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IBM SPSS Modeler vs IBM Watson Explorer comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on May 21, 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 SPSS Modeler
Ranking in Data Mining
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Data Science Platforms (13th)
IBM Watson Explorer
Ranking in Data Mining
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Data Mining category, the mindshare of IBM SPSS Modeler is 15.5%, down from 17.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Watson Explorer is 3.5%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Mining Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM SPSS Modeler15.5%
IBM Watson Explorer3.5%
Other81.0%
Data Mining
 

Featured Reviews

RB
Business Owner at SASS GmbH
Support and flexibility enable effective project initiation and meet customer needs but deployment requires enhancement
The customer comes to you and says they want to deploy it and make a production out of this, which is very difficult and expensive with IBM SPSS Modeler. With MATLAB, there is no problem. I have a solution, and then I convert my MATLAB solution to C programming language. This I can deploy, and I can check it, and it is MISRA compatible. It is very easy to deploy it, to go from MATLAB to C or C++, which is actually needed in the car industry. In the car industry, they want to have it in the hardware. You cannot put MATLAB or IBM SPSS Modeler in the hardware of a car, but with C, there is no problem with a microcontroller. They can shoot it into the microcontroller, and I can check it with Polyspace, and it is MISRA compatible, which is an industrial standard. There is nothing similar in IBM SPSS Modeler. I made solutions with IBM SPSS Modeler, and then the customer said they wanted to make a production out of it, and it was not possible. I stopped with IBM SPSS Modeler 18. It is now 18.6 from what I know at the moment. I do not believe that there is a possibility to design a graphic user interface with it. It is itself a graphic user interface, where you put all sorts of little icons into the display.
it_user1319820 - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
A data analysis tool that is scalable and includes keyword search functionality
The solution is used for a government company for data collection and analysis I have found the auto-generated document very useful as well as the main keywords that are highlighted, which are used for the search functionality within IBM Watson Explorer. I have been using the solution for five…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is very scalable for non-technical people."
"I also use SAS, but SPSS is easier than SAS, and I enjoy it."
"It is a great tool even for an individual with no or basic predictive modeling experience."
"In the solution, I like the virtualization of data flow since it shows what goes where, which is mostly the strength of the tool."
"Stability is good."
"I used it mostly for the PCA, the principal component analysis, and I have been using that for my bachelor's thesis."
"Our go live process has been slightly enhanced compared to the previous programmatic process, and there is now a faster time to production from the business end."
"Our business units' capabilities with SPSS Modeler is high. They no longer waste time on modeling and algorithms, meaning they are not coding any more. For example, segmentation projects now take one to three months, rather than six months to a year, as before."
"The valuable feature of Watson Explorer for us is data entities, and being able to see hidden insights from within unstructured data."
"IBM has been working with Bradesco since 1968, I think, and the support is very good, with a team of 10 IBM employees working every day, 24 hours, inside the bank in Sao Paolo."
"What impressed me more about Watson is that it is easy to use it, not for the technical people, but for business people."
"I have found the auto-generated document very useful as well as the main keywords that are highlighted, which are used for the search functionality within IBM Watson Explorer."
"Implementing the solution really helped with manual labor, it takes care of a lot of FT work."
"I really can't talk enough about the team."
"Previously we'd have a set of health and safety analysts who would be the key focal points for doing work to understand health and safety risks; so a very small number of people, but through WEX and through our Watson HSEQ solution, we've managed to get engagement across at least one-third of our workforce, so over 1,300 people, and a 25% reduction in health and safety incidents."
"The main use case is FAQ for the user; it works for almost 80% of the use case coverage."
 

Cons

"​I would like better integration into the Weather Company solution. I have raised a couple of concerns about this integration and having more time series capabilities.​"
"The product does not have a search function for tags."
"Requires more development."
"I would not rate the technical support very well. The technicians have accents, and when you do find someone, it is very hard to get somebody able to answer the technical questions."
"The software is quite expensive and IBM is currently marketing its other digital dashboard tools such as IBM cognos, now we aren't sure on the plans of IBM integrating these two softwares."
"Unstructured data is not appropriate for SPSS Modeler."
"It is not integrated with Qlik, Tableau, and Power BI."
"The platform's cloud version needs improvements."
"I would say, give some kind of a community edition, a free edition. A lot of companies do, even Amazon gives you some kind of trial and error opportunities. If they could provide something like that, it would be good."
"No, it's not yet stable."
"It needs better language support, to include some other languages. Also, they should improve the user interface."
"Small businesses will probably have a little harder time getting into it, just because of the amount of resources that they have available, both financial and time, but it really is a solution that should work for them."
"We haven't used it in production yet so I can't answer this."
"I think we'll get it to a 10, but I think at the moment it's got to be a good eight or nine out of 10 at least."
"The solution is expensive."
"More cognitive feedback would be good. The natural language analysis is great, the sentiment analyzers are great. But I would just like to see more... innovation done with the Watson platform."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Having in mind all four tools from Garner’s top quadrant, the pricing of this tool is competitive and it reflects the quality that it offers."
"It is an expensive product."
"I am using the free version of IBM SPSS Modeler, it is the educational edition version."
"It got us a good amount of money with quick and efficient modeling."
"$5,000 annually."
"This tool, being an IBM product, is pretty expensive."
"The scalability was kind of limited by our ability to get other people licenses, and that was usually more of a financial constraint. It's expensive, but it's a good tool."
"It is a huge increase to time savings."
"The solution is expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
Construction Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Construction Company
15%
Healthcare Company
13%
Performing Arts
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM SPSS Modeler?
The government has funds and a budget, it's hard to say if it's expensive or cheap. In Canada, they have a yearly budget. They used to encourage people to use the modeler for development. If ten us...
What needs improvement with IBM SPSS Modeler?
The customer comes to you and says they want to deploy it and make a production out of this, which is very difficult and expensive with IBM SPSS Modeler. With MATLAB, there is no problem. I have a ...
What is your primary use case for IBM SPSS Modeler?
I have been using IBM SPSS Modeler for a long time. I am using IBM SPSS Modeler mainly for ETL. Sometimes I use it to compare the results of the modeling as compared to MATLAB. MATLAB is the main t...
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Also Known As

SPSS Modeler
IBM WEX
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Reisebªro Idealtours GmbH, MedeAnalytics, Afni, Israel Electric Corporation, Nedbank Ltd., DigitalGlobe, Vodafone Hungary, Aegon Hungary, Bureau Veritas, Brammer Group, Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, InSites Consulting, Fortis Turkey
RIMAC, Westpac New Zealand, Toyota Financial Services, Swiss Re, Akershus University Hospital, Korean Air Lines, Mizuho Bank, Honda
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM SPSS Modeler vs. IBM Watson Explorer and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
910,437 professionals have used our research since 2012.