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IBM Cognos vs TIBCO Jaspersoft comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 2025

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
Ranking in Reporting
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (7th)
TIBCO Jaspersoft
Ranking in Reporting
10th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Embedded BI (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of IBM Cognos is 4.8%, down from 5.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TIBCO Jaspersoft is 2.7%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

AMOL JAJU - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers ad hoc analysis reports and good for operational dashboarding
There used to be many valuable features, but in the last three or four years, whatever IBM is doing with enhancements, it has taken a lot of time to build and develop. But the best usage of Cognos is the ad hoc analysis reports. I really like that. Our customers also like that. But now the usage of Cognos and OBIE is reduced by various business users because people and business users are now more focused on analytics, slice and dice, and the dashboard, and the widgets.
Chan Sambopol - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use with a nice design and good connectivity
TIBCO Jaspersoft has two versions. Version one is the enterprise version, The other one is the community version, and which allows us to use it for free. In the free version, we have to support ourselves. For the enterprise version, you have technical support if you need it. I wish that we had more support while in the portal, at least for the community version, or if we could talk to someone regarding issues, like how to configure or fine-tune would be helpful. We'd like to have help on how to solve some problems when we use the product and have some error or limitation. They need to, at the very least, improve the community. The Enterprise Edition has support, and we can force some tickets through the portal and then have an engineer support us in some cases. However, in terms of the subscription price, it's a bit high. Therefore, we'd like to see the community version offer a little bit more support and better documentation and we'd like the enterprise edition to have better pricing.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's enabled us to report directly from our main application systems. We're removing islands of data and we're removing inefficiencies, where people or small divisions had their own store of information."
"The product is a very good reporting tool and is very flexible. It allows for the users to get a scheduled report."
"If they want dashboarding, storytelling, and analyzing why KPIs are met or not, then Cognos is a better candidate than Qlik Sense."
"I have worked on the features like dashboards and stories, and I do like them a lot."
"The Report Studio that is aimed at professional report writers."
"Integration with Office can enable the 'download' mode of storytelling.​"
"IBM Cognos is a robust governed platform with significant security features and provides excellent graphics and reporting."
"The correlation analysis is excellent. It's one of the best that I have used to date."
"We find the access restrictions on different user groups valuable."
"The solution is standalone with the flexibility to use visualize.js to embed within the application."
"We can set any property dynamically."
"With the online view, it's easier to create Ad Hoc reports. It has inbuilt reports so we can easily get data from the system and customize the fields."
"I give the stability of the solution a nine out of ten."
"The growth time is the most valuable feature of TIBCO Jaspersoft."
"It's easy to use and maintain."
"The feature that I like most is the drag and drop capability."
 

Cons

"There are some small features that are missing. It would be nice if the graphics were better. You can use external sources for charts, but it's quite complex to use and not easy to implement. If you want a new chart, you can download it from multiple tools and implement it into IBM Cognos."
"I would like them to reinclude PowerPlay. One thing that I am missing in the current Cognos is what was formally named PowerPlay. They have basically removed PowerPlay from it, which is something that I fail to understand because it was the most wonderful tool for business intelligence that I've ever used. As far as I know, they don't provide this functionality anymore, so this is one thing that I dislike about Cognos."
"It would be good if the solution had conditional formatting."
"The technical support team’s response time is slow and needs to be improved."
"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."
"We need more predictive analytical functions, not only diagnostic or decryptic analytics."
"It is a costly product; it is comparatively expensive."
"Compared to Tableau and PowerBI, the IBM interface is easier to use. However, the drag-and-drop functionality isn't as straightforward. Formatting is also more challenging in the cloud than in other applications, like Power BI. Also, if you encounter an issue, it takes more time to resolve it on the formatting side."
"The Ad Hoc Report Writer does not include as many features as Tableau and needs to be improved to meet expectations."
"Currently, JSON format is the main format we use, however, in TIBCO Jaspersoft, XML format is the default and JSON did not work because TIBCO did not fix it."
"We'd like to see the community version offer a little bit more support and better documentation and we'd like the enterprise edition to have better pricing."
"Jaspersoft should focus on user interaction features, and one should not expect it to suit every niche."
"I would like to see better support for big data."
"The upgrades are not easy."
"I would like to see some analysis done prior to data extraction. The data extraction itself could also be improved."
"TIBCO Jaspersoft would benefit from enabling you to run multiple reports in one file and incorporating more options related to multiple reports."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"IBM Cognos is priced reasonable. However, it is more expensive than Power BI and Tableau."
"The solution is affordable."
"The cost of IBM Cognos it's more or less the same as most of the other solutions on the market. They're very competitive with the rest of the market and it is not the most expensive product."
"It is averagely priced."
"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."
"IBM Cognos price is on the higher side of the spectrum. However, with the features that it brings, such as correlation analysis, it's worth the money. They should look at the pricing more clearly because it's a little on the higher side."
"It is my understanding that the cost is very low. It's not very expensive."
"The solution is a little bit expensive."
"I find the price to be reliable and not overly costly."
"Since I checked last time, only one annual license costs about $25,000."
"I would rate the pricing as four out of five because it's expensive."
"The pricing is cost effective because it is based on servers rather than users."
"I give the cost of the solution a five out of ten."
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Comparison Review

it_user6978 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 10, 2013
Jaspersoft vs. Pentaho – Which one to use & is there any need to purchase the commercial edition
Any company (be it technology, manfucaturing, human resource, ecommerce, SME etc) always has the need for Business Intelligence to some or the other extent. If cost is one of the consideration factor, then the 2 BI tools which are at the forefront are Pentaho and Jaspersoft. But, often the same…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
55%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
4%
Insurance Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
5%
 

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?
There is room for improvement in self-service analytics and predictiveness.
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
The best and open source (No cost involved) solution for all BI requirements is Jaspersoft Open Studio. Refer to rajeshsirsikar.com for more information.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Jaspersoft?
I am sharing a scenario for pricing: for ten thousand users and a robust server, it may cost in the hundreds of thousands USD. However, TIBCO is more enterprise-focused and might have different pri...
 

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.
Mosaic, Vander University, Telesoft, Entrust, Ericsson, BT, Groupon, John Hopkins, Puma
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Cognos vs. TIBCO Jaspersoft and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.