Knowage vs SQL Server comparison

Why PeerSpot?

The compared Knowage and Microsoft solutions aren't in the same category. Knowage is ranked #22 in RT , and holds a 2.0% mindshare in the category. Microsoft is ranked #1 in SQL , with an average rating of 8.3, and holds a 10.2% mindshare. Additionally, 85% of Knowage users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

Knowage

Read 18 Knowage reviews

4,165 Views
2,083 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

SQL Server

Read 276 SQL Server reviews

25,531 Views
22,978 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

Knowage

SQL Server

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Knowage and SQL Server based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Plotly and others in Reporting.

To learn more, read our detailed Reporting Report (Updated: October 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Reporting

October 2026

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Helped 921,523 peers since 2012

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

Knowage

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (32nd), Reporting (22nd)

SQL Server

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

276

Ranking in other categories

Relational Databases Tools (1st), Database Management Systems (DBMS) (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

Knowage and SQL Server aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Knowage is designed for Reporting and holds a mindshare of 2.0%, up 1.0% compared to last year.
SQL Server, on the other hand, focuses on Relational Databases Tools, holds 10.2% mindshare, down 14.2% since last year.

Reporting Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Knowage	2.0%
Tableau Enterprise	13.3%
Microsoft Power BI	12.4%
Other	72.3%

Reporting

Relational Databases Tools Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
SQL Server	10.2%
Oracle Database	10.3%
IBM Db2 Database	6.5%
Other	73.0%

Relational Databases Tools

Featured Reviews

AbdulshukoorMohammed

General Manager Information Technology & Enterprise Applications Manager at OXFORD HOLDING

Easy to customize, cross-platform capable, and very stable

The only challenge here is that it's a Java-based platform. It requires very high technical skills. When we come to the integration with the single sign-on facilities, that part is very challenging. In Power BI and other tools, it's very easy to integrate with active directory and single sign-on, and identity management is very easy in other business intelligence tools. However, when it comes to Knowage, it's a bit heavy, it's time-consuming sometimes, it's not very fast, and definitely not as fast as other business intelligence tools in terms of getting graphical reports. The solution could be cheaper.

Read full review

Shakti Gupta

SQL server database administrator at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Hybrid data platform has strengthened performance, security, and incident response for production

SQL Server is very mature, but I see areas for improvement, especially in performance tuning, troubleshooting, and automation. Although tools such as Query Store and dynamic management views are powerful, some troubleshooting tasks still require senior SQL Server database administrator expertise. It would be valuable to have more intelligent, built-in recommendations for root cause analysis, indexing, blocking, and query optimization. I would also like to see simplified and consistent management across on-premises SQL Server and Azure SQL services, as managing hybrid environments sometimes requires different tools and approaches. Finally, improved patching, updates, monitoring, and cost and license transparency could make SQL Server easier to manage at the enterprise scale. One area I would improve in SQL Server is its documentation and troubleshooting guidance. SQL Server documentation is comprehensive, but for complex production issues, I would like to see more real-world troubleshooting examples, especially for scenarios such as Always On synchronization issues, blocking and deadlocks, performance degradation, and upgrade features.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We can easily do our own customizations."

"It's a great product. It has a lot more features than many other BI tools. You can get the most out of machine learning, the best connectivity to Python, and it cuts across enterprise sections."

"It's very easy to get the historical reports you need based on the business requirements and this helps our executives for taking decisions."

"I can't name the features the way the Knowage community calls them because I still don't know the lingo. However, I can describe them. I like the ability to join more than one report, set all fields on one end, and replicate that on the other reports. I like that a lot. I think it's one of the features that got me using Knowage. They have tables, and I like that too. They took SQL scripts and many other scripts and enabled them to even correlate with Python. That's also one of the best things about Knowage. You could also decide to get information per user role, and this is also a feature that I like in Knowage."

"Customer Service: Excellent."

"The embedding feature is great."

"I would use SpagoBI if a company wants to use a free tool that has enough features."

"Unified interface, a lot of tools for BI, easy configuration, standalone SDK."

More Knowage pros

"We have found there are many useful features such as the solution is continually being upgraded, ETL capabilities for extracting and transformation, and it is very easy to use."

"For the most part, we have been satisfied with its capabilities."

"SQL Server's most valuable features are its user-friendly nature and cost-effectiveness."

"The solution is very common. It's easy to use."

"Great product."

"As an engineer working for multiple organisations, MS SQL has proven stability and operational power."

"The MSBI features SSAS, SSIS as well as SSRS together has enabled us to build a data warehouse for our Enterprise with Business Intelligence reports around the data."

"Of course, one thing is that as great with this and other Microsoft products is that it's quite well documented and there are also light versions available."

More SQL Server pros

Cons

"The support is very meager: We had to break our heads to figure out everything"

"The only challenge here is that it's a Java-based platform. It requires very high technical skills."

"We expected the community to be bigger than what it currently is."

"Unfortunately, many interesting features do not work when you are using a custom database for storing the metadata."

"We had stability issues."

"Tomcat configuration was tricky in earlier versions."

"Many things need to be improved, most of all robustness."

"When it comes to Knowage, it's a bit heavy, it's time-consuming sometimes, it's not very fast, and definitely not as fast as other business intelligence tools in terms of getting graphical reports."

More Knowage cons

"On the SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) side, I have noticed more bugs in terms of being able to connect to our SQL servers. I can't tell how many times my recent server list got dropped or cleaned out. It is a pain, and it would be nice to have that recent connect list when you connect in. For whatever reason, once in a while, I get a hard error, and it'll close. When I go back in, everything is cleared out. It is annoying when you are working with more than a hundred database instances."

"The solution needs to be more secure. It's lacking, compared to, for example, Oracle."

"Better integration with other platforms would be an improvement."

"Third-party services from Redgate should be built-in to it, like SQL Search."

"You do need to have technical knowledge in order to install the solution. It's not something a layperson can do."

"The performance could be better."

"We experience latency at times when there is a lot of data being processed."

"From Microsoft -- poor/very expensive, but there are many other helpful resources out there."

More SQL Server cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It allows the implementation of an effective reporting system using internal skills at a limited upfront cost."

"Knowage is open-source, and an enterprise edition is also available."

"SQL Server is expensive if you use the advanced SQL version, but if you use the standard version, it's not expensive."

"Synapse is a bit costly. If I compare it with different databases, I think it's a reasonable price"

"There is a license to use this solution. However, the model is not easy to understand. There is a guide you have to read about all the information on how it works. If you read this documentation, you can understand how it works. We are paying for our SQL Servers by CPU cores with an enterprise license."

"SQL Server has the best licensing price."

"This is a downside of enterprise Microsoft products."

"For a brief period, approximately one year before 2018, I had experience working with the open-source version of SQL Server. During that time, I found SQL Server to be the preferred choice, in my opinion."

"There is a license required for the use of SQL Server and we are on an annual subscription."

"The price of the solution is very expensive. If I went with the cloud version of SQL a license would cost me approximately 11,000 Riyals per month."

More SQL Server pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Construction Company

19%

Outsourcing Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

34%

Outsourcing Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	6

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	119
Midsize Enterprise	60
Large Enterprise	122

Questions from the Community

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Would you say the price of SQL Server is high compared to that of similar products?

SQL Server is fairly priced because it has various editions, depending on the number of users, servers, or core packs you are using. If you compare the product to others in this category, the price...

See all answers

Has using SQL Server helped your organization in any way?

SQL Server has helped my organization through partitioning to distribute the workload, as it splits them up into smaller pieces so the machines can easily deal with it. However, this comes with a h...

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Which authentication mode is best for SQL Server?

My company connects through SQL Server authentication. We have company Windows accounts, but we do not want to connect the two, out of security concerns and to keep things separated for our own pur...

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Comparisons

Tableau Enterprise vs Knowage

Compared 8% of the time

Pentaho Business Analytics vs Knowage

Compared 7% of the time

Procurify vs Knowage

Compared 5% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Knowage

Compared 5% of the time

Oracle OBIEE vs Knowage

Compared 4% of the time

More Knowage Competitors

IBM Db2 Database vs SQL Server

Compared 27% of the time

Oracle Database vs SQL Server

Compared 7% of the time

SAP HANA vs SQL Server

Compared 5% of the time

MySQL vs SQL Server

Compared 5% of the time

Teradata vs SQL Server

Compared 5% of the time

More SQL Server Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Knowage

October 2026

Download Knowage product report

Buyer's Guide

SQL Server

October 2026

Download SQL Server product report

Also Known As

SpagoBI

Microsoft SQL Server, MSSQL, MS SQL

Overview

Knowage is an open-source business intelligence suite offering features like engine concepts and report customization. It's favored for its integration capabilities and self-service BI functionality, allowing users to leverage cross-platform access and conduct comprehensive data analysis.

Knowage stands out in the BI landscape by providing tools that facilitate autonomous data exploration, with an emphasis on flexibility and extensive integration options. With capabilities for embedding reports and dynamic dashboards, it supports various analysis needs through integration with databases and tools like Jasper and BIRT. Despite its technical complexity and interface limitations, Knowage's features such as GIS integration and big data visualization enhance operational efficiency and profitability analysis.

What are the key features of Knowage?

Powerful engines: Facilitate complex data processing with high efficiency.
Report customization: Tailor reports to meet specific business requirements.
Cross-platform access: Enable data accessibility across different devices.
Open-source: Leverage the flexibility and cost-effectiveness of open-source solutions.
Embedding capabilities: Integrate seamlessly with tools like Jasper for enhanced functionality.
Python support: Use Python for advanced data correlation and analyses.
GIS integration: Incorporate geographical data for enriched insights.

What benefits should you consider in reviews?

Increased efficiency: Streamlined report deployment and big data visualization.
Comprehensive analysis: Tools for evaluating activities and profitability.
Data export options: Support for exporting data in preferred formats simplifies reporting tasks.
Operational cost savings: Eliminates the need for third-party BI solutions.

In the healthcare and financial sectors, Knowage is used for deriving insights from health data warehouses and performing financial analyses. Companies use it to create dashboards and reports from MySQL databases, embedding them for wider distribution, and enabling effective resource evaluation and decision-making.

Knowage

SQL Server is a comprehensive database management system known for ease of use, robust performance, and seamless Microsoft integration, making it a preferred choice for data management and analysis needs.

SQL Server offers high availability with Always On availability groups and dynamic memory configuration. It integrates effortlessly with Microsoft products via tools like SSMS and Visual Studio. Supporting advanced features such as replication, clustering, and in-memory OLTP, it provides a versatile platform for managing and analyzing significant data volumes securely and efficiently. While it shines in integration with .NET applications and business intelligence, there are opportunities to improve its scalability and integration with open-source platforms. Its licensing costs can be a barrier, and enhancements to management tools for non-technical users, along with better setup processes, would increase its appeal.

What are SQL Server's most important features?

User-Friendly GUI: Simplifies interaction with a visually intuitive interface.
High Availability: Always On availability groups ensure data redundancy.
Dynamic Memory Configuration: Efficient resource allocation for optimal performance.
Strong Transaction Management: Reliable processing of concurrent transactions.
Advanced Features: Includes replication, clustering, and in-memory OLTP.

What benefits should users look for in reviews?

Efficiency: Streamlined processes for faster data management and analysis.
Compatibility: Smooth integration with Microsoft products enhances productivity.
Security: Robust features protect against data breaches.
Adaptability: Supports various enterprise needs, from small to large scale.

SQL Server is implemented across industries for database management, data warehousing, and business intelligence. Companies in finance, ERP, and cloud deployments leverage its capabilities for transactional processing, .NET program integration, and reporting. Enterprises particularly benefit from its scalability and cost-efficiency when integrated with Azure for small and medium-sized operations.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

FIAT Group, Italian air navigation service provider, Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation, Telecom Italia, ASL Genovese, San Giovanni Battista University Hospital

Microsoft SQL Server is used by businesses in every industry, including Great Western Bank, Aviva, the Volvo Car Corporation, BMW, Samsung, Principality Building Society, Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and the Catholic District School Board of Eastern Ontario.

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Plotly and others in Reporting. Updated: October 2026.

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