Lucidchart vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest comparison

The compared erwin by Quest and Lucid Software solutions aren't in the same category. erwin by Quest is ranked #3 in AM , with an average rating of 8.1, and holds a 10.9% mindshare in the category. Lucid Software is ranked #2 in MMS , with an average rating of 10.0, and holds a 24.3% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of erwin by Quest users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Lucid Software users who would recommend it.

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Read 39 erwin Data Modeler by Quest reviews

4,005 Views
2,219 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Lucidchart

Read 54 Lucidchart reviews

787 Views
703 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Lucidchart

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between erwin Data Modeler by Quest and Lucidchart based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about SAP LeanIX, Sparx Systems, erwin by Quest and others in Enterprise Architecture Management.

To learn more, read our detailed Enterprise Architecture Management Report (Updated: March 2025).

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Enterprise Architecture Management

March 2025

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Helped 842,767 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

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Architecture Management (3rd), Business Process Design (9th)

Lucidchart

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

8.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Mind Mapping Software (2nd), Visual Collaboration Platforms (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

erwin Data Modeler by Quest and Lucidchart aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. erwin Data Modeler by Quest is designed for Enterprise Architecture Management and holds a mindshare of 10.9%, up 9.9% compared to last year.
Lucidchart, on the other hand, focuses on Mind Mapping Software, holds 24.3% mindshare, up 18.2% since last year.

Enterprise Architecture Management

Mind Mapping Software

Featured Reviews

JorgeSanz

Data Governance Senior Advisor at Abu Dhabi National Oil Company

Streamline data modeling and automate network changes for increased efficiency

The initial setup depends on the tool if you are using the data model environment. Stopping the server could be complex and require strong expertise. If you have everything set up and configured, Erwin is straightforward. You can deploy it in a few hours. In our case, it took a couple of months to address internal conditions, assign machines, and set up everything for the services. I rate the initial setup a six out of ten, where one is difficult and ten is easy.

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MichaelChirinian

Data Engineer at Mindmap

Intuitive, integrates well, and is a great way to change text into visual ideas

I'm not a super user, and there might be a way of doing it that I haven't explored, but I was looking for some specific icons that are just standard icons, and I found the icon library to be very focused on architecture icons. It didn't have as many standard or generic icons. Another thing that somewhat irritated me is the fact that there is a paste function in the menu, but when you right-click and select paste, it tells you that you can't use paste. You must press Command-V or Apple-V to paste. They give you a menu option to paste, but every time you use that, they say, "We don't accept it." On top of that, normally, you'd have an option for paste or paste values, but when you use the paste function, you don't have that capability. So, to copy text from one place, I have to use Command-V to paste it, but if I don't like the format, I've got to go back and do copy style and then paste style on top of that. It is a small detail, but when you're doing diagrams, it is annoying that they don't support paste values. It is a small irk. I'm not penalizing it, and I still think it is a five-star product. In terms of other bigger things, I don't really have any comments or criticism so far.

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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 solution's ability to compare and synchronize data sources with data models is fantastic. We use it for that on a regular basis to make sure that changes haven't been made to the database outside of the modeling process. I can take existing databases and reverse engineer them and understand their structure within 15 minutes. If I didn't have Data Modeler it would take hours. It increases our productivity and helps in understanding our legacy application."

"Drag-and-drop data modeling and reverse engineering out of databases are the most valuable features of erwin Data Modeler by Quest."

"The solution is excellent in providing a visual representation of a database and can generate DDL for implementing changes. We use DDL for logical purposes to review with business people, ensuring they have the required fields for processing. We also use it as a data dictionary for the physical data model to understand all the purposes of the terms. This helps us map the logical and physical terms with the business definition to understand our data."

"It's important to create standard templates — Erwin is good at that — and you can customize them. You can create a standard template so that your models have the same look and feel. And then, anyone using the tool is using the same font and the same general layout. erwin's very good at helping enforce that."

"One of the best aspects of the tool is its reverse engineering capability."

"Forward engineering, DDL generation, reverse engineering, and reporting are the most valuable features of the solution."

"It supports a wide variety of databases, including the latest ones. We have chosen to go for a cloud-based database, and it supports that, which is very useful."

"Any tool will do diagramming but I think the ability to put the stuff up in a graphical fashion, then think about it, and keep things consistent is what's valuable about it. It's too easy when you're using other methods to not have naming consistent standards and column consistent definitions, et cetera."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pros

"When it comes to documenting things like processes, systems, and new teams, I'd give it an eight or nine out of ten. It's very high because it's fairly intuitive, there's a low learning curve, and it's easy to get immediate output. You can get results very quickly without a lot of direct effort. You don't usually take a week-long series of training. You don't need to go through a lot of hoops to make it work."

"The wireframe and mock-up features have been the most useful so far. It's easy to create the mock-ups and then communicate to our development team what they need to look like. Lucidchart's capabilities for visualizing and understanding process flows or workflows is very good as well. I'm able to easily use any style of box that I need to create on a flowchart, to effectively communicate to our development team."

"I like the panel on the left of the screen that has all of the shapes that are available to use in the charts. It's easy to use because you can just drag and drop."

"The flow chart is most valuable. It is a very user-friendly and simple-to-use product. Quite quickly, I was able to understand how to use it and just get on with my process flow."

"The most valuable features are the different templates that they have already created, as well as all the different shapes you can use in the process charts because each shape stands for a different element or thing that's being done. It's easy to distinguish between different steps using the already set-out shapes."

"I really like the drag and drop feature because it makes the work easier. It is very easy to use. All the pieces are very good. All the icons and all the fields are available in the left panel. So, I just click, drag, and then edit a piece. When I showed it to my managing director, he was very inspired, and he also got a premium account for himself."

"The most valuable feature is the ease of use, and just being able to drag and drop."

"In general, the usability is great. You have a ton of customization options with different colors, different borders, different thicknesses of lines, different types of arrows, et cetera. There's so much variety. You can really make a chart with all sorts of color-coding, and color charts in different colors, link them together, for example, or use different types of arrows for different types of links between the chart elements. That variety, while not a specific feature, is really useful. If you want to make a chart, you can basically do anything."

More Lucidchart pros

Cons

"The solution's model mark could be better because it crashes sometimes."

"I would like to see more support for working with the big-data world. There are so many new databases evolving and it's very hard for them to keep up with all of the new technologies. It would be good if they were able to dynamically support big-data platforms, other than Hive and Teradata."

"The erwin ETL functionality has room for improvement when it comes to mapping databases with a classic entity-relationship model to a data warehouse model."

"The solution's reporting side needs to be improved."

"One of the best aspects of the tool is its reverse engineering capability."

"In terms of new features, it would be great to have a cloud base. We should be able to put it on the cloud for better collaboration and data models sharing."

"In terms of improvements, support could have been better in terms of installation, especially of workgroups. We struggled quite a bit to get it up and running. Collaboration could have been better from an installation perspective, but it is trivial as compared to what we use it for. Other than that, I don't have much feedback. It works pretty well, and the fact that we've been using it for more than a decade shows that it is quite solid."

"I would like the solution to be more user-friendly to deploy."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest cons

"I don't know if I will be able to add some animations if I want to. I believe the problem may be the program's process flows but if I want to transfer it into a PPP or any other document, I can only do image transfer."

"One of the things that I find frustrating is that all of our Tableau information is on a server, so when I send that out people can't open it and use it. I then have to go back and do extra work to convert everything into an Excel format that everybody can use. It would be really important to me, if I send something out to somebody who doesn't have a Lucid account, that they can just click and see it, instead of having to log in and create an account."

"It would be nice to have more features that help me visually present information. Since I use it as a canvas, my use case for it is probably very specific. I use it as a way to present information to people visually on a large mind map. So, it would be nice to be able to have more graphical things to clean it up, like a header, banners, or something to help draw attention to certain areas. I would also like more infographic-like features, because I am kind of limited to float chart shapes. This makes the solution a little cumbersome."

"A couple of times when I tried to move a line, connecting two shapes on an organizational chart, occasionally the line doesn't move as intuitively as I think it should. I have to fiddle around with it a few times to get it to do what I want it to do."

"When I download a flowchart as a PDF file, it breaks it up. I would like to see the continuous display of flow charts, even if they are larger than one page."

"It might already exist and I haven't used it, but in terms of improvement, I would like a hot-key system for some of the diagrams to auto-generate things a bit quicker to be able to produce charts a lot faster, or have more standard templates that you can just go to if you're trying to generate something quickly."

"What I do find extremely frustrating is that when I've sent the sheet to non-license holders, you have to create an account. You create a username and password. The path taken to create that account is so confusing that everyone thinks that they have to give their credit card number, and then they're reluctant. They don't want to go through the sheet."

"There is a basic function that I struggle with, in the interface, which is having to switch between the editing and navigation modes. A lot of clicks are required when switching between edit and navigation modes and I think that many could potentially be avoided by handling the tasks at the same time."

More Lucidchart cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of erwin Data Modeler is very expensive, in particular for this part of the world."

"The pricing of the solution is cheap. I rate the pricing a five out of ten."

"This company had bought the license for three years, and it's not an individual license. While you can buy a license for each individual, that would be very expensive. There is something called concurrent licenses where you can purchase licenses in bulk and 15 to 20 people can access the license and model. Concurrent licenses are scalable to the number of users and are proportional to the cost."

"The tool is expensive."

"I wish it wasn't so expensive. I would love to personally buy a copy of my own and have it at home, because the next job that I'm looking at is probably project management and I might not have access to the tool. I would like to keep my ability to use the tool. Therefore, they should probably have a pricing for people like me who want to just use the solution as an independent consultant, trying to get started. $3,000 is a big hit."

"Likewise, the solution is a little pricey."

"erwin is expensive compared to other solutions. We are paying almost $6,000 per seat a month."

"erwin Data Modeler by Quest is an expensive solution."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pricing and cost advice

"I have only used the trial version and have not yet paid for it, or explored the pricing options."

"We signed up for the month-to-month and it charged us all at once for the whole year. I believe we signed up for the $7.99 one. I think that was the price."

"Lucidchart's pricing model is not excessive, as compared to similar products. It is pretty much in line with everyone else."

"Its pricing is very affordable and reasonable for the features that it provides. I am using its basic plan, and for my usage, it is perfectly reasonable. It suits perfectly."

"The price and licensing are good."

"I have a subscription as an individual user for one year, and it is not expensive."

"We chose Lucid based on the price comparison between it and draw.io... Lucidchart was about 15 percent cheaper per user... I was surprised to learn that it came with a separate subscription model and was not included in my existing Lucidchart subscription."

"The pricing and licensing are fine. It has a lot of features that I prefer over some of the other programs, which is good. Being that it is web-based, I feel that it is acceptable that it's on a monthly pay basis. However, I think I pay on an annual basis, which is fine with me."

More Lucidchart pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

Forward engineering, DDL generation, reverse engineering, and reporting are the most valuable features of the solution.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

The product is expensive. I rate the product’s pricing a nine out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

As a documenting tool, it's solid, though its reporting could be more robust. The reporting mechanisms could be more intuitive regarding report creation. It can generate reports in CSV files, displ...

See all answers

LucidChart vs LucidSpark for brainstorming sessions over Zoom

Hi @Krista Thompson - Yes, LucidSpark is a much more nimble and, in some ways, user-friendly tool than LucidChart. LucidSpark is designed to do a better job managing multiple users participating ...

See all answers

Do you recommend Lucidchart?

I definitely recommend Lucidchart. I feel it is one of the top visual collaboration platforms that’s available on the market. Out of all the solutions I have tried, it is by far the best for diagra...

See all answers

Can we use a product like Lucidchart for "personal" use?

Absolutely! Lucidchart is a clever tool that is fit for purpose for whatever activity you would like - whether it's your thoughts or processes. There is a well-populated library of well-designed te...

See all answers

Comparisons

SAP PowerDesigner vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 31% of the time

IDERA ER/Studio vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 19% of the time

Visio vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 8% of the time

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 7% of the time

AWS Well-Architected Tool vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 4% of the time

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest Competitors

Figma vs Lucidchart

Compared 16% of the time

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs Lucidchart

Compared 10% of the time

Visual Paradigm vs Lucidchart

Compared 9% of the time

Visio vs Lucidchart

Compared 9% of the time

Lucidspark vs Lucidchart

Compared 8% of the time

More Lucidchart Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

March 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Lucidchart

March 2025

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Also Known As

erwin DM

No data available

Overview

erwin pioneered data modeling, and erwin Data Modeler (erwin DM) remains trusted, award-winning software for data modeling and database design, automating complex and time-consuming tasks. Use it to discover and document any data from anywhere for consistency, clarity and artifact reuse across large-scale data integration, master data management, metadata management, Big Data, business intelligence and analytics initiatives – all while supporting data governance and intelligence efforts.

erwin by Quest

Our online diagram application makes it easy to sketch and share professional flowchart diagrams. From brainstorming to project management, we support all of your communication needs. That’s why millions of users choose Lucidchart.

Lucid Software

Sample Customers

Premera, America Honda Motors, Aetna, Kaiser Permanente, Dental Dental Cali, Cigna, Staples

Google, Salesforce, Adobe, Whirlpool, Uber, Wal Mart, Pearson, Twitch, Riot Games, Western Union, Trimble, Starbucks

Buyer's Guide

Enterprise Architecture Management

March 2025

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