IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs OpenText Application Quality Management comparison

IBM and OpenText are both solutions in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category. IBM is ranked #13 with an average rating of 7.2, while OpenText is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.2. IBM holds a 3.9% mindshare in ALM, compared to OpenText’s 4.9% mindshare. Additionally, 76% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 89% of OpenText users who would recommend it.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

Read 19 IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) reviews

1,497 Views
1,482 Comparison Views

76% willing to recommend

OpenText Application Qualit...

Read 208 OpenText Application Quality Management reviews

5,181 Views
3,316 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

OpenText Application Qualit...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 20, 2025

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management and OpenText Application Quality Management are competitors in lifecycle management and quality assurance. IBM ELM is preferred for pricing and support, whereas OpenText offers a superior feature set, justifying its higher cost.

Features: IBM ELM integrates seamlessly with complex development environments and emphasizes lifecycle governance. It excels in process automation, enhancing workflow efficiencies. OpenText Application Quality Management features robust test management and reporting, supported by advanced analytical tools and comprehensive dashboards. It focuses on quality management with a user-friendly interface.

Room for Improvement: IBM ELM could enhance its analytical capabilities and add more flexibility to its dashboards. Better integration with third-party tools would be beneficial. OpenText might improve its support responsiveness and streamline customization options. User-interface upgrades might also increase its appeal.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM ELM offers flexible on-premise and cloud deployment and is noted for its responsive customer service. OpenText provides a robust cloud-based deployment solution with strong customer support, ensuring smooth implementation.

Pricing and ROI: IBM ELM offers cost-effective pricing, providing substantial ROI through its integration capabilities. OpenText's pricing reflects its extensive feature set, delivering significant ROI through its advanced quality management functions. IBM's cost-efficiency contrasts OpenText's higher price points justified by enhanced features.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Application Quality Management Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Application Quality Management

September 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

13th

Average Rating

7.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

OpenText Application Qualit...

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

4th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

208

Ranking in other categories

Quality Management Software (4th), Test Management Tools (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) is 3.9%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText Application Quality Management is 4.9%, down from 5.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
OpenText Application Quality Management	4.9%
IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)	3.9%
Other	91.2%

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

Featured Reviews

Juergen Albrecht

Managing Director at CCC Systems Engineering Suisse GmbH

Combining tools for effective data analysis while customization and integration need improvement

The most valuable feature is how IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) allows me to present to the customer what the actual software, even hardware, will do. It helps them gain an impression of the complexity of the functionality and find an easier way to decide whether to implement it. A picture says more than one thousand words, which is why I work with the combination of ELM and the specification of DOORS. The automation capabilities I built use column-based scripts for analysis to search, fetch, and transfer information. When I open modules, it automatically analyzes the changes since the last opening by me.

Read full review

Hosney Osman

Senior Operation Engineer at Vodafone

Service provider recognizes effective project tracking and reporting capabilities

Regarding integration with various development tools, I can provide examples, and I am using customizable dashboards in OpenText ALM _ Quality Center, which definitely help identify project bottlenecks. As for the scalability of OpenText ALM _ Quality Center, there are limitations, particularly in agile methodologies, which is currently my main concern.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The most valuable feature is how IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) allows me to present to the customer what the actual software, even hardware, will do."

"The cataloging is a very valuable feature. For a lot of enterprises, they end up not knowing which applications do specific features. The cataloging helps with this. It's not that verbose, but it still gives you allowances to put in more detail."

"The planning feature is rich with Scrum concepts: Sprint, Sprint retrospective, the rules in the Scrum framework."

"Everyone in a team can work on the same platform and share the same information."

"The solution is customizable."

"One of the key advantages of IBM Rational ALM is its workflow capabilities, which enable seamless collaboration between development and production teams and ensure that all stakeholders are aware of the progress and readiness of the solution. Additionally, the solution is good for integration."

"It is relatively easy to use and user-friendly once the setup is complete."

"You can customize the board according to your needs."

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) pros

"The tools could be useful if we were utilizing them more effectively"

"The initial setup is straightforward. It's not too hard to deploy."

"From reporting to team management, everything is better now."

"We were able to manage test cases effectively when we were using it. It worked well for us."

"The ability to integrate this solution with other applications is helpful. If there is automation, it comes with improved quality and speed."

"OpenText ALM Quality Center is highly customizable."

"It's basically the way to show the work that we do as QA testers, and to have a historical view of those executions."

"It is stable and reliable."

More OpenText Application Quality Management pros

Cons

"Improvement is needed in bridging DNG and Rhapsody and vice versa for better data exchange from both sides with some trigger technologies."

"Some improvements to the user interface (UI) would be helpful, such as exposing more services to make it easier to customize to the needs of each customer."

"The user interface requires significant improvement as it is overly complex."

"One of the complaints from users is that they have to click buttons too many times for just a simple task. Changing this would lead to a better user experience."

"The GUI is a little bit outdated."

"I think nowadays people are getting into Jira and other tools. What is happening is, this solution is becoming more traditional, whereas Jira and other tools are more attractive for the new users to learn and start using because of the graphical interfaces."

"The product must be more user-friendly."

"The stability of IBM Rational ALM could be improved."

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) cons

"I would like to be able to search easier, not just do SQL queries, being able to do free keyword searches on the data. That's valuable."

"Sometimes I do run my queries from the admin login. However, if I want to reassess all my test cases, then I am still doing this in a manual manner. I write SQL queries, then fire them off. Therefore, a library of those SQL queries would help. If we could have a typical SQL query to change the parameters within test cases, then this is one aspect I can still think that could be included in ALM. Though they would need to be analyzed and used in a very knowledgeable way."

"The UI is very dated. Most applications these days have a light UI that can be accessed by pretty much any browser; QC still uses a UI which has a look almost the same for the past 20 years."

"Cross project reporting is limited to similar database schemas"

"The downside is that the Quality Center's only been available on Windows for years, but not on Mac."

"HP-QC does not support Agile. It is designed for Waterfall. This is the number one issue that we're facing right now, which is why we want to look for another tool. We're a pharmaceutical services company, so we require electronic signatures in a tool, but this functionality isn't available in HP-QC. We don't have 21 CFR, Part 11, electronic signatures, and we need compliant electronic signatures. Some of the ALM tools can toggle between tabular format and document format for requirements, but the same feature is not available in this solution. There is also no concept of base-lining or versioning. It doesn't exist."

"Requirements management could be improved as the use is very limited. E.g., they have always stated that, "You can monitor and create requirements," but it has its limitations. That's why companies will choose another requirements management solution and import data from that source system into Quality Center. Micro Focus has also invested in an adapter between Dimensions RM and ALM via Micro Focus Connect. However, I see room for improvements in this rather outdated tool. I feel what Micro Focus did is say, "Our strategy is not to improve these parts within the tool itself, but search for supported integrations within our own tool set." This has not been helpful."

"It can be quite clunky, and it can easily be configured badly, which I've seen in a couple of places. If it is configured badly, it can be very hard to use. It is not so easy to integrate with other products. I've not used Micro Focus in a proper CI/CD pipeline, and I haven't managed to get that working because that has not been my focus. So, I find it hard. I've often lost the information because it had committed badly. It doesn't commit very well sometimes, but that might have to do with the sites that I was working at and the way they had configured it."

More OpenText Application Quality Management cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is not cheap."

"The price of the solution could be reduced. Many of our customers are not using all the features and this could be why our clients feel the price is too high."

"IBM Rational ALM has both monthly and yearly licensing options."

"This product is a little expensive and we had to pay extra to have them set it up for us."

"We have a contract, but I am not aware of the details."

"This is an expensive solution."

"I feel that the licenses are expensive. "

"Compared to the market, the price is high."

"It allows us to keep our costs low. I do not want to pay beyond a certain point for this solution."

"The solution was expensive for us."

"It is very expensive as compared to other tools. We didn't get their premier version. It is a lesser version, and to upgrade, there will be an additional cost for us."

"It all comes down to how many people are going to access the tool. When teams go above 20, I think ALM is a better tool to use from a collaboration and streamlining perspective."

"I don't know the exact numbers, but I know it is pricey. When we talked to the sales reps we work with from our company, they say, "Well, Micro Focus will never lose on price." So, they are willing to do a lot of negotiating if it is required."

More OpenText Application Quality Management pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

23%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

12%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

10%

Performing Arts

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	39
Midsize Enterprise	32
Large Enterprise	161

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Rational ALM?

The solution is customizable.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Rational ALM?

Improvement is needed in bridging DNG and Rhapsody and vice versa for better data exchange from both sides with some trigger technologies. This would provide a visual reminder of changes in a modul...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IBM Rational ALM?

Most of my primary use cases involve the combination of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) ( /products/ibm-engineering-lifecycle-management-elm-reviews ) and DOORS, including both Classic D...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus ALM Quality Center?

The on-premises setup tends to be on the expensive side. It would be cheaper to use a cloud model with a pay-per-use licensing model.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Micro Focus ALM Quality Center?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Micro Focus ALM Quality Center?

People are using OpenText ALM _ Quality Center for recording user cases, testing and hand documentation, defect tracking, business purposes, and reporting.

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 23% of the time

Codebeamer vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 18% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 12% of the time

Polarion ALM vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 10% of the time

Rally Software vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 5% of the time

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) Competitors

OpenText Software Delivery Management vs OpenText Application Quality Management

Compared 16% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs OpenText Application Quality Management

Compared 15% of the time

Tricentis qTest vs OpenText Application Quality Management

Compared 13% of the time

Jira vs OpenText Application Quality Management

Compared 11% of the time

IBM Engineering Test Management vs OpenText Application Quality Management

Compared 2% of the time

More OpenText Application Quality Management Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

October 2025

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) report

Download IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) product report

Buyer's Guide

OpenText Application Quality Management

October 2025

OpenText Application Quality Management report

Download OpenText Application Quality Management product report

Also Known As

IBM Engineering Rhapsody, Rational ALM, MKS

Micro Focus ALM Quality Center, HPE ALM, Quality Center, Quality Center, Micro Focus ALM, OpenText Quality Manager

Overview

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management stands out for its robust Agile Scrum planning, lifecycle traceability, and tool management, offering cloud-based configurability and strong collaboration features.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management provides rich capabilities for Agile project management, facilitating requirements and test management, configuration management, and version control. Its integration with IBM Doors supports comprehensive requirements handling, and the cloud-based platform enhances collaborative efficiency across teams. Despite needing advances in user-friendliness and reporting, ELM's global configuration and compliance features make it invaluable in demanding environments.

What are the key features of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management?

Scrum-based planning: Supports Agile methodologies with rich planning tools.
Lifecycle traceability: Offers complete traceability across development stages.
Customizable workflows: Adaptable workflows with Kanban for flexibility.
Git integration: Supports efficient version control and collaboration.
Global Configuration: Manages complex configurations globally.
Compliance and reporting: Ensures robust auditing and comprehensive reporting capabilities.

What benefits should be evaluated in reviews?

Collaboration: Enhanced sharing across platforms for seamless teamwork.
Cost-effectiveness: Delivers efficient tools that optimize project spend.
Comprehensive requirement handling: Facilitates detailed requirement management through IBM Doors integration.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management is vital in sectors like automotive and manufacturing, where it implements Agile frameworks to manage requirements, conduct testing, and handle defects. It integrates into development pipelines ensuring live traceability and visibility, supporting critical engineering processes efficiently.

IBM

OpenText Application Quality Management offers centralized data management, traceability, and integration capabilities. It aids in handling requirements, test planning, and defect tracking while supporting both manual and automated testing. Challenges exist in deployment and browser compatibility.

Known for its robust reporting and flexibility, OpenText Application Quality Management is tailored for large organizations requiring a comprehensive solution supporting lifecycle coverage and seamless tool integration. Users can consolidate testing processes, manage requirements, and centralize reporting across manual and automated testing. While some face issues with project tracking, outdated interfaces, and limited browser compatibility beyond Internet Explorer, it remains widely used for regression and performance testing. Integration with tools like JIRA and support for tools such as UFT and ALM PC underscore its utility.

What are the key features of OpenText Application Quality Management?

Centralized Data Management: Consolidates and organizes testing data efficiently.
Traceability: Ensures traceability across all stages of the testing lifecycle.
Integration Capabilities: Connects seamlessly with automation and other essential tools.
Test Planning and Execution: Supports both manual and automated tests in a streamlined manner.
Advanced Reporting: Provides robust options to generate insightful test reports.
Customization: Offers tailored solutions to fit specific organizational needs.

What benefits should users look for in reviews?

Efficiency: Increases test management efficiency across projects.
Scalability: Adapts to the varying scope of large-scale projects.
Lifecycle Coverage: Comprehensive management from requirement to defect tracking.
User-Friendly Interface: Designed for ease of use despite needing updates.
Cost-Effectiveness: Balances high initial costs with long-term savings through efficient testing management.

In industries such as finance and healthcare, OpenText Application Quality Management is implemented to ensure rigorous testing standards. It supports test case creation and execution, defect tracking, and requirements management. Integration with JIRA and performance testing tools make it suitable for organizations needing synchronized testing environments.

OpenText

Sample Customers

Tennis Australia, WeCloud AB, Port Otago Limited, Logicalis US, Valmer, The Chevrolet Volt, Ashurst

Airbus Defense and Space, Vodafone, JTI, Xellia, and Banco de Creìdito e Inversiones (Bci)

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Application Quality Management

September 2025

Free Report: IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Application Quality Management

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