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

IBM Db2 Warehouse vs SAP BW4HANA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

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 Db2 Warehouse
Ranking in Data Warehouse
13th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAP BW4HANA
Ranking in Data Warehouse
9th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of IBM Db2 Warehouse is 1.9%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP BW4HANA is 4.6%, up from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Josef Kraus - PeerSpot reviewer
Useful for ETL process and has good documentation
The tool's most beneficial feature for our data management tasks has been the ETL process. Additionally, we utilized Windows and Linux. IBM Db2 Warehouse's scalability has significantly impacted our data storage capabilities. We needed to order new disks for storage every week within this hosting environment. Additionally, we implemented protection measures for production use. The tools are readily available, and if you're willing to invest in them, you can access a good data warehouse without any issues.
Csaba Grünblatt - PeerSpot reviewer
Performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities
SAP BW4HANA improved data reporting processes significantly. Performance on HANA database is good. Well-built data models ensure consistent and fast reporting. Reusable models enhance efficiency, even for SaaS services. In-memory computing, especially since HANA, has greatly improved performance in data analysis tasks. It eliminates the need for complex optimizations like creating indexes or aggregates. Queries that once took minutes now run in seconds, enabling real-time reporting, especially for SAP ECC on HANA. SAP BW4HANA's integration capabilities are streamlined with a simplified architecture and more virtual layers. You can directly load data into optimized layers, reducing the need for extra storage. The introduction of Open ODS Views allows for additional logic and master data inclusion, making integration faster and simpler. The learning curve for SAP BW4HANA is much faster now compared to ten years ago, thanks to abundant free resources like documentation, videos, blogs, and learning journeys provided by SAP. It is simpler to learn with these resources available compared to the past when you had to attend courses and rely on books. I would recommend SAP BW4HANA to users looking to implement it, especially if they want to keep their systems on-premise and already have SAP systems. Those with BW on HANA have two choices: BW4HANA or DataSphere, depending on their cloud strategy. If they are advanced in their cloud strategy and want to migrate off-premise, DataSphere is a good choice. However, for a robust solution on-premise or in a private cloud, BW4HANA is an excellent option. Overall, I would rate BW4HANA as a nine out of ten. It performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities. We use it traditionally, with complex transformations and models but with less emphasis on real-time processing and third-party sources.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The standout feature of IBM Db2 Warehouse, which is particularly valuable for large enterprises, is its ability to handle big data."
"The analytics engine is not bad at forecasting predictions."
"It can be mounted on the cloud, which is a huge plus. If the client, for example, starts small with on-premise deployment and then it rapidly needs to grow, we can transfer this to the cloud easily."
"Some of the best features are stored procedures, parallelism, and different indexing strategies."
"The solution is stable."
"It can scale effectively as long as resources are available."
"I think it scales really well and as long as you take enough time to learn a little bit about it, it works really well."
"Provides good security and reliability."
"SAP BW4HANA aids in managing data from ER to front-end analysis, contributes to ROI, and fosters business growth understanding. I like that the solution breaks down components to a very granular level, allowing for customization and implementation based on specific requirements. The solution is stable. The solution is scalable."
"It is a very stable solution."
"We like that it is an SAP product, so we can easily connect with the SAP ERP system."
"The product has efficient performance."
"It's quite scalable."
"Out of the box, this solution has a lot of standard features."
"Some of the main features of this solution are that it uses HANA and it has good performance."
"The most valuable features are the speed of reporting and the HANA database."
 

Cons

"The biggest problems we have is when the backup solution is failing or slow and we run out of log space, which has happened probably a couple of times in the last four years."
"There should be more material available for training and training should be free."
"The biggest challenge anyone could have with Db2 Warehouse is their references or online resources and documentation. They are very, very, very limited on the web."
"Lacks sufficient documentation and particularly in Spanish."
"In terms of improvement, IBM Db2 Warehouse should be more scalable."
"The areas of the solution that is needing the most improvement are separating compute from storage, elasticity, which means scaling up and then retracting."
"There were some initial challenges with IBM Db2 Warehouse about eight months ago when I worked in this environment. When I coordinated with IBM support, they mentioned that the memory was insufficient for our needs. Our business environment required significantly more memory than the previous cluster could provide. Consequently, we have worked closely with on-site IBM technical personnel to address this issue."
"Responding to support tickets takes a lot of time. It can range from two to four days, even for critical issues."
"It's complicated to use. You need to spend a lot of time learning about it. The interface could be improved. It's not intuitive to build a data model and use their ETL tools."
"We cannot integrate with third-party tools like Python or advanced integration options. You can't fine-tune tables within BW or generate specific views or reports."
"The speed of operations could be a little faster."
"The UI is not user-friendly."
"The solution does occasionally get a few bugs, but this is typical for any product."
"The solution is not scalable. It does not have a data streaming feature as well."
"There's one area where the other vendors have an upper edge, which is the data lake. I think SAP is trying to figure out whether to stick with IQ, their own data lake solution, or push customers toward customer-preferred vendors, like Azure Data Lake, AWS, or any other provider."
"The tool is not cloud-compatible."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In a traditional on-prem database, in a data warehouse, the solution is probably on the expensive side."
"We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses."
"It is an expensive product."
"The product is free if we have the ECC license."
"The tool is affordable."
"The solution is expensive."
"The price is high and currently only affordable for large organizations."
"Price wise, this solution is on the higher side."
"As an investment, the solution is very expensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Warehouse solutions are best for your needs.
831,265 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
60%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
5%
Insurance Company
4%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Energy/Utilities Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Db2 Warehouse?
The standout feature of IBM Db2 Warehouse, which is particularly valuable for large enterprises, is its ability to handle big data.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Db2 Warehouse?
Db2 Warehouse or IBM products are pretty expensive. There are cheaper tools on the market. However, if the client is satisfied with paying for the Db2 Warehouse license, especially for cloud-based ...
What needs improvement with IBM Db2 Warehouse?
Responding to support tickets takes a lot of time. It can range from two to four days, even for critical issues. The technical support quality is good, but the response time needs improvement.
What do you like most about SAP BW4HANA?
One significant advantage of SAP BW/4HANA is the direct integration with the SAP HANA database, providing seamless access to real-time analytics. Additionally, it enables real-time data integrati...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP BW4HANA?
We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses.
What needs improvement with SAP BW4HANA?
The interface could be more user-friendly, as we often need to do low-level coding to get things done.
 

Also Known As

InfoSphere Warehouse, IBM InfoSphere Warehouse
SAP BW/4HANA
 

Learn More

Video not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Alameda County Social Services Agency, Sui Southern Gas Company Limited
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Db2 Warehouse vs. SAP BW4HANA and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,265 professionals have used our research since 2012.