BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs Visio comparison

BiZZdesign and Microsoft are both solutions in the Business Process Design category. BiZZdesign is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.3, while Microsoft is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.0. BiZZdesign holds a 2.1% mindshare in BPD, compared to Microsoft’s 12.4% mindshare. Additionally, 77% of BiZZdesign users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 80% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

BiZZdesign HoriZZon

Read 17 BiZZdesign HoriZZon reviews

2,063 Views
926 Comparison Views

77% willing to recommend

Visio

Read 106 Visio reviews

7,701 Views
6,239 Comparison Views

80% willing to recommend

BiZZdesign HoriZZon

Visio

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Visio and BiZZdesign HoriZZon compete in the realm of diagramming tools and enterprise architecture software. While both have strong offerings, HoriZZon has a distinct advantage in enterprise-level architecture creation due to its ArchiMate 3.0 compliance and integration capabilities with platforms like ServiceNow.

Features: Visio offers seamless integration with Microsoft Office, an extensive library of templates, and BPMN 2.0 validation for standardized business process diagrams. BiZZdesign HoriZZon excels with ArchiMate 3.0 support, robust modeling tools for enterprise architecture, and integration capabilities with SQL databases and dashboard features for collaborative use.

Room for Improvement: Visio could improve its cloud integration and expand its user interface customization options. Users wish for better scalability and compatibility with modern applications. BiZZdesign HoriZZon could benefit from more flexible APIs, improved user-friendliness for non-architects, and a more competitive pricing model to enhance accessibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Visio primarily operates in on-premises environments but is also available in the cloud, offering extensive documentation and community support. BiZZdesign HoriZZon supports both public and private cloud environments, facilitating collaboration. It offers specialized support, though some users find it limited.

Pricing and ROI: Visio is seen as reasonably priced, especially when bundled with Office 365, providing both one-time licenses and subscription options. Despite higher costs, users perceive it as a valuable investment due to its integration and time-saving capabilities. BiZZdesign HoriZZon's pricing is higher, potentially challenging for smaller companies, but justified by its enterprise architecture features, providing a solid ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs. Visio Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs. Visio

March 2025

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Helped 839,319 peers since 2012

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

BiZZdesign HoriZZon

Ranking in Business Process Design

11th

Average Rating

7.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Architecture Management (6th)

Visio

Ranking in Business Process Design

2nd

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

106

Ranking in other categories

Mind Mapping Software (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of BiZZdesign HoriZZon is 2.1%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Visio is 12.4%, down from 13.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Business Process Design

Featured Reviews

BijoyTalukder

Enterprise Architect at Tata Consultancy

Helps to get a clear overview of our enterprise architecture, especially when dealing with multiple departments

One area where BiZZdesign HoriZZon could use some improvement is in its REST APIs. While the platform offers REST APIs, they have limitations when it comes to retrieving and exporting data. Obtaining detailed information at the individual application or component level, including IDs, costs, and deployment-related data, can be challenging through these APIs. This limitation makes it difficult to smoothly export such granular data. I have raised this issue with the BiZZdesign team, and they expressed interest in addressing it, but I'm not aware of the current status of this improvement effort. Nonetheless, improving the usability and flexibility of the REST APIs for data extraction is an area that could enhance the platform's capabilities.

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Tugrul TASCI

IT Professor at Sakarya University

We have seen return on investment in the form of time savings but should have more design tools

I am generally using Visio to create some diagrams Visio should implement more complex tools or graphics to facilitate processing and use flexible templates. It should allow users to easily drag and drop some previously created diagrams. The tools supplied or provided are very basic, and there…

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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 that it allows you to work with different methods, using the same tool."

"BiZZdesign HoriZZon is scalable, and I'd give it an eight out of ten for scalability. Our customers are enterprise level companies, but the solution is suitable for small and mid-sized companies as well."

"t's a good tool. My colleagues that are making use of it for application, business processes, or data modeling, are very satisfied with it. They find it easy to use. The graphical representation is simple but therefore efficient, so I know that they are planning a very good commencement on the use of these tools."

"I like the flexibility of the modeling part for standards like ArchiMate and, at the same time, BPMN. It allows us to connect elements from different areas and to have a single repository and a single source of truth. It gives us one place to do analysis throughout the organization."

"I used BiZZdesign HoriZZon at two organizations. At Manchester Metropolitan University, I used it with a small team for architectural modeling of the student record system. We modeled teams, process objects, and their interactions with applications. We also used it to model a gradual rollout with plateaus showing migration over time. At the BBC, I used it to model software services for publishing content online. I showed key model views to senior stakeholders using Horizon, allowing them to modify and score applications and services."

"The most valuable features are the application, portfolio, data, architectures, and modeling things."

"The powerful editing function in teamwork project-based, common or shared modeling, based on a powerful repository and knowledge sharing in a portal are the most valuable features. These are the most important features for me. I can add the integration of individual modeling notations like Archimate plus BPMN and DMN, and so on. We travel from one location to another and the tool allows us to keep track."

"The feature I find most valuable is that the start times and loading times are short. It takes only a few seconds to load the repository and whenever I want to open diagrams, they are there almost immediately."

More BiZZdesign HoriZZon pros

"The solution is easy to understand with some hands-on experience."

"Good interface and good tool configuration."

"The main reason I choose Visio is that it is easy to use. The user interface is familiar and straightforward. Additionally, it offers a variety of templates, such as those for Cisco solutions, which make it easy to create diagrams for specific use cases. For example, we use a Cisco Meraki switch and we can find the exact template for it, then we can easily drop in the components and connect the cables to create the diagram."

"Process modeling is a good feature."

"The fact that you could program in VBA is most valuable."

"What I like most about the solution is that It's quite easy to use."

"If you are a knowledgeable individual, the initial setup isn't too difficult."

"The thing I like most about Visio is the stencils. As the product has matured over time, it comes with more stencils and objects that you can just pick out of the menu and go with."

More Visio pros

Cons

"Scalability is a bit of a problem for BiZZdesign. There is always a possibility it will failover."

"It should be more open to integrating with other existing tools. Although there has been progress in the past."

"This tool is something of a beast - it takes a long time to learn, and it isn't possible for casual users and most architects. Unless a person spends 500 or 1,000 hours on the tool or does very concentrated sessions using all its functionalities, it's very difficult to master."

"The ability to generate charts and deal with a use case involving Kibana was quite difficult."

"The repository of duplicate objects is bad."

"I have seen table charts where, if the chart is a little too big, it does not fit in HoriZZon and it is not at all visible... There have been several times where we could not publish a chart properly and we had to break the chart into small tables and create multiple artifacts, creating a complete mess. This should be seriously taken up by BiZZdesign because there is a lot of scope for improvement in terms of usability. It's not at all good, unfortunately."

"The users of BiZZdesign should be able to enter their data or make modeling changes via HoriZZon."

"In HoriZZon, there are different matrices. In some of the cases, there is an option to aggregate them, but in other cases, we have not done this, e.g., to see the proper costs. For example, if I have 10 different matrices, then I need to create an aggregate view out of those 10 matrices somewhere. That is where we have been struggling a bit. We have a counterpart from the HoriZZon product team with whom we have bi-weekly discussions. We have suggested to him that this can be improved."

More BiZZdesign HoriZZon cons

"Visio requires a lot of memory, and it is not good for a small design."

"Visio should implement more complex tools or graphics to facilitate processing and use flexible templates."

"It thinks that it knows what you want to do, but it doesn't. It has a way of behaving that can be very frustrating from time to time. Either it moves things about because it thinks its placement should be at a certain place, or it's keeping track of things that you don't necessarily see, so it moves something elsewhere."

"Visio could be improved by adding more features. If you look at draw.io, they have more features. Also, if you want to design something for the cloud, Microsoft Azure still isn't enabled, so you need to install the plugin. This prototype is easily available, though."

"One thing that I always felt was missing was the ability to integrate with other Microsoft products, particularly with things like SharePoint or other Excel Office tools. It may be available, but it is not as good as it could be."

"Microsoft should include Visio as part of their Office 365 offering."

"Visio should be object-oriented to enable the reusability of objects across different models."

"I would like to see the project planning element improved, although it won't happen because Microsoft deliberately made it worse."

More Visio cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"[The] Orbus... pricing model was based on every single functionality having a price. The pricing was comparable but if we wanted to scale, it would have ended up being a lot more expensive. BiZZdesign gave us one price with all of the functionality, and we could scale as much as we needed."

"I haven't found any issues with the scalability and licensing parts that are access-related."

"If one is very cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the product price as a seven out of ten."

"We were customers and bought licenses from them. We used their remote instance initially but upgraded to the on-device version due to lag. For pricing, we paid about 2200 pounds a year per seat for the client installation at an educational rate. I'm not sure about commercial rates. I managed to get a free copy at BBC since it was for evaluation purposes."

"The price is reasonable."

"The pricing model is slightly on the high side and could be more competitive for long-term partnerships."

"First and foremost within the scope of improvement for the solution would be the cost. It's very costly..."

"In terms of this particular product usage, my clients currently only use per-user licenses."

"I haven't looked at the prices lately. We have an older copy, and it was a couple of hundred dollars for this software. That's a huge expense."

"Visio is a pricey tool. It's a five out of ten, cost-wise. It would be great if it had a pay-per-use licensing model because my company uses it sparingly."

"The product is inexpensive if you already have Microsoft products in your environment. The license encompasses all the required services."

"My company does pay toward the licensing costs of Visio. It is a cheap product based on my experience, and since I purchased Visio for my own use."

"I think costs are on a per user basis."

"Personally, I think the price of this solution is too high."

"I pay for the license and it is very expensive. If you're only going to use this tool from time to time, you can save money by just using the available online tools. But if you plan on using it heavily, then it's worth it to invest."

"The price could be more flexible for infrequent users. If it's your main utility that you use daily, then it's a good price."

More Visio pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

33%

Financial Services Firm

16%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

16%

Government

11%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BiZZdesign HoriZZon?

This is one of the best tools, especially because of its collaborative nature. Anyone using it can access previous projects and related data. It's definitely a strong collaborative tool.

See all answers

What needs improvement with BiZZdesign HoriZZon?

The ability to generate charts and deal with a use case involving Kibana was quite difficult. We don't use the chart functionality much, and I think that is quite problematic at the moment. We have...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for BiZZdesign HoriZZon?

I use the solution in my company for all sorts of things, like enterprise and solution architecture. As part of our design process, BiZZdesign HoriZZon is used for road mapping. We also use it for ...

See all answers

How easy is it to migrate process flow charts (modeled using tools like Visio) into Bizagi?

I have been using Bizagi with a major project for a state government agency for about four years now. It is pretty straightforward to load in files that are BPMN 2.0 compliant. The option to load V...

See all answers

What do you like most about Visio?

The diagrams Visio creates are quite impressive in the sense that we can cooperate with more colleagues in one task and see the flow of the process.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Visio?

One of the main problems with Visio is its licensing options and associated issues, which lead to discussions about the price with a Microsoft representative. If asked to rate the price, I would gi...

See all answers

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Compared 19% of the time

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Compared 13% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

IBM Blueworks Live vs Visio

Compared 9% of the time

Xmind vs Visio

Compared 2% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

BiZZdesign HoriZZon

March 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Visio

February 2025

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Also Known As

HoriZZon

Microsoft Visio

Overview

Make smarter decisions and optimize outcomes by unifying all your strategy, capabilities, operating models and change portfolios in a single platform.

With all the data about your business in one place you can see the big picture and make properly informed strategic decisions to drive growth. Bizzdesign Horizzon brings together strategy, IT architecture, operating models, data, capabilities, change portfolios and ideas into a single, intuitive collaborative business design platform. Real-time visibility of key metrics and trends allows you to take action more quickly. Accelerating the speed and accuracy of your operations now – and into the future.

Core Platform Capabilities:

Multi-discipline collaboration
Data Integration
Advanced analytics
Models and Roadmaps
Governance & Security
Business Insight Graph

BiZZdesign

Visio is an innovative collaborative solution that enables users to quickly visualize data-connected business process flows with a host of integrated intuitive features that bring the power of Microsoft 365 to Visio. Visio allows users to easily create professional diagrams, graphs, and other visual data, easily anywhere, anytime, and with anyone. Users are able to confidently and easily transform data into creative powerful visuals. Visio provides dozens of easy-to-use templates along with thousands of customizable colorful shapes that bring a user's best ideas to life. Visio is available for all Microsoft 365 commercial users and is available on desktop and Web applications.

Visio Features

Visio can easily create visual data for today’s business needs. Some of its most useful visual data include:

Flowcharts: Users can easily bring business concepts to fruition with Visio’s robust flowchart features. Visio provides a huge library of shapes, stencils, and templates to transform numbers and data into impactful, easy-to-understand business stories.
Organizational charts: Visio makes it easy to design articulate org charts to better visualize team, reporting, and hierarchy structures. Users are then able to seamlessly share the charts with stakeholders, teams, and employees.
Network diagrams: Users are able to creatively display how a system design processes function and visually illustrate how devices and networks interact with each other using a variety of network shapes, templates, and connector tools.
Brainstorming: Visio makes brainstorming simple and actionable with a wide range of templates designed specifically for interpreting problems and mapping out solutions, including fishbone and Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) diagrams.
Floor plans: Users can design ergonomic workspaces, retail store layouts, new homes, and more with accurate, scalable templates and tools to help them better visualize function, flow, and overall aesthetic appeal.
Accessible: Visio is able to integrate with a wide variety of accessibility tools, such as Narrator, Accessibility Checker, and high-contrast support, to ensure Visio diagrams are available to your entire team.

Reviews from Real Users

“Visio has improved my workflow by making it easy to create charts, diagrams, and essential illustrations to use in my client reports and proposals. It has saved me a lot of time I would otherwise spend creating visuals for clients manually.” - Michael B., Principal Consultant at Lexington Consulting

“I use it for diagramming networks, racks, data centers, data flow applications, etc. It is a useful tool to map data flows, network objects, and computer science technology and to show to clients. It does what I need it to do. It's a tool I've used the longest, so I know it the best, and that's probably the claim to fame.” - Greg S., Director of Solution Architecture at Winslow Technology Group

“We use Visio for architecture modeling. We also use it to facilitate communication with other people. The feature I like most about Visio is that it acts as a facilitator of communication, as it displays information in a way that's easier to understand.” - Guy M., IT/Business Architect at a financial services firm

Microsoft

Sample Customers

T-Mobile, Shell, HSBC, Erasmus University, VIVAT Insurance

Thomas College, Hamburg Port Authority, Portigon AG, Conseil G_n_ral du d_partement des Hautes-Alpes, AAA Auto a. s., Commonwealth Financial Network, ICA, Abu Dhabi National Energy Company

Buyer's Guide

BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs. Visio

March 2025

Free Report: BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs. Visio

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