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Informatica PowerCenter vs Qlik Sense comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 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

Informatica PowerCenter
Ranking in Data Visualization
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
80
Ranking in other categories
Data Integration (2nd)
Qlik Sense
Ranking in Data Visualization
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
118
Ranking in other categories
Embedded BI (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Data Visualization category, the mindshare of Informatica PowerCenter is 1.7%, down from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qlik Sense is 7.3%, down from 10.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Visualization
 

Featured Reviews

Lars Borchers - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and reliable product that provides a variety of features for data integration
The solution is not for newcomers. It has an old touch. The solution must improve the integration with new services. It was part of the program at Informatica when they moved to their cloud platform. It is integrated. However, from an on-premise perspective, we need to buy licenses for PowerExchange. If we want a native driver to access a special service, we need to extend our license to those services. It is expensive. I don't like that it's not all included in the solution.
Vishal_Goyal - PeerSpot reviewer
In-memory data storage boosts performance
The advantages compared to other BI tools show architectural differences. The main feature is that it keeps all the data in memory. It doesn't retrieve the data from data sources when I need it on the dashboard; instead, it quickly provides the desired data, making it very fast compared to other BI tools. The ROI is very high using Qlik Sense. It offers many benefits of BI. It is flexible from a developer's point of view, allowing me to accomplish many tasks compared to other BI tools. From an end-user perspective, it's convenient and performance-oriented, providing something meaningful from all the organization's data.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Deployment was simple and straightforward."
"Has a good visual tool for data mapping."
"The product's initial setup phase is very easy."
"We can scale the product."
"It's a complete package, which is why we use this solution."
"I found the map links, work links, and workflows valuable. They are important features."
"The technical support is excellent."
"The reliability of the product and the way of orchestration of different services is valuable to us."
"We can generate various graphs, various reports and we can mainly use it for dashboard related things. We can create a dashboard with live data and we can make decisions based on this information,"
"The reports are better looking than in QlikView."
"The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are its speed and seamless development of web technologies."
"Time-saving efficiencies have translated into genuine bottom-line improvements via the reduction in FTE."
"The drag and drop UI has been the most useful to me."
"The product is reasonably priced."
"It connects very simply​ to data sources."
"The most valuable feature is flexibility."
 

Cons

"Informatica are very rigid when it comes to cloud migrations which discourages customers in moving their solution to the cloud."
"The reputation of Informatica is that it is expensive."
"Lacks ability to calculate cost of the product."
"The only problem with this product is the level of complexity with the number of levels of transformation that you have to go through."
"Requires an established data center because there is no option for software as a service."
"In terms of performance improvement and tuning, there should be a bit more guidance and documentation."
"The UI is outdated and old-fashioned, at least in our current version. Also, we have experienced some stability issues with the Workflow Monitor application."
"This product is going to decommission in the next couple of years."
"We need more types of visualizations."
"One area of improvement is that it doesn't offer an API for accessing processed data stored in the QED files."
"Ability for the administrator to approve Community Sheets in the QMC and then move them into base sheets."
"A valuable improvement for this solution would be the enabling of us to host dashboards for our customers."
"There are some tools like Alteryx, which are used for data preparation. These features can be built into Qlik to make the process smoother."
"The on-demand report generation button in Qlik Sense currently doesn't work if NPrinting requires Okta verification, which our company uses."
"We want the next version of this solution to be cloud-based so that each user can access it from anywhere in the world with their phone, tablet, or computer without a VPN connection."
"Reload failure alerts on the application within the Qlik Management Console without any use of extensions. QlikView is able to handle these alerts directly through the QlikView Management Console. We would appreciate a similar solution that is easy to set up and use. Simple formatting options in the pivot and straight tables such as adjusting line thickness and font selection and size."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is for big enterprises. We have leveraged Informatica for big enterprises but not for small and medium enterprises because it is a very costly product as compared to other products. We propose this solution only for enterprise customers. For small to medium enterprises, we would propose the Microsoft solution. Its licensing is currently bundle-wise. It should be features-wise and not bundle-wise."
"Its maintenance is expensive."
"I rate the solution's pricing a four out of ten. The price is very high, and it doesn't understand the market now."
"Its licensing is expensive in terms of scaling."
"I consider this to be an expensive product."
"The license model is CPU based."
"We are using an annual license for Informatica PowerCenter."
"I rate the product's price a ten on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price."
"QlikSense offers a Hybrid environment architecture, which is very cost effective based on where the enterprise data resides."
"Licensing: Review the named model and move towards a usage model (e.g., cores, memory, computers, API calls, etc.)."
"Understand the break over price point for switching to the Enterprise license."
"The license mechanism of Qlik is quite complicated and not exchangeable. Such as 2016, they charge licenses by token, 1500$ for a token / 1 user. 2018: they change to 2 kinds of licenses: professional 1500$ / user, analyzer 800$ / user. 2019: they support subscription with 70$ Monthly for professional, 40$ monthly for analyzers, but for those you’re using perpetual licenses, they don't support acquiring more subscription licenses. The maintenance fee yearly are also high, 20% of the perpetual license."
"The costs can initially become quite high. Make sure you have a clear understanding of who will truly use the product as opposed to someone that will simply receive the end report."
"Costs are a little high on the license/token side. However, if you look at the TCO, it is not too bad, particularly against Power BI."
"Qlik Sense and its pricing model can follow any scalability."
"The cost is not bad considering the flexibility and support you receive from Qlik. I believe it is worth the cost."
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Comparison Review

it_user90069 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 20, 2014
Informatica PowerCenter vs. Microsoft SSIS - each technology has its advantages but also have similarities
Technology has made it easier for businesses to organize and manipulate data to get a clearer picture of what’s going on with their business. Notably, ETL tools have made managing huge amounts of data significantly easier and faster, boosting many organizations’ business intelligence operations…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
59%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica PowerCenter?
Azure Data Factory is flexible, modular, and works well. In terms of cost, it is not too pricey. It offers the stability and reliability I am looking for, good scalability, and is easy to set up an...
Which is better - SSIS or Informatica PowerCenter?
SSIS PowerPack is a group of drag and drop connectors for Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services, commonly called SSIS. The collection helps organizations boost productivity with code-free compo...
Which Informatica product would you choose - PowerCenter or Cloud Data Integration?
Complex transformations can easily be achieved using PowerCenter, which has all the features and tools to establish a real data governance strategy. Additionally, PowerCenter is able to manage huge...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
There are many...It would rather depend what System BI architecture or Enterprise legacy you have at your end...I would recommend as follows: 1) If you have legacies of SAP, Oracle - look for SAP...
What do you like most about Qlik Sense?
The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are its speed and seamless development of web technologies.
 

Also Known As

PowerCenter
QlikSense
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, LexisNexis, Rabobank
Abbvie, Airbus, Barclays, BT Openreach, BMW, Daimler AG, HSBC, IKEA, Nationwide Building Society, Royal Mail Group, Sanofi, Siemens, Wendy'', Vodafone, Volvo
Find out what your peers are saying about Informatica PowerCenter vs. Qlik Sense and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
832,138 professionals have used our research since 2012.