IBM DOORS vs Jira comparison

IBM and Atlassian are both solutions in the Application Requirements Management category. IBM is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.1, while Atlassian is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.4. IBM holds a 34.5% mindshare in ARM, compared to Atlassian’s 15.7% mindshare. Additionally, 90% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of Atlassian users who would recommend it.

IBM DOORS

Read 53 IBM DOORS reviews

8,366 Views
5,695 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

Jira

Read 274 Jira reviews

4,059 Views
2,693 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

IBM DOORS

Jira

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

IBM DOORS and Jira are competing in the field of requirements and project management tools. IBM DOORS seems to have the upper hand with robust capabilities for managing complex requirements, although Jira is favored for agile project management with its strong integration features.

Features: IBM DOORS offers traceability, impact analysis, and history baselining. It provides extensive customization through the DOORS Extension Language (DXL). These features make it ideal for large-scale projects. Jira is renowned for its issue tracking and workflow management and its wide range of third-party integrations. It’s versatile, especially within agile environments.

Room for Improvement: IBM DOORS faces challenges with integration and a steep learning curve, alongside usability concerns. Its proprietary database also limits flexibility. Jira struggles with complex customization and performance issues, particularly during scaling. Its reporting capabilities and user experience could be enhanced.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM DOORS is mainly deployed on-premises with varying customer service quality. Noteworthy improvements have been made recently, although technical support can sometimes be stretched thin. Jira is flexible, offering cloud-based and on-premises deployment. It is generally appreciated for responsive customer support, although more direct interaction with Atlassian is desired by some users.

Pricing and ROI: IBM DOORS is considered expensive, often justified by its comprehensive feature set for large enterprises. Jira offers more economical pricing for smaller setups, but costs can rise with additional plugins. Both tools yield high ROI for large-scale implementations, but Jira's adaptability is more beneficial for smaller, agile teams.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM DOORS vs. Jira Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM DOORS vs. Jira

January 2025

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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 DOORS

Ranking in Application Requirements Management

1st

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Jira

Ranking in Application Requirements Management

2nd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

274

Ranking in other categories

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites (1st), Project Management Software (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Application Requirements Management category, the mindshare of IBM DOORS is 34.5%, up from 34.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jira is 15.7%, down from 17.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Requirements Management

Featured Reviews

MarioCataldi

Senior Consultant Bip - Business Integration Partners at Business Integration Partners

Offers ability to automate tasks and to track changes within documents and compare different versions of requirements but modeling capabilities could benefit from a web-based tool

The biggest improvement for me is definitely the ability to use DOORS in a web environment through Rational DOORS Next Generation. Integrating with Rational Team Concert via the web interface has also been beneficial. However, not all Rational Team Concert operations are available from the web client. Certain operations, like creating streams or components, still require using the desktop application. They're not accessible through the web interface. And in my opinion, this limitation should be removed. Creating streams, components, etc. We still need the desktop app for those. DOORS has enabled flexibility in mapping requirements to the software. Tracking changes over time due to team meetings and other factors is important. Additionally, I've been using DOORS Next Generation, the web-based tool, especially in the last year.

Read full review

Saroj Ekka

Technical Delivery Lead at Applied Materials

Offers good repository integration, sprint board and easy to set up

There are some features and reports we need that are not there. For example, if I have to find out the capacity of the current sprint by user and compare it with the previous sprint, that visibility isn't there. We can know the capacity and what happened with the whole sprint, but not for an individual person to see where it's falling and how it's tracking. Report and analytics capabilities are important for a product manager. That visibility is important, so we use Jira. Some of the features are there, and I use my own Excels or other data things to compensate for that.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"When you install DOORS locally, you have the flexibility to do what you want with the solution. You can add functionality and do many things that you can't do with other tools or do well enough to satisfy your users' requirements."

"Very customizable and can be as powerful as you want it to be."

"Rational DOORS' most valuable feature is that you can write any kind of requirement you want."

"The solution is stable."

"The most valuable feature is the management verification and login."

"I like the user interface with regard to creating links between requirements and tracing links to requirements."

"What I like about DOORS is baselines, it's easy and I use the capability of multiple users. The traceability or links between different levels are very nice. Additionally, it is used by all of our suppliers, which brings us commonality."

"The platform's traceability capabilities are invaluable. They provide a solid foundation for certification processes and manage requirement changes across project lifecycles."

More IBM DOORS pros

"JQL, JIRA Query Language enables me to filter all the issues, display the items as I want."

"Jira is user-friendly and offers many features."

"Jira is designed for issue tracking, making the process much easier than traditional methods like paper-based tracking. It is number one for agile management."

"It allows you to do a lot of stuff, and the functionality is pretty rich. It integrates well with other products, like GitLab, that we are currently intensely using at the company."

"The feature that I have found most valuable is its ease of use. I don't need to train anyone to use it, I just give them access and they can use it to add comments, move their issues, change the status, monitor, read, and so on."

"This product provides you a good view of the status of your projects."

"The design of the interface is clean and not too busy visually."

"The solution has been very stable overall."

More Jira pros

Cons

"There needs to be quicker access to tech support. When I have a two minute question that takes two minutes to answer, it shouldn't take me 45 minutes and/or a few days of callbacks to get to the right technical support person. It's unnecessary and frustrating for the user."

"The kind of dashboard is not very convenient."

"It would have been ok ten years ago, but we are used to having better tools now."

"It could be more user-friendly. It's not a beautiful tool. The user interface is gray. It has only lists inside, and it's horrible when you want to add tables. It's tough to add tables and manage them. It also becomes difficult when you want to add images."

"Overall, the user experience should be enhanced."

"Enhancing security measures, particularly when handling multiple projects simultaneously, would be beneficial to prevent data loss within DOORS."

"IBM should integrate some solutions they already own toenhance the utility of the product further. Specifically import and export to Office products is more difficult than it needs to be."

"They need to provide users with information on what options would be best for their setup."

More IBM DOORS cons

"Sometimes the solution doesn't communicate well with other platforms. It's quite difficult to integrate things and make the data flow from A to B, to Jira, and then back to other areas."

"There is always a bit of a performance problem. It's a bit slow to load the whole data."

"Jira can improve by making user management better. It is not easy to have visibility of who has the right to do what. Only the administrator has this visibility but there should be the option for other users too."

"It would be very practical if you can more freely reach the information that is already inside the system. Currently, we have to buy add-ons for it. There is a lot of information in the Jira system that you can handle only through add-ons. You cannot reach such information on your own. If you want to use this information, which is already in the system, you have to buy some add-on to use. For example, information about how much time an assignee is spending on a ticket is there in the system, but you cannot access it without an add-on. JQL is a very good way to reach the data inside Jira. If we can reach more objects, even through JQL, it would be great."

"They can maybe dumb down the directions for building the automation a little bit because to be able to build out the automation, I had to play around with it and learn what all the fields meant and what they were referencing. I don't have an IT background originally. My background is in biology, and I got into project management by chance. I am good at it, but I haven't really worked with coding languages. In terms of writing automation, it is easier for devs because they intuitively know what they're being asked, but as a PM who originally didn't have IT experience, it was a little bit daunting at first. It could also have an extra hierarchy to be able to allow tasks under stories. It could be the way it is set up at our organization, but currently, under stories, you can have sub-tasks, but you can't create a task. Being able to customize your hierarchy a little bit more would be beneficial because sometimes, the devs would say, "Well, here's a story, and now we need sub-tasks," but as we were building out the sub-tasks, sometimes we had to go a step lower to dig in a little bit more, and we couldn't do that."

"If CI/CD is integrated with it, it would be better. I've used Azure DevOps before, and it's nice to have everything, such as CI/CD Repos and other things, integrated. Jira has fewer integrations. Azure DevOps has an easier interface, and it has got everything in one spot. I don't have to jump around in different applications."

"The solution heavily focuses on the Agile framework, which might only suit some business use cases. This particular area needs enhancement."

"End-to-end management from product backlog to test completion could be improved."

More Jira cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's expensive."

"The licensing costs for the product are quite high."

"I think it's expensive because you have to pay for the licenses to IBM and all that and maintain them."

"We have to pay for a license. I think it's a one-time payment as my company hasn't notified me about more charges. I don't think it's expensive for large corporations, but it will be costly for an average person."

"Pricing can vary depending on the size of the organization and how contracts are negotiated."

"IBM DOORS is available at a reasonable price"

"I am not sure why it is so expensive, but one license will cost approximately $15,000 in US dollars."

"I don't personally know what the numbers are. I just know that one of the reasons we've limited it to three seats is a function of cost."

More IBM DOORS pricing and cost advice

"The price is quite competitive."

"Our client handles the licensing aspect. They have not yet purchased the premium version."

"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution. The product offers flexibility in pricing since it depends on the memory bits you have used."

"The price of Jira is reasonable."

"I am not sure if the client is using a commercial version. I think it is on a per-user basis, and it is around 15 Canadian dollars for a user, but I'm not sure. It also has a free version."

"The price at the moment for Jira is okay. I'm absolutely not amused with the plans to try to drive us to the cloud or to other licensing models. For the very simple reason that we are a company in the defense sector where cloud is problematic in a number of the domains. We are now approximately 60 users and the new policy will actually confront us with an upscale to approximately 500 users. I find it unacceptable, and may potentially lead us to look for another solution."

"I don't have the number, but I sure wish Jira was less expensive. Its price point should be a little lower, and it should be more flexible for users who are just ticket viewers."

"It is not too expensive. It is just comparative to other tools like Microsoft Teams."

More Jira pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

26%

Computer Software Company

11%

Aerospace/Defense Firm

Government

Educational Organization

52%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Rational DOORS?

The traceability matrix in DOORS improved our project outcomes. It helps ensure coverage of requirements at different levels, from user requirements to software requirements to test requirements.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Rational DOORS?

The price of IBM DOORS depends upon the pricing models and the licenses the user selects. The product, on average, starts at $134/month. IBM DOORS is available at a reasonable price.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Rational DOORS?

IBM DOORS effectively synchronizes with Polarion. But suppose when Polarion is running on Linux and you want to integrate with IBM DOORS on Windows, that is when compatibility issues arise. For the...

See all answers

Is Jira better or would you go with Micro Focus ALM Octane?

Hi Netanya, Basically , it all depends on the use cases for your environment and the business needs. Hope the below data may be relevant to you for identifying your needs and deciding on the approp...

See all answers

Which is better - Jira or Microsoft Azure DevOps?

Jira is a great centralized tool for just about everything, from local team management to keeping track of products and work logs. It is easy to implement and navigate, and it is stable and scalabl...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jira?

We operate under a nonlimited license with Jira, allowing a number of users to access it with a single enterprise license.

See all answers

Comparisons

Polarion Requirements vs IBM DOORS

Compared 26% of the time

Jama Connect vs IBM DOORS

Compared 18% of the time

IBM DOORS Next vs IBM DOORS

Compared 8% of the time

Helix ALM vs IBM DOORS

Compared 7% of the time

PTC Integrity Requirements Connector vs IBM DOORS

Compared 6% of the time

More IBM DOORS Competitors

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Jira

Compared 19% of the time

OpenText ALM Octane vs Jira

Compared 9% of the time

Rally Software vs Jira

Compared 7% of the time

Polarion ALM vs Jira

Compared 7% of the time

ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management vs Jira

Compared 4% of the time

More Jira Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM DOORS

January 2025

Download IBM DOORS product report

Buyer's Guide

Jira

January 2025

Download Jira product report

Also Known As

Rational DOORS

Jira Software

Learn More

IBM

Atlassian

Overview

IBM Engineering Requirements Management DOORS (DOORS) is a Requirements Management (RM) software designed to help organizations manage engineering project requirements throughout the development lifecycle. It provides a central location for capturing, defining, and organizing project requirements, facilitating communication and collaboration among stakeholders like engineers, system designers, and customers. Key features include requirements traceability, version control, and impact analysis, ensuring effective implementation and testing. DOORS improves efficiency, enhances communication, reduces risks, and supports better decision-making through clear visibility into requirements. Compared to its newer, web-based counterpart DOORS Next, the mature DOORS 9 offers a wider range of features with a traditional user interface but lacks web-based functionality and modern integration with IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) tools.

Jira is a powerful cloud- and subscription-based application lifecycle and issue management solution. It is designed to aid users both in project management and in resolving any issues that arise at any point in the software development process. It is especially concerned with easing the ability of developers to collaborate.

Jira Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy Jira include:

DevOps lifecycle visibility and planning. Jira provides application developers with tools that enable them to track and visualize where they are in the development process. This means that a DevOps team can measure their progress at all times. Jira’s roadmapping feature also enables a DevOps team to work more efficiently by setting goals for their projects, keeping them on track. Additionally, they are able to track whether they are meeting the goals that they set for their projects.

Regular product updates. Atlassian is constantly updating Jira so that it is continuously evolving into an ever more powerful and user-friendly solution. Users can be sure that the product that they are using is always being tweaked so as to provide them with the best possible project management solution.

Flexibility. Jira enables users to customize their workflows and dashboard so that the solution is operating in a way that best matches their needs. Jira can also integrate with more than 3,000 other applications and integrations. Organizations can use it to expand their project management and DevOps capabilities in many different ways.

Jira Features

Security capabilities. Jira is equipped with a number of useful security features. It gives administrators the ability to restrict access to certain tools so that only users who are authorized to complete certain tasks have access to the tools related to the completion of that task. Users can also set default permissions so that only particular users can work on new projects or particular projects.

Real-time notification feature. Users can set Jira so that it offers them notifications that contain critical information in real time. It can send users email notifications when pressing issues have been updated. They can also set it to notify them about tasks that may be due, or other similar events.
Activity log. Jira has the ability to track any and all changes that are taking place within the software framework. Users can keep a close eye on everything that is going on. This promotes a high level of visibility and can be leveraged to aid developers in their collaboration efforts.

Reviews from Real Users

Jira is a powerful solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are its workflow engine and its highly customizable dashboard.

Bharath R., the tool implementation and project management lead at a financial services firm, writes, “I feel the strongest feature of Jira is its workflow engine. It empowers us to automate our workflows within our organization. It's the one characteristic of Jira which I think can help any organization, be it in any domain.”

Uday J., a staff engineer at a computer company, says, “Another thing that I like a lot about Jira is that in the dashboard, you can plug the modules that you want. You can enable certain sections. For example, you can show trend history, open Jira tickets, etc. Some of the managers have created a dashboard for each engineer.”

Sample Customers

Infosys, Chevrolet Volt

Square, Nasa, eBay, Cisco, SalesForce, Adobe, BNP Paribas, BMW and LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.

Buyer's Guide

IBM DOORS vs. Jira

January 2025

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