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Jama Connect vs OpenText ALM Octane comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 2024

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

Jama Connect
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
12th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Application Requirements Management (4th)
OpenText ALM Octane
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
8th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of Jama Connect is 3.1%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText ALM Octane is 6.3%, up from 5.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
 

Featured Reviews

Lasse Mikkonen - PeerSpot reviewer
Traceability has improved documentation for auditors and regulators
The collaboration feature in Jama Connect could be improved because it is only used by a limited number of people within an organization due to license costs. For broader collaboration that includes departments like marketing and engineering, many still rely on tools like Slack ( /products/slack-reviews ) or Confluence ( /products/atlassian-confluence-reviews ). Additionally, there are areas where usability and configurability could be enhanced.
GeorgNauerz - PeerSpot reviewer
Makes team collaboration between IT and non-IT users easier with more transparency
The user experience is a lot better than any tool that I have used before. Overall, it is great. It has a smooth interface, which is very user-friendly. It makes it easier to work together and have more transparency and customization, which is very good. There are a lot of features where you can add fields, input individual fields, and input rules, like templated rule-based interaction between entities. The Backlog management is really interesting, because it is all in one place. You don't have a feature here and a feature there, instead you have the Backlog and testing using different backup items, like user storage features and tasks, all in one place. In addition, we are able to write documents, which we can transfer to backup items. Then, we can test them in the same solution without switching tools, or even switching from one part of the tool to another part, because it is all in one place. We use the solution’s Backlog and Team Backlog capabilities. They make our DevOps processes easier through transparency and asset collaboration.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The relationship mapping feature is especially helpful, as it allows us to connect different requirements and compliance-related documentation."
"It is good at requirements management and test management."
"I like Jama Connect because it's easy to use and understand. The widgets are great, and linking is straightforward. The solution is not complex compared to its competitors."
"Jama Connect is a good tool for the entire software development cycle."
"In Jama Connect, users have the capability to view and manage all test cases directly within the platform and execute them. The entire product specification, spanning various domains such as electrical, mechanical, software, and testing, is consolidated within Jama Connect."
"The most valuable feature is the user-friendly interface."
"Provides suitable tools for managing regulatory requirements."
"Technical support answers fairly quickly compared to others like IBM or Atlassian. They also offer quite a good knowledge base for advanced cases and how to plan it, etc. via videos that they provide. They are quite useful."
"The most important feature is the integration among all the different features in just one tool: Agile management system, requirements management system, test management, defects management, automatic test execution. Really, if you're looking at other tools, you will never find all that integrated into just one tool with all the traceability, with all the elements in just one place."
"The filtering options are very good once you learn them. The document reports are also valuable. You can create reports in Word and PDF formats. That's very useful."
"We like Micro Focus ALM Octane because its performance is okay, and its stability is okay, so we use it a lot. The platform is easy to use."
"Octane creates a gentle approach to Agile-based projects."
"The dashboards and metric reporting are valuable features."
"The ability to generate audit evidence with a single click saves ten days of work for ten people, enabling them to focus on other tasks."
"Current version of the solution is fairly stable."
"Micro Focus' technical support is good."
 

Cons

"I think there's room for improvement, especially with the review process. Reviews should be integrated with requirement evaluation instead of being separate from it. The review should not run parallel to the requirement."
"The user interface could be modernized and the product lacks project management functionalities."
"The initial setup could be better, it's complicated."
"There are some security concerns with Jama Connect, including two-factor enablement."
"Test management can be improved. It's not so scalable. The user interface needs to split things into small projects."
"The collaboration feature in Jama Connect could be improved because it is only used by a limited number of people within an organization due to license costs."
"The solution is very software-centric, and its validation piece is not time-efficient at all."
"I have inquired about pricing for this solution but have not yet heard anything, so their response time in this regard is something that should be improved."
"When I manage projects that are being created in ALM, I have a standard template, but I don't have a template for them in Octane. I literally have to create the project from the ground up every time, which for an administrator, is a nightmare solution"
"They don't support all IDEs yet. We have Visual Studio code, which is not supported, and loved by our developers. This integration is missing. We also had to do our own in-house integration with the Confluence. That is also something that they could add."
"Promoting it more could help a lot of projects."
"The cluster architecture that we implemented was server to server communication: Octane application to Elasticsearch and Elasticsearch to another Elasticsearch service. Recently, we found this is a security gap. The Octane application is interacting with Elasticsearch server, but that was missing from the requirements and prerequisites in the setup. The Micro Focus team has not given advice on how to implement authentication-based communication between Octane to Elasticsearch, and we found it as a gap later, then our security team asked us to fix that gap. So, there was a lot of time spent on rework."
"Octane, from an administration perspective, is very limited. The application is improving with each release but what is missing is the ability to manage users and workspaces. I would also like "usable" reporting for more than a few workspaces. Also still missing is the ability to copy a workspace or get data in or out, except for limited REST calls."
"The product's requirements management feature needs enhancement in terms of functionality."
"There's a trend in our requests to have the ability to export data, en masse, out of Octane. There are capabilities within Octane to export data, but there are specifics around test suites and requirements and relations, as well as certain attributes, that we would like to be able to export easily out of Octane and into a database or Excel."
"I have yet to experience the CI/CD part of Micro Focus ALM Octane but as demonstrated by the team who is providing the services, I see that the CI/CD could improve. When we check in the code, for the code snippet that has been checked in by a particular user, you need to open a separate file. When comparing Micro Focus ALM Octane to Jira, they have a separate window in which you can click on the ID and the code is visible in the snippet. It's a two-step process in Micro Focus ALM Octane and it's a single-step process in Jira. It's essential for the developers to think about this difference."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost seems very competitive with other offerings."
"If you want to have creative licenses, pricing may be an issue with the licenses, as it can become quite expensive over time to serve many people."
"Jama Connect is a little pricy."
"To have a single source for all the requirements and all the change requests our company gets is the most valuable feature. It has also helped us to keep track of reviews."
"Going forward, I think we will want to explore adding more licenses."
"The comparison is always with Jira, so the pricing of Octane is a bit on the higher side. But if you look at what you have to add to Jira, on the plug-in side, to have the same abilities you have with Octane, you're more or less even, or even ahead with Octane."
"Pricing is the weakest point. It is expensive, but the tool has plenty of features. The main problem we have is that the pricing is very high compared to some other solutions."
"The solution has reduced our testing costs."
"The cost of this product is very high."
"Microsoft is a big challenge for Micro Focus when it comes to pricing because they are much cheaper. But it definitely depends on the complexity of the environment. If it has multiple technologies, at that point, looking at other options and Microsoft would be a feasible approach."
"It's pretty pricey, one of the most expensive ones on the market... The value depends on if you use all the features that it has. It comes with a lot of features. The difference between the license structure of ALM and Octane versus JIRA, is that you get everything with ALM and Octane... For JIRA, you buy the pieces one piece at a time."
"For what it does, it's very reasonably priced. I like the licensing model as well, because it's very flexible. You can scale licenses up and down for short periods of time."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
27%
Healthcare Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
7%
Financial Services Firm
26%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Jama Connect?
I like Jama Connect because it's easy to use and understand. The widgets are great, and linking is straightforward. The solution is not complex compared to its competitors.
What needs improvement with Jama Connect?
The collaboration feature in Jama Connect could be improved because it is only used by a limited number of people within an organization due to license costs. For broader collaboration that include...
What is your primary use case for Jama Connect?
I primarily work with Jama Connect ( /products/jama-connect-reviews ) for requirements management.
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...
What do you like most about Micro Focus ALM Octane?
The platform's most valuable feature is pipeline integration or continuous integration services.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus ALM Octane?
OpenText ALM Octane is an expensive product. However, it offsets costs by saving time and money, thus creating a balance between expenses and benefits. Our organization with over 1500 users sees sa...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Micro Focus ALM Octane, Micro Focus Octane
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Deloitte, SpaceX, Omnigon, Delft University
Orange, Airbus, Haufe Group, Kellogg's, Claro, Bon Secours, World Wide Technology
Find out what your peers are saying about Jama Connect vs. OpenText ALM Octane and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.