Microsoft BI (MSBI) vs. Qlik Sense

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft 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.
$9.99
per user/per month
Qlik Sense
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Qlik Sense® is a self-service BI platform for data discovery and visualization. It supports a full range of analytics use cases—data governance, pixel-perfect reporting, and collaboration. Its Associative Engine indexes and connects relationships between data points for creating actionable insights.
$20
per month per user (10 user minimum)
Pricing
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
Editions & Modules
Power BI Pro
$9.99
per user/per month
Power BI Premium
4,995
per month
Standard
$20
per month per user (10 user minimum)
Premium
$2700
per month unlimited basic users & purchased full users
Qlik Sense Enterprise on Windows
Contact Sales
Enterprise
Custom Quote
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
Considered Both Products
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
Chose Microsoft BI (MSBI)
Microsoft BI is ideal for proficient Excel users, and it is the best choice in terms of visualizations. We decided to use Microsoft BI for these reasons.
Qlik Sense
Chose Qlik Sense
Tableau is too expensive. Microsoft BI is what we might switch to in terms of our department's skill set, available (free) training resources through forums and youtube, and pricepoint for a nonprofit.
Chose Qlik Sense
Qlik Sense can easily integrate multiple data models to visualize customer data. Tableau is easy to use—perhaps more manageable than Qlik—but expensive. Microsoft BI was chosen because it was similar to previously used
Chose Qlik Sense
Qlik was a way to combine data retrieval and presentation in one place. The majority of other solutions we evaluated required one part to retrieve data, or multiple parts to retrieve the data from various sources, then something else to prepare visualisations or reports. Qlik …
Chose Qlik Sense
More user-friendly and more advanced visualization options at a very reasonable price.
Chose Qlik Sense
Low threshold implementation traject. Low starting cost. Experience of the project team in former companies with Qlik also contributed to the decision.
Chose Qlik Sense
We chose Qlik for their responsive design, ability to access dashboards on Cloud, and for customization abilities.
Chose Qlik Sense
Cognos felt too complex for the user. Tableau was slow and did not have a CSR programme. Hyperion is great but more for finance. Microsoft not as developed and rich in features. Qlikview as much as Qlik Sense felt well developed, rich in features and relatively easy to use for …
Chose Qlik Sense
Better currently, however, Power BI is gaining more popularity with its ease to integrate with Microsoft Products.
Chose Qlik Sense
Other BI tools used previously was nowhere as dynamic and easy to use as Qlik Sense. Whilst they also present data in a graphical manner, it requires a lot more effort and time to achieve the same and also the user typically requires a lot more training to utilise.
Chose Qlik Sense
We selected QlikView and Qlik Sense hands down over the competition.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
8.6
49 Ratings
5% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.4
312 Ratings
2% above category average
Pixel Perfect reports9.042 Ratings8.3213 Ratings
Customizable dashboards8.049 Ratings8.9310 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates8.947 Ratings8.1225 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
8.7
49 Ratings
7% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.6
323 Ratings
6% above category average
Drill-down analysis8.944 Ratings8.8319 Ratings
Formatting capabilities8.049 Ratings8.2312 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages8.939 Ratings8.3152 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration8.949 Ratings8.9296 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
8.9
48 Ratings
6% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.7
275 Ratings
4% above category average
Publish to Web9.044 Ratings8.7207 Ratings
Publish to PDF9.044 Ratings8.7254 Ratings
Report Versioning8.940 Ratings8.7174 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling8.943 Ratings8.7180 Ratings
Delivery to Remote Servers8.924 Ratings8.7106 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
9.0
48 Ratings
11% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.6
311 Ratings
6% above category average
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)8.947 Ratings8.4304 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization8.944 Ratings8.7281 Ratings
Predictive Analytics8.942 Ratings8.5193 Ratings
Pattern Recognition and Data Mining9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
9.0
49 Ratings
4% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.9
294 Ratings
3% above category average
Multi-User Support (named login)8.946 Ratings9.2273 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model8.943 Ratings9.0270 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)8.946 Ratings8.7272 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)9.028 Ratings8.9216 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
8.5
39 Ratings
7% above category average
Qlik Sense
7.5
220 Ratings
6% below category average
Responsive Design for Web Access8.036 Ratings8.5214 Ratings
Mobile Application8.027 Ratings8.2132 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile9.936 Ratings8.3184 Ratings
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft BI (MSBI)
8.8
21 Ratings
10% above category average
Qlik Sense
8.5
143 Ratings
7% above category average
REST API8.919 Ratings8.7123 Ratings
Javascript API8.919 Ratings8.392 Ratings
iFrames8.918 Ratings8.592 Ratings
Java API8.917 Ratings8.669 Ratings
Themeable User Interface (UI)8.918 Ratings8.695 Ratings
Customizable Platform (Open Source)8.017 Ratings8.482 Ratings
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Medium-sized Companies
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Score 9.9 out of 10
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User Ratings
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(73 ratings)
8.5
(327 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.0
(25 ratings)
8.4
(7 ratings)
Usability
8.9
(14 ratings)
8.0
(11 ratings)
Availability
9.5
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
7.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.9
(15 ratings)
7.3
(8 ratings)
In-Person Training
6.9
(3 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Online Training
8.5
(2 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.6
(7 ratings)
7.3
(5 ratings)
Configurability
10.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Microsoft BI (MSBI)Qlik Sense
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft
Microsoft BI is well suited for Stream analytics, easy data integration, report creation and UI/UX designs (limited but what all available are great ones) Microsoft BI may be less appropriate for handling huge number of datasets and difficult queries. It may also be difficult for a company with heavy data.
Read full review
Qlik
Qlik Sense is a program whose purpose is to greatly improve all your operations and use of all data in an organic way. The mission will always be to increase the economic and commercial processes of the company in a short time. I recommended it for its high technology, which was Created for this area, the results are successful. We have noticed how it has increased relationships with our clients thanks to the credibility and security that we provide.
Read full review
Pros
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.
Read full review
Qlik
  • Flexibility in data recording, from the app, as well as in handling them. Allowing you to view reports quickly and effectively.
  • Easy to generate dynamic graphics according to our needs.
  • It is very easy to use, intuitive, so it does not generate costs in the learning process compared to the tool with collaborators
Read full review
Cons
Microsoft
  • The race to perfect gathering of Non-Traditional datasets is on-going; with Microsoft arguably not the leader of the pack in this category.
  • Licensing options for PowerBI visualizations may be a factor. I.e. if you need to implement B2C PowerBI visualizations, the cost is considerably high especially for startups.
  • Some clients are still resistant putting their data on the cloud, which restricts lots of functionality to Power BI.
Read full review
Qlik
  • Scalability is RAM limited, all data is associative and in-memory so server's RAM is directly proportional to performance
  • Limitation on advanced analytics capabilities in the form of R integration to perform complex statistical and analytical calculations
  • Can have more intuitive interface
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
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
Qlik
Qlik Sense is a constantly improving it's software and working with its' users to make it better. They are great at keeping their users informed of progress and care about delivering a quality product
Read full review
Usability
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.
Read full review
Qlik
Standard user interface and powerful analytic functions is GREAT. As technical person working in the background there are more things to do to make this a completely great tool. Some functions that should be standard requires consult scripting and hours. Now we are using it quite advanced and with many servers and in combination with QlikView. So overall I love the tool. But it could be better and user friendly and powerful in the background
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Microsoft
The product has been reliable.
Read full review
Qlik
No answers on this topic
Performance
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
Qlik
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Microsoft
While support from Microsoft isn't necessarily always best of breed, you're also not paying the price for premium support that you would on other platforms. The strength of the stack is in the ecosystem that surrounds it. In contrast to other products, there are hundreds, even thousands of bloggers that post daily as well as vibrant user communities that surround the tool. I've had much better luck finding help with SQL Server related issues than I have with any other product, but that help doesn't always come directly from Microsoft.
Read full review
Qlik
Not only can you ask the support team for help, but you can also ask the community. Also with the community there is a vast amount of problems that have already been solved. The problem you are encountering has a likely chance of already being discussed and even solved in the community section saving you time from reaching out.
Read full review
In-Person Training
Microsoft
This training was more directed toward what the product was capable of rather than actual programming.
Read full review
Qlik
The instructor was very knowledgeable.
Read full review
Online Training
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
Qlik
The online instructor was very knowledgeable.
Read full review
Implementation Rating
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
Qlik
Hire Qlik consultants. It's better done by them or with their aid.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
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.
Read full review
Qlik
The customization of the platform opens up plenty of other options depending on the use cases. The API layer is incredibly rich and makes integration of Qlik based visualization into web pages a simple and effective pattern. It's been very easy to use with a great community made up of professionals. Qlik Sense has introduces artificial Intelligence into my data visualization and reporting activity.
Read full review
Return on Investment
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.
Read full review
Qlik
  • Once an app is published and running good, we can quickly see the time we save to analyze data.
  • It's hard sometimes to realize the money we save by using this system.
  • People start understanding the power of data and asking more questions.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Qlik Sense Screenshots

Screenshot of Qlik Sense Cash Flow DashboardScreenshot of Qlik Sense Global Smart SearchScreenshot of Qlik Sense Smart Data Compression - Get immediate insight on large dataScreenshot of Extend, mix and mash-up with our APIsScreenshot of Add "External data" with Qlik DataMarket - Data as a ServiceScreenshot of Visualization Bundle