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IBM Rational ALM vs TFS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Rational ALM
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
13th
Average Rating
7.2
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
TFS
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
96
Ranking in other categories
Test Management Tools (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of IBM Rational ALM is 2.5%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TFS is 5.6%, down from 9.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
 

Featured Reviews

Harold Pogue - PeerSpot reviewer
Dec 7, 2022
A complex deployment that is not stable, but is cloud-based
The team of 15 to 20 software engineers uses IBM Rational ALM and Jira for testing. They coupled different online packages together because the Duration Enterprise was impossible to use IBM Rational ALM did not help the organization and we ended up moving to another solution. The most valuable…
Pmurki@Micron.Com Praveen - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 19, 2024
Version control is excellent and good for code review, branching, merging strategies and more
I've worked with TFS for source control and Agile project management. We also used TFS for seamless team collaboration and tracking.  I used TFS for a couple of years. Now, we use Azure DevOps. It's a wonderful tool for source control and CI/CD pipelines It's a really valuable tool for…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The integration with Git works well."
"The most valuable feature is the reporting of the CPU usage on the dashboard."
"One of the key advantages of IBM Rational ALM is its workflow capabilities, which enable seamless collaboration between development and production teams and ensure that all stakeholders are aware of the progress and readiness of the solution. Additionally, the solution is good for integration."
"We have something called the GC (global configuration), which is a unique feature compared to any other competitor we have in the ALM space."
"The cataloging is a very valuable feature. For a lot of enterprises, they end up not knowing which applications do specific features. The cataloging helps with this. It's not that verbose, but it still gives you allowances to put in more detail."
"I would rate the stability of this product a nine out of ten."
"The solution is customizable."
"It is relatively easy to use and user-friendly once the setup is complete."
"The initial setup is easy, it is easy to understand and use."
"Work item management integration with source control."
"This solution enables us to link all items usefully, in the way we use Agile."
"The interface is good with TFS."
"I like its MTM (Microsoft Test Manager) section which gives us options to create various test plans and add test cases into it."
"As far as queries are concerned, creating, grading, or customizing the queries as a primary requirement is very easy to do."
"Basically, the capacity to construct various products is something I find handy."
"The most valuable features of TFS are the test plans. We can reproduce reusable test plans in test automation. We have a lot of queries and this feature is very useful."
 

Cons

"One of the complaints from users is that they have to click buttons too many times for just a simple task. Changing this would lead to a better user experience."
"The user interface requires significant improvement as it is overly complex."
"In the next release, we expect a traceability metrics configuration where we can configure the user stories. We also expect them to improve or simplify the query process."
"The directory designer manager is uncivil. The design manager is clearly really unstable."
"I would like to see better reporting features. The out-of-box reporting is - I don't want to say limited - but the focus is on the Scrum and Sprint reports. We need more reporting features regarding the history of the work, tracking it more deeply."
"The interconnectivity between packages is a major support problem and can be improved."
"The stability of IBM Rational ALM could be improved."
"Of course it would be related to customer experience. The solution is not user friendly at all. It needs an expert to use it, although the reporting feature was okay."
"It has been really dated. When you start to work more in an agile environment, it is not really that flexible. They tried to replicate the look and feel of Jira, but it is not quite there. It was nice to use in the past, but it is not as flexible now with the changing development environments and methodologies."
"Since it is Microsoft, it is technology agnostic, thus it does not really fit into various different technologies in the organization."
"Merging branches is definitely one of the more challenging aspects for people new to TFS."
"I would like to see TFS improve its web interface as there are some limitations with IDs and the integration behind it and with open-source tools like VS Code."
"Sometimes we feel that it need more CPU, and RAMs on TFS server, either we implemented the hardware with the product minimum requirements."
"The project management side should be addressed and the project and release planning should be somewhat extended."
"It would be better if we could bring it out on the cloud."
"Not all of the functionality, which is exposed by the command line interface (tf.exe) is available in the Visual Studio GUI."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution could be reduced. Many of our customers are not using all the features and this could be why our clients feel the price is too high."
"IBM Rational ALM has both monthly and yearly licensing options."
"This product is a little expensive and we had to pay extra to have them set it up for us."
"The solution is not cheap."
"We have a contract, but I am not aware of the details."
"TFS is not cheap."
"I was working with the engineering team, and that was not under my umbrella. From what I can remember, its license was yearly. They had the licenses on a per-user basis, and they included MTM."
"TFS is expensive, and the licensing costs are yearly. I rate the tool's pricing an eight out of ten."
"I believe we pay on a yearly basis. I don't know the current costs of them. We outsource all that to a third party. Each of the developers gets a Microsoft Visual Studio Azure DevOps license, which gives them access to the TFS server as well. We probably pay on average about 1,800 Canadian Dollars a year for every developer, but that covers a lot more than just TFS."
"It is an expensive solution."
"There are different prices depending on the configurations. There is a free version available. There is no extra cost for the solution. However, the hardware could be something that needs to be considered."
"You will need to obtain server and account licenses."
"On a scale where ten is the highest and one is the cheapest, I rate the solution's licensing cost at one on a scale of one to ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
25%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
60%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Rational ALM?
We have some special needs. The product does not support our needs perfectly. The GUI is a little bit outdated. There are not many diagrams that help us organize or plan the work for the team. The ...
What is your primary use case for IBM Rational ALM?
We have three modules. The DOORS module is for requirements. RTC is for storage planning and workflow planning. We also use the module for quality. We use IBM Rational ALM as the main tool to plan ...
Which is better - TFS or Azure DevOps?
TFS and Azure DevOps are different in many ways. TFS was designed for admins, and only offers incremental improvements. In addition, TFS seems complicated to use and I don’t think it has a very fri...
What do you like most about TFS?
Microsoft's technical team is supportive.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TFS?
There are many version control options available in the market. From a costing and licensing perspective, I would rate it around six out of ten. It is not the cheapest product, but it offers good v...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Rational ALM, MKS
Team Foundation Server
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Tennis Australia, WeCloud AB, Port Otago Limited, Logicalis US, Valmer, The Chevrolet Volt, Ashurst
Vendex KBB IT Services, Info Support, Fujitsu Consulting, TCSC, Airways New Zealand, HP
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Rational ALM vs. TFS and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.
814,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.