Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

IBM Cognos vs Oracle OBIEE comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Cognos
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
7th
Ranking in Reporting
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Oracle OBIEE
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
5th
Ranking in Reporting
3rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
157
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of IBM Cognos is 3.8%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle OBIEE is 4.0%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Carlos Larrad Salgado - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved the quality of our KPIs, while reducing calls to the IT department
I don't like that when we use Colab packages, we get less functionality. For example, you can make groups of data with Excel or with the data sets from the packages, but when you use the Colab packages directly, you can only group the data when you analyze it with Analysis Studio. I think Cognos needs to improve more on this functionality. The user experience is also very important. Cognos is not very easy to understand sometimes, especially when they change the layout but keep the functionality the same. The help is not very graphic and they have no examples. Cognos has to make a big effort to help with understanding the functionality by improving the documentation. There is a lot of documentation, but the examples are hard to find and they should make their help section easier to understand for non-technical users.
VishnuReddy - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles large datasets and easy to interact with and handle but performance could be better
Oracle's technical support usually recommends to upgrade when you contact them for support. They don't focus on fixing the issue at hand or providing guidance on how to do it. If you are in a lower environment, like one version down, they will blindly suggest upgrading. Additional patches are given for other Oracle products like WebLogic, databases, and apps. They fix issues and create patches based on client needs. But from an OBIEE point of view, they mostly provide bundle patches of around 5 to 6 GB that need to be applied and tested end-to-end. It's not an easy way to get small patches, and if issues arise after applying the patches, you have to contact Oracle again.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"If they want dashboarding, storytelling, and analyzing why KPIs are met or not, then Cognos is a better candidate than Qlik Sense."
"Dashboarding, reporting, and ad hoc reporting are the valuable features of IBM Cognos."
"The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools."
"This solution allows you to input a wide range of file formats."
"The product is a very good reporting tool and is very flexible. It allows for the users to get a scheduled report."
"The three IBM Cognos features I find the most valuable are Dynamic Cubes, PowerPlay, and Watson."
"We use the account statement report. When you use an account in HSBC, you receive various types of accounts, such as the stock market, fixed accounts, credit cards, and business accounts. We can create one consolidated report called CCS support, which includes all these accounts. In that statement, we are consolidating all those accounts."
"Comparing IBM Cognos to other applications, once a person is trained on it or they have developed a skill set to operate the application, it is best in its category."
"The most valuable feature of Oracle OBIEE is it's designed for Oracle. It works well in the Oracle environment and can sit on top of any application."
"Oracle OBIEE is very easy to use. Looking at analytics, I think they have come a long way by adding new features like visualization, which is really cool."
"The performance can issue queries to work in the Oracle database in Oracle's native language. There are a lot of visualizations which suit our business."
"It's easy to use for business analysts."
"For me, it makes the difference is in terms of our users being able to take advantage of a product which allows you to get access to data, reports, make decisions quickly, and have better insights regarding operations."
"Ability to create our own reports."
"It is a very stable solution."
"Integration-wise, it's good."
 

Cons

"The AI-based features could be further enhanced by the solution."
"The high cost of a license makes it hard to scale up on a budget."
"I would like for the platform to become more standard. If we make a development on our report and our dashboard, it will not be used in another solution. That means there is no portability for the developers."
"The solution's support could be better."
"They should provide improved visual reporting."
"Need improvement towards Visualization."
"Cognos charts are not as fast as those of the other tools, even with DQM (dynamic query mode)."
"Chart quality: many other competitors have charts and graphics that look much better and that provide dynamic effects. Cognos doesn't."
"Its functionality is lacking."
"It takes a lot of maintenance to support the architecture, which is something that should be improved."
"It should have more self-service capabilities."
"From an improvement perspective, the technical team should be able to provide more accurate answers by taking into consideration the context of the issues faced by users."
"The platform's data visualization features need improvement."
"Oracle OBIEE only displays KPIs, but it does not include strategic objectives or display risk in a strategic map."
"Customer service/technical support gets five out of 10. Sometimes good, sometimes bad."
"It crashes when many people login simultaneously."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a standard license required to use this solution. There are some additional tools but I am not sure if they are an extra cost."
"I don't know the exact cost, but I believe Cognos is quite expensive, especially when it comes to the support consultants and the procedures that need to be applied."
"There is some additional licensing that we needed to purchase because we were touching data outside of our core data platform. The cost was approximately $25,000 for the additional licenses, which were approximate 45 licenses. For the application itself, updates, and the core platform it was approximately $50,000. Giving a total cost of $75,000 annually for our usage of IBM Cognos."
"The pricing and licensing policies are comparatively cheaper than other products in the market ."
"My company uses IBM Cognos with another IBM product, so I think only one license is used."
"Pricing should be improved."
"Cognos is super expensive compared to Tableau ($70/month) and Power BI ($20/month) — I think Cognos is roughly $200 a month."
"It is my understanding that the cost is very low. It's not very expensive."
"A person only needs to pay towards the subscription costs since it is a cloud-based solution. I use the free version of Oracle OBIEE."
"If you compare Qlik Sense and Oracle OBIEE licensing, then Oracle products are much better. With Qlik Sense, you have to pay per client and per use. But we get Oracle OBIEE along with the Oracle database, making it much more cost-effective in the long term."
"Oracle products are extremely expensive."
"There are no additional costs, but there might be some charges for the Java feature."
"All products from Oracle are very pricey."
"Be prepared to spend a lot of time and money."
"Its licensing is yearly."
"In our organization, we use a user-based license for Oracle OBIEE, and I've heard that the license cost is based on the number of users."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which BI (Business Intelligence) Tools solutions are best for your needs.
824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
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
Educational Organization
55%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
4%
Government
4%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Government
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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?
I need improvements, particularly with the Framework Manager, which has an outdated user interface from older versions like IBM Cognos 10 or 8. Additionally, the Event Studio, which offered great f...
How does Oracle OBIEE compare with Microsoft BI?
Oracle OBIEE is great in allowing design and creativity per the individual needs of the organization. Dashboards are fully customizable and very user-friendly. This solution is very stable. Oracle ...
Which Oracle product is better - OBIEE or Analytics Cloud?
Oracle OBIEE is designed to be relatively easy to set up and has a helpful customer support staff at the ready to assist customers. These are two attributes that make this system quite valuable. OB...
What do you like most about Oracle OBIEE?
The most valuable feature of Oracle OBIEE is its ability to handle large volumes of data and provide traditional BI functionalities that developers can easily understand.
 

Also Known As

Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics
OBIEE, Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition, Oracle BI, Oracle BI EE 11g
 

Learn More

 

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.
Banca Transilvania, BeckmanCoulter, Hong Kong Housing Society, HealthShare, Ivanhoe Cambridge Unifies, and Home Credit, and Finance Bank.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Cognos vs. Oracle OBIEE and other solutions. Updated: November 2024.
824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.