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Alteryx vs SAS Enterprise Guide comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 10, 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

Alteryx
Ranking in Data Preparation Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
81
Ranking in other categories
Predictive Analytics (1st), Data Science Platforms (4th)
SAS Enterprise Guide
Ranking in Data Preparation Tools
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Data Preparation Tools category, the mindshare of Alteryx is 26.9%, down from 36.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAS Enterprise Guide is 21.9%, down from 26.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Preparation Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Theresa McLaughlin - PeerSpot reviewer
Quick development enables seamless data processing despite occasional support issues
There were times when the product would fail during development without an apparent reason. The support structure changed; initially, we received great support, however, it later became less reliable due to licensing issues and a tiered support system. Licensing negotiations were problematic, affecting our product usage. For instance, our licenses were temporarily lost during negotiations when an agreement couldn't be reached.
Karunakar Kankata - PeerSpot reviewer
A predictive data analytics that lacks support for advanced modeling techniques
I find it challenging when I need to use certain functions and predictive modeling techniques in SAS. The procedures and data steps for database analysis take longer, and I've noticed that the current version we are using, lacks support for advanced modeling techniques. We've requested support for these advanced algorithms, but it seems there have been challenges in implementing them. As a result, we are facing difficulties in developing advanced models. Another issue we've encountered is that the community support for SAS is relatively limited compared to open-source environments.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The GUI is simple and it integrates with Python."
"It has everything that one needs. Whatever you want to do with the data can be done with Alteryx."
"Alteryx's connectivity is essential. We like the ability to connect the solution to multiple sources. It's easier than other data modeling and extraction solutions. It's built on a self-service concept, so it's easy for anyone to open the tool and directly import or export data from it."
"Alteryx helps me do a lot of automation. The best thing about Alteryx is that you don't have to repeat the workflow over and over again. Unlike Excel, where you need to write formulas for each new file, Alteryx follows a consistent process. You can schedule and automate the workflow, even if the files change."
"The most valuable feature of Alteryx is its stand-alone version that we do not have to download dependencies for loads. Additionally, the scan is useful for beginners."
"There are a lot of good customization capabilities."
"The solution offers excellent predicting power. The accuracy and confidence have been great."
"Good data transformation."
"It is also compatible with other softwares, such as Excel."
"We do not bother any longer with some programs did not run, hence having to rerun them again."
"Enterprise Guide is much better at generating reports than many solutions. We often use it to generate reports, and people interpret them how they like. They often probably use Excel spreadsheets or something like that after they get our data."
"Filter and sort query builder is valuable. The ability to do advanced SAS programming is also a useful feature because we can do anything by using Enterprise Guide. It has a lot of functionalities. We can build ETL processes. There are clients who are using SAS Enterprise Guide to build ETL processes. They have a SAS-based program that is scheduled to run at a certain frequency to produce some reports for the business. It is a very useful tool for ETL unit tests and functional tests. You can also do data science projects in SAS Enterprise Guide by using different statistics. During my MBA, we used SAS Enterprise Guide for our statistic course. To query the data, there are many solutions such as SQL, but these tools are only a part of the integration. They are only useful for querying the data and require knowledge of SQL, so they are not suitable for business users. SAS Enterprise Guide can be very easily used by business users to filter and sort the data and build queries. It is not necessary to have coding skills to use SAS Enterprise Guide. For this reason, it is attractive for businesses."
"We are able to work on the server, and I can copy a data set and share it with someone in my team. Similarly, if I want some data from them, I can get it. Being able to work on the server and being able to switch from one user to another is a good thing. It is reliable and powerful, and its community is very wide."
"We now mostly use the Enterprise Guide for such scheduling purposes, so error processes will not inhibit the others."
"Statistical functionality and basic database interaction can become very straightforward for business users that don't have a background in SQL and data analysis."
"Enabled us to remove PC SAS, which reduced risk."
 

Cons

"All of the reports are migrated or exported in an Excel file, and most of the time, a business intelligence tool is required. They could have better reporting. The aesthetic could be improved."
"It should have Linux support. It currently supports only Windows. It does not support any other platform. Its price should also be lower. Their US partner management program is actually unresponsive. One of the reasons why we don't have a formalized partnership plan with them is because their partner management team is atrociously unresponsive. This is something that they need to change."
"More statistics tools: We can use to compare SPSS statistics with some automated advisory."
"Sometimes, there are performance constraints. Especially when a large file has to be ingested, the system slows down a bit. Its performance is the only thing that can be improved."
"There are a few hiccups with specific data sets and languages or formats that the data comes in. That may be a minor problem, but we can work through it. We had some issues looking at XML format in added data, but it wasn't significant."
"It's a technical product and those that don't have proper training will have to deal with a steep learning curve."
"The interface could be improved."
"What they're struggling with is it's not as mature as Tableau in the user management area. It was tougher to manage the server part of it right away, especially since the user base has grown."
"We don't use SAS Enterprise Guide that much here because we haven't explored some of the statistical modeling capabilities. However, I do not think SAS Enterprise Guide provides all the machine learning features that we want. Those would be separate products from SAS, such as SAS Buyers or any of the other solutions, which will give us the capabilities that we are looking for."
"Recently, we realized that SAS Enterprise Guide is not so stable and gives us some outputs which are not suitable...Sometimes it's quite hard to report its stability issues."
"I see no reason for limiting the process to sequential all the time."
"I would like it to give more information rather than just a forever loop that forces you to shut down the system. Give you more error messages without stopping the entire project, or even the entire application. That it displays more error messages rather than terminating the application."
"For some of the advanced functions, you need to learn some SAS code to get what you want."
"They should provide more information for the errors or logs. Currently, it gives you just the error message without explaining anything."
"The technical support response time has been consistently slow, and this has been a concern."
"Our data warehouse is built on the Netezza database. We have SAS BI, and we populate the Netezza database. When we have tables with, for example, a hundred million rows in Netezza, SAS Enterprise Guide doesn't work. It doesn't return any results. It works for around 30 to 40 million rows, but it is not working for anything more than that. This issue is only with the Netezza database. With Oracle, it is quite good. They can improve its performance with the Netezza database. There should be one unique tool that includes SAS Data Integration Studio and SAS Enterprise Guide for more integration capabilities. With SAS Enterprise Guide, it is not possible to create connections and libraries and build transformations that can be used for other projects. This tool should have all capabilities that SAS Enterprise Guide does not have. Such a tool would be perfect because it will be used by developers and business users at the same time. In addition to the integration capabilities, they should also provide more deployment capabilities. There should be an option to easily create SAS packages and export them from one environment to another. There could also be a possibility to connect with R and Python. Open-source tools are hot in the market nowadays, and it would be good to extend its capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I don't know much about the licensing, but there are some additional costs for certain features."
"The seat is too expensive."
"The pricing is $5000 per year per production license."
"There are some implementation services and internal effort costs at the beginning but there is nothing else."
"The cost of Alteryx is approximately $2,900 annually."
"Its price should be lower. The key thing that we see is that talking about ROI is an important element at the time of purchase. Cost becomes a factor in every discussion. Justifying the ROI for these kinds of workflows is always a challenge, and the only way to counter the challenge is by addressing the pricing."
"In order to have designers, and, if you want to collaborate, you have to buy a server. If the designer is $5,000, and if you want a server, you have to pay $80,000."
"I rate the solution's pricing as a ten, as it is highly priced."
"In general, SAS has high prices, which is a reason why some clients don't use SAS solutions. The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"The pricing and associated costs are substantial."
"I did look at the prices a few years ago, and I believe it was approximately $1,000 for a yearly subscription at that time."
"It is very expensive. We have a basic license, and there are many features that are not available with the basic version."
"It is expensive. We get a different price based on our corporate rate. So, I'm not sure what the general cost is because we got a special rate for it."
"Management liked it a lot because the license per seat was cheaper than a traditional SAS environment."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
24%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Healthcare Company
12%
Government
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is the Biggest Difference Between Alteryx and IBM SPSS Modeler?
One of the differences is that with Alteryx you can use it as an ETL and analytics tool. Please connect with me directly if you want to know more.
What is the Biggest Difference Between Alteryx and IBM SPSS Modeler?
Alteryx is an extremely easy and flexible data tool, flexible in terms of drag and drop toolset and also has python, R integrations if your team requires this. It can handle over 2 billion rows of...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Alteryx and IBM SPSS Modeler?
I am not familiar with IBM SPSS Modeler, therefore, I cannot compare these two products. Regarding Alteryx I can say the following: - An excellent desktop tool for Data Prep and analytics. - Featu...
What do you like most about SAS Enterprise Guide?
It streamlines our workflow involving multiple steps, from data extraction to modeling, and it is aimed at improving various aspects of banking operations, including customer retention and risk man...
What needs improvement with SAS Enterprise Guide?
I find it challenging when I need to use certain functions and predictive modeling techniques in SAS. The procedures and data steps for database analysis take longer, and I've noticed that the curr...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

AnalyticsIq Inc., belk, BloominBrands Inc., Cardinalhealth, Cineplex, Dairy Queen
Canary Islands Statistics Institute
Find out what your peers are saying about Alteryx vs. SAS Enterprise Guide and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,296 professionals have used our research since 2012.