[s] the classic Microsoft UI. Another good thing is that it comes with the complete MS Office Suite.
    • It is really fast when joining multiple tables no matter what type of join.
    • Works on pretty much same SQL scripts so no need to learn a new language!
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • Comparatively easy to use compared to other data analytics solutions, collaborating with other colleagues on data work is simple.
    • Using Visual Studio for database, ETL, reporting, and analytics development save time and money.
    • Transfer of data from one application to another via Excel and comparison of data attributes between applications
    • Dashboard functionality, as well as Python support, are available, allowing you to add additional charts and graphs.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Microsoft
    • Microsoft Access has not really changed at all for several years. It might be nice to see some upgrades and changes.
    • The help info is often not helpful. Need more tutorials for Microsoft Access to show how to do specific things.
    • Be careful naming objects such as tables, forms, etc. Names that are too long can get cut off in dialog boxes to choose a table, form, report, etc. So, I wish they would have resizable dialog boxes to allow you to see objects with long names.
    • I wish it could show me objects that are not in use in the database for current queries, tables, reports, forms, and macros. That way unused objects can be deleted without worrying about losing a report or query because you deleted the underlying object.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • MSBI designs can work on increasing data processing capabilities enough to handle the huge datasets etc.
    • It would be a lot better if it is a little low on cost.
    • it needs to create opportunities little more than they do regarding customization of some very unique visualization effects
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Microsoft
    I and the rest of my team will renew our Microsoft Access in the future because we use and maintain many different applications and databases created using Microsoft Access so we will need to maintain them in the future. Additionally, it is a standard at our place of work so it is at $0 cost to us to use. Another reason for renewing Microsoft Access is that we just don' t have the resources needed to extend into a network of users so we need to remain a single-desktop application at this time.
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    Microsoft BI is fundamental to our suite of BI applications. That being said, Northcraft Analytics is focused on delighting our customers, so if the underlying factors of our decision change, we would choose to re-write our BI applications on a different stack. Luckily, mathematics are the fundamental IP of our technology... and is portable across all BI platforms for the foreseeable future.
    Read full review
    Usability
    Microsoft
    Microsoft Access is easy to use. It is compatible with spreadsheets. It is a very good data management tool. There is scope to save a large amount of data in one place. For using this database, one does not need much training, can be shared among multiple users. This database has to sort and filtering features which seem to be very useful.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    The Microsoft BI tools have great usability for both developers and end users alike. For developers familiar with Visual Studio, there is little learning curve. For those not, the single Visual Studio IDE means not having to learn separate tools for each component. For end-users, the web interface for SSRS is simple to navigate with intuitive controls. For ad-hoc analysis, Excel can connect directly to SSAS and provide a pivot table like experience which is familiar to many users. For database development, there is beginning to be some confusion, as there are now three tool choices (VS, SSMS, Azure Data Studio) for developers. I would like to see Azure Data Studio become the superset of SSMS and eventually supplant it.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Microsoft
    I don't think the program has ever failed me. It is one of those programs where there is always a solution if you know where to look.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    The product has been reliable.
    Read full review
    Performance
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) can drag at times. We created two report servers and placed them under an F5 load balancer. This configuration has worked well. We have seen sluggish performance at times due to the Windows Firewall.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Microsoft
    While I have never contacted Microsoft directly for product support, for some reason there's a real prejudice against MS Access among most IT support professionals. They are usually discouraging when it comes to using MS Access. Most of this is due to their lack of understanding of MS Access and how it can improve one's productivity. If Microsoft invested more resources towards enhancing and promoting the use of MS Access then maybe things would be different.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    MSBI natively has a site that allows you to vote on user enhancements and bug fixes. This allows the largest nagging issues to float to the top and the development team can prioritize accordingly. As mentioned earlier, the large community base of MSBI developers assist technical resources in handling technical questions.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    This training was more directed toward what the product was capable of rather than actual programming.
    Read full review
    Online Training
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Microsoft
    I have used on-line training from Microsoft and from Pragmatic Works. I would recommend Pragmatic Works as the best way to get up to speed quickly, and then use the Microsoft on-line training to deep dive into specific features that you need to get depth with.
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Microsoft
    there is no key idea, since it is easy to implement Microsoft Access
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    We are a consulting firm and as such our best resources are always billing on client projects. Our internal implementation has weaknesses, but that's true for any company like ours. My rating is based on the product's ease of implementation.
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Microsoft
    Excel is a fantastic - robust application that can do so much so easily. Its easy to train and understand. However - excel does not provide a reporting function and that is typically where we will suggest a move to [Microsoft] Access. [Microsoft] Access requires a little more knowledge of data manipulation.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    We have used the built in ConnectWise Manager reports and custom reports. The reports provide static data. PowerBI shows us live data we can drill down into and easily adjust parameters. It's much more useful than a static PDF report.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Microsoft
    • Not having to recreate queries or reports every time you want to use them.
    • Once an item is created and saved as part of the database, you save manpower by not having to recreate them.
    • ROI from a usability standpoint is great. Solid product with great functionality that requires low maintenance usually.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Microsoft
    • As a SaaS provider we see being able to provide self-service BI to our client users as a competitive advantage. In fact the MSSQL enabled BI is a contributing factor to many winning RFPs we have done for prospective client organisations.
    • However MSSQL BI requires extensive knowledge and skills to design and develop data warehouses & data models as a foundation to support business analysts and users to interrogate data effectively and efficiently. Often times we find having strong in-house MSSQL expertise is a bless.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots