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TFS vs Zephyr Enterprise comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 2024

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

TFS
Ranking in Test Management Tools
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
99
Ranking in other categories
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites (8th)
Zephyr Enterprise
Ranking in Test Management Tools
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.6
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Test Management Tools category, the mindshare of TFS is 5.5%, down from 7.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zephyr Enterprise is 5.2%, down from 7.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Test Management Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
TFS5.5%
Zephyr Enterprise5.2%
Other89.3%
Test Management Tools
 

Featured Reviews

PS
Service delivery manager at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Ensures team collaboration with strong version control but could improve testing capabilities
Version control is the most basic feature in TFS. It has been there since the beginning. We use it primarily for that purpose. Basically ensuring that the code is not overwritten by other team members and maintaining the sanctity of the code. Bringing order to a disparate team which is virtual at different locations is very important, and TFS provides that control. Once you update a code, nobody can modify it until you are done working on it and check in. It is a great product that revolutionized the way teams work together on Microsoft pieces of code. The versioning part has unique features and capabilities which are unmatched with other products out there.
JM
Director - Quality Engineering at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Integration with tool streamlines test management but needs better exporting options
I use it for test management within Jira This tool boasts an incredibly user-friendly interface that integrates seamlessly with other Jira tools. I particularly appreciate its intuitive features for designing test plans, creating test cases, and executing test cycles. Some areas for improvement,…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has great functionality: work items, backlogs, source code, build releases, and it's easy to use."
"The most valuable feature is integration, particularly if you have a .NET application because it nicely integrates the CI/CD pipeline where you can automate your build whenever developers check the code."
"The most valuable feature of TFS is that it keeps the code secure while working collaboratively in a team of four or five individuals."
"The most valuable feature is having everything in a single interface, allowing quick and efficient browsing."
"A notable feature of TFS is its ease of creating user stories and tasks, which simplifies the process of adding and editing them."
"From the project management perspective, the tool is efficiently managing teams by giving management information, such as reports, graphs, velocity, capacity, etc."
"The most valuable features of TFS are the test plans, as we can reproduce reusable test plans in test automation and we have a lot of queries, making this feature very useful."
"Complete integration with VS IDE and Office tools: This give us a possibility of high-level automation, thus minimizing human error."
"It has integration with test automation tools."
"Zephyr Enterprise is a stable solution."
"Zephyr really improves the testing of the product on many levels - planning, test case creation, automation goals, test reporting, and verification of the testing."
"If anyone is looking for a good, lightweight, flexible and agile test management product, I think they would do very well with Zephyr Enterprise."
"At this moment, it is fulfilling our requirements."
"It's very simple to use, which is beneficial, and it has 90% of the basic features you need without having to pay a lot of extra money."
"It has 90% of the basic features you need without having to pay a lot of extra money."
"Now, we are getting consolidated reports in one place, we have all our metrics and repository together, and this is helpful."
 

Cons

"There's not automatic access to test case management and execution."
"This solution is quite old and it is already being bundled as Azure DevOps Server."
"It has been really dated. When you start to work more in an agile environment, it is not really that flexible. They tried to replicate the look and feel of Jira, but it is not quite there. It was nice to use in the past, but it is not as flexible now with the changing development environments and methodologies."
"Agile metrics/reporting (if you compare it to JIRA's functionality), as well as more/better customizable widgets to create richer dashboards."
"They should have design patterns in TFS for the development team, and design patterns for the QA."
"TFS has room for improvement as there have been global security issues that many companies, including ours, have experienced."
"The dashboard needs more enhancements."
"They have room for improvement in merging the source code changes for multiple developers across files. It is very good at highlighting the changes that the source code automatically does not know how to handle, but it's not very good at reporting the ones that it did automatically. There are times when we have source code that gets merged, and we lose the changes that we expected to happen. It can get a little confusing at times. They can just do a little bit better on the merging of changes for multiple developers."
"Zephyr Enterprise needs to redesign the reporting."
"The reporting, and the ability to reorganize the test repository, which are a little stifling. There is definitely room for improvement there."
"The solution is not really stable. Sometimes in the past, some pages wouldn't load due to issues."
"Creating better default varieties of reporting would make the product much better and more popular."
"We faced some errors while uploading the test cases."
"The reporting, and the ability to reorganize the test repository, which are a little stifling. There is definitely room for improvement there."
"The reporting, and the ability to reorganize the test repository, which are a little stifling. There is definitely room for improvement there."
"We are looking for advanced support with integration to CI tools. This is something which Zephyr does not have today."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Microsoft products are always expensive. Obviously, they are quality products, but it would be helpful if there was a reduction in price. But compared to other vendors, I think the cost is high."
"Use the Microsoft recommended “seat-based” licensing model. This allows a single developer with multiple machines to consume only one client license."
"I believe we pay on a yearly basis. I don't know the current costs of them. We outsource all that to a third party. Each of the developers gets a Microsoft Visual Studio Azure DevOps license, which gives them access to the TFS server as well. We probably pay on average about 1,800 Canadian Dollars a year for every developer, but that covers a lot more than just TFS."
"It is an expensive solution."
"The solution is expensive."
"There is a yearly licensing fee that needs to be paid."
"It is pretty expensive compared to other project management tools."
"TFS is more competitively priced than some other solutions."
"It costs a couple of thousand dollars for a little more than 125 users, per month."
"DFS is more expensive than Zephyr. DFS is around $32 per person, whereas Zephyr is $10 per person. There is a major difference in the price, which is the main reason why we are trying to shift to Zephyr."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Construction Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
8%
University
6%
Construction Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise64
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - TFS or Azure DevOps?
TFS and Azure DevOps are different in many ways. TFS was designed for admins, and only offers incremental improvements. In addition, TFS seems complicated to use and I don’t think it has a very fri...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TFS?
While I do not know the exact pricing, TFS is likely more expensive than GitLab.
What needs improvement with TFS?
From a testing perspective, while the build and deploy automation capability and pipeline integration are already present to a great extent, these are areas where TFS can improve further.
What needs improvement with Zephyr Enterprise?
Some areas for improvement, include its export capabilities. Exporting test cases, especially those with screenshots or attachments, can be cumbersome, hindering easy sharing and scalability.
What advice do you have for others considering Zephyr Enterprise?
I would recommend it mainly for manual testing and test management. Within Zephyrscale, they also have automated testing, however, I would recommend it only for test management. The overall rating ...
 

Also Known As

Team Foundation Server
SmartBear Zephyr
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Vendex KBB IT Services, Info Support, Fujitsu Consulting, TCSC, Airways New Zealand, HP
Hyundai, Fujitsu, Google, David Jones, Burger King, Ingenico, Websense, Dow Jones, Harris, Saab
Find out what your peers are saying about TFS vs. Zephyr Enterprise and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
896,099 professionals have used our research since 2012.