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IBM DOORS vs Jira vs Polarion Requirements 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Application Requirements Management category, the mindshare of IBM DOORS is 34.0%, down from 35.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jira is 15.7%, down from 16.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Polarion Requirements is 15.1%, up from 15.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Requirements Management
 

Featured Reviews

UweSeufert - PeerSpot reviewer
Old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements
I use IBM DOORS because my customer wants it for managing their requirements IBM DOORS is a tool from the 20th century. It is very old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements. It helps to manage requirements efficiently, which significantly improves the way requirements…
Saroj Ekka - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Michael Sanchez - PeerSpot reviewer
Useful for Application Lifecycle Management and has good collaboration features
In my opinion, Polarion Requirements' most beneficial feature is the ability to manage specifications within a work-like document that functions as a work item. Its collaboration features have worked very well and have been very useful. We can easily exchange information with the testing team, the business, and with DevOps.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has the features of: traceability, configuration management, and user access."
"It helps to manage requirements efficiently, which significantly improves the way requirements are managed."
"I like being able to sort and categorize the requirements and the exporting functions."
"We have different generations of all products. It lets us select and see unique attributes for each release or generation. You can use attributes to define a selection area to see which equipments are for the old versions and which ones are for the new versions. This inbuilt view is what I like in IBM Rational DOORS. So, for a database and a set of requirements, it will select and show unique attributes for a release or a generation."
"The most valuable feature of IBM Rational DOORS is the full requirements development and testing."
"IBM DOORS has a well-refined ASPICE template"
"It's a very interesting tool. I like that it's simple. You have to create your document, add your templates, and have your headings and definitions, and it's done. You must attribute the discipline and fill out the comment field for requirements. It also provides you with unique IDs for each requirement. I like that it never duplicates IDs."
"The most valuable feature is the management verification and login."
"The most valuable features of Jira are the dashboards and user interface. The processes within Jira to monitor, maintain and release are beneficial. It is a continuous development solution."
"We can integrate a lot of tools with the solution."
"The dashboards are useful."
"The design of the interface is clean and not too busy visually."
"It's a Scrum tool, so it's very easy to use."
"The most valuable feature is the Burndown Chart to see work that is outstanding."
"Integrates with other components."
"When we run the Jenkins pipeline, the build is already automatically connected to Jira. We've been able to integrate the ecosystem we created using this automation tool."
"In my opinion, Polarion Requirements' most beneficial feature is the ability to manage specifications within a work-like document that functions as a work item. Its collaboration features have worked very well and have been very useful. We can easily exchange information with the testing team, the business, and with DevOps."
"We worked with the web interface."
"Polarion Requirements' most valuable features are link tracing, book entry, and sequence training features."
"My company mainly utilizes the product for documenting internal standards, guidelines, and requirements. Currently, we're focusing on using it for internal purposes, but the vision is to expand its usage to include contract requirements and tracking functionalities. While we're not there yet, it has proven effective for managing our internal documentation needs."
"I would say there is value in how powerful, configurable, and user-friendly it is."
"I like the way this solution is structured."
"It is easier to produce documents using the platform."
"We can easily customize it because of the web services and open APIs. Also, the APIs are available. We integrated Polarion with one of Siemens' products, Teamcenter, which is especially useful for automotive industries. There is an open API for integration with Jira as well, so for me, customization is a strong point."
 

Cons

"It would have been ok ten years ago, but we are used to having better tools now."
"Rational DOORS' most valuable feature is that you can write any kind of requirement you want."
"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."
"The problem is that because the GUI is so bad, you either have to spend a lot of money customizing the interface yourself, or a lot of money on training."
"The performance could be improved. It doesn't run as smoothly as it could."
"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."
"It would be nice if it could be scaled-down so that it could be installed and implemented without much learning or training."
"The customer must also have the tool to import the changes and accept them as a part of the review."
"Improvements in Jira for the next release could include adding AI tools for dashboarding, making it easier to report insights, and enhancing business intelligence capabilities. It should also improve on-prem support. As far as I know, Jira's on-premise support is being discontinued. From last year onward, they stopped providing on-premise licenses and now only offer cloud support. This shift happened gradually, and I believe they now only offer cloud licenses."
"I have noticed a problem with Jira in the Philippines. In the Philippines, there are only a few companies that offer local support, which is alarming."
"The support could be improved."
"I want the tool to integrate connectors."
"The Jira dashboards could be more useful. The dashboards have good widgets but the comparison of data over time or extraction of trends from the data is not easy."
"It would be good if we can grant access based on the roles. This is something that Jira can look into. Currently, anyone with Jira access can access everything. Being able to define access based on the roles will give us more flexibility in managing Jira. I would like to have more reports in Jira. Currently, eight or nine reports are there. You can use Screen Test to get more reports or data from Jira, but you will have to get more add-ons, plug-ins, and stuff like that. It would be good if they can increase the number of reports."
"In Jira, sometimes developers are not getting alerts when Jira is moving out of the SLA to the product development team."
"Jira is a little bit old fashioned, it could be more user friendly."
"The one thing I would mention is the license policy is a little bit difficult. For different roles, you will need different license models. That seems a little bit difficult for us. Especially when you introduce such a complex system, you want to know the right way is to do licensing. It's not clear what that best way would be. The solution will be here for a long time, and I just think it could be more clear."
"Polarion Requirement needs to have a feature where we can track changes and compare documents. Currently, we do it manually."
"Integration can be a little tricky if you're not aware of basic computer science or programming language."
"In my opinion, the main area for improvement in Polarion Requirements is its user interface. It should be easier for engineers to understand how it works, as many features are not very easily understandable for end-users."
"The usability of the solution should also be improved."
"It is not a stable solution, as we had issues with shared licenses."
"The platform's review process for the documents could be better."
"Its user interface could be more user friendly. In addition, a lot of features are missing for test management. It should have the test case ordering feature."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing can vary depending on the size of the organization and how contracts are negotiated."
"The licensing costs for the product are quite high."
"IBM is a bit too expensive in terms of pricing. Customers are paying a lot for the license, and the price is quite high for this kind of environment. It is quite high as compared to what we can get today with other solutions."
"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."
"It is expensive to onboard additional users."
"I think it's expensive because you have to pay for the licenses to IBM and all that and maintain them."
"IBM Rational DOORS is highly expensive."
"We have a corporate license, and it is probably based on the number of people."
"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."
"There is a monthly license required for this solution and it is expensive."
"Jira and its solution off the shelf are cheap. It is cheap for startups."
"Licensing is on a monthly basis, and it is based on what you use."
"We are on an annual license and could be less expensive."
"I don't deal with licensing in my current consultant position."
"We make use of the solution free of charge."
"The product's price is high."
"I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten."
"Polarion Requirements is a little pricey."
"I believe the cost is subjective. It seems a bit pricey, but it depends on your perspective. To provide some context, I compared the prices with GitLab and Jira. Unfortunately, I couldn't find Jira's prices. However, GitLab costs around 40 euros, and DeepLab, which I recently discovered, also falls in a similar price range. I'm not sure about DeepLab's features or interface improvements, as they might have been implementing requirements management over the past six months. In contrast, Polarion costs around 50 to 60 euros based on the 2021 prices I have. While it may seem a bit expensive, it's worth considering whether the additional investment, perhaps around 68 euros per user, is justified. It might appear costly at first glance, but it's essential to acknowledge that it can greatly streamline your work processes."
"The pricing model is flexible. You don't have to pay for the full functionalities. And it's a one-time investment for the licenses. You purchase what you need and then can work with that."
"It is expensive but not for what it is. It is just the right price for what it is. Its price is also similar to other solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
26%
Computer Software Company
9%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
8%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
51%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
30%
Computer Software Company
11%
Healthcare Company
8%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
5%
 

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 differen...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Rational DOORS?
Over the years, the first version cost something around 5800 euros.
What needs improvement with IBM Rational DOORS?
Compared to today, DOORS' competitors also excel in this discipline. Yet the price is too high. It's often not as gen...
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 d...
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 a...
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 lic...
What do you like most about Polarion Requirements?
In my opinion, Polarion Requirements' most beneficial feature is the ability to manage specifications within a work-l...
What needs improvement with Polarion Requirements?
In my opinion, the main area for improvement in Polarion Requirements is its user interface. It should be easier for ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Rational DOORS
Jira Software
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Infosys, Chevrolet Volt
Square, Nasa, eBay, Cisco, SalesForce, Adobe, BNP Paribas, BMW and LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.
NetSuite, Ottobock, Zumtobel Group, Kªster Automotive GmbH, Sirona Dental Systems, LifeWatch, U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), PHOENIX CONTACT Electronics GmbH, Metso Corporation
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM, Atlassian, Siemens and others in Application Requirements Management. Updated: April 2025.
849,335 professionals have used our research since 2012.