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IBM Cognos vs IBM Controller comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 Cognos
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
139
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (7th), Reporting (3rd)
IBM Controller
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Business Performance Management (20th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM Cognos is designed for BI (Business Intelligence) Tools and holds a mindshare of 1.3%, down 3.6% compared to last year.
IBM Controller, on the other hand, focuses on Business Performance Management, holds 1.0% mindshare, up 0.3% since last year.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Cognos1.3%
Microsoft Power BI9.3%
Tableau Enterprise6.7%
Other82.7%
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
Business Performance Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Controller1.0%
Anaplan7.1%
Board5.0%
Other86.9%
Business Performance Management
 

Featured Reviews

RL
Senior Project Manager at BD
Data insights have transformed reporting speed and support faster, informed decisions
IBM Cognos makes it simple to create visually appealing products, and we are able to run about 1,000 reports on a daily basis while another 1,000 are run through the scheduler built into IBM Cognos Analytics. It offers triggering through the scheduler, which we use to confirm the completion of other processes needed to be available before the job is scheduled to run, allowing us to make data-driven decisions easily. Some of the best features that IBM Cognos offers are enterprise reporting, which enables us to create, customize, and run reports on sales trends, consumer sentiment, and many more; dashboard creation; and data exploration and analysis. We are able to use the drag and drop feature to create ad-hoc visualizations. Additionally, I find the AI-powered natural language query feature for data analysis and dashboard input to be very useful for a non-technical person to put queries around the spreadsheets data to get a quick answer. Building insights for accurate decision-making has been great. Moreover, we can package reports with data-backed insights for stakeholders in PDF and Excel format to support business ad-hoc cases, forecasting, and strategic recommendations on relevant tasks. Of all those features, the visual graphs, predictive analytics, and data cleansing feature makes the biggest difference for my team. IBM Cognos is deployed in my organization using a hybrid cloud setup with Amazon Web Services as our cloud provider.
TL
Enterprise Architect at Veidekke
User support and consolidation capabilities have strengthened financial reporting
We primarily use IBM Controller for the consolidation of all our company results and yearly reporting IBM Controller appeals significantly to our user group led by the Chief Financial Officer and the team under them. The strong user support and capability in consolidation are standout features.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The main difference that I like about Cognos compared to other solutions is its data splitting functionality. We have all our company data inside the Cognos environment and so we prefer to split the information Cognos itself. It's more efficient this way."
"IBM Cognos offers tools so that you can design and develop your own test queries and reporting solutions."
"If they want dashboarding, storytelling, and analyzing why KPIs are met or not, then Cognos is a better candidate than Qlik Sense."
"The comprehensiveness or broadness of the software functions or business intelligence functions that it provides is valuable. It is also quite easy to use and user-friendly."
"It is a stable product."
"The solution's initial setup process is easy."
"The initial setup is quite straightforward."
"The Report Studio that is aimed at professional report writers."
"IBM Controller appeals significantly to our user group led by the Chief Financial Officer and the team under them."
"The strong user support and capability in consolidation are standout features."
 

Cons

"Cognos charts are not as fast as those of the other tools, even with DQM (dynamic query mode)."
"Tableau and Power BI are faster than Cognos."
"It would be good if the solution had conditional formatting."
"I would like to see the introduction of mapbooks for supporting some geographical information."
"We need more predictive analytical functions, not only diagnostic or decryptic analytics."
"The performance is a bottleneck and something that can be improved."
"There are some problems with how Cognos handles huge data sets and when connecting with multiple sources and searching the data."
"There are many problems with the product's stability part, making it an area where improvements are required."
"I am uncertain about the delivery model of IBM Controller and the direction it is headed."
"I am uncertain about the delivery model of IBM Controller and the direction it is headed."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is affordable."
"It's more expensive than similar solutions like Tableau and Power BI."
"There is need to assess the purchase license accordingly so as to avoid audit penalties."
"It is averagely priced."
"The pricing of this product is meant for medium to large-scale enterprises."
"IBM Cognos offers competitive pricing similar to other BI vendors in the market."
"It is pretty expensive."
"The pricing and licensing policies are comparatively cheaper than other products in the market ."
Information not available
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Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager - BI Head with 5,001-10,000 employees
Feb 4, 2015
Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho
1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Insurance Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise90
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
What do you like most about IBM Cognos?
The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools.
What needs improvement with IBM Cognos?
One area where IBM Cognos can be improved is that customer service sometimes is not very responsive, and I would love to see the user interface improved, especially to look somehow updated. In addi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Controller?
I haven't provided a definitive opinion on pricing. However, knowing our CFO's cost-conscious nature, the pricing is likely very competitive and has never been an issue.
What needs improvement with IBM Controller?
I am uncertain about the delivery model of IBM Controller and the direction it is headed. While the delivery model includes both cloud and on-premises options, it causes confusion. A more straightf...
What is your primary use case for IBM Controller?
We primarily use IBM Controller for the consolidation of all our company results and yearly reporting.
 

Also Known As

Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 23,000 leading organizations across multiple industries use Cognos. Some examples of Cognos customers include BMW Financial Services, Quinte Health Care, Troy Corporation, Michigan State University, and GKN Land System.
California Franchise Tax Board, Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., Kelsey-Seybold Clinic, Mirle Automation Corp., Radware
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and others in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools. Updated: March 2026.
884,266 professionals have used our research since 2012.