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LeanIX vs SAP PowerDesigner comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 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

LeanIX
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAP PowerDesigner
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
5th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
Metadata Management (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the mindshare of LeanIX is 16.3%, up from 13.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP PowerDesigner is 8.9%, up from 8.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Architecture Management
 

Featured Reviews

Umit Sengul - PeerSpot reviewer
A platform that facilitates efficient IT architecture management and integration, improving organizational coordination and decision-making
LeanIX is primarily used to create and manage architectural models, link capabilities, activities, and products and generate comprehensive reports. It serves as a central platform for overseeing the IT landscape within EON, a large organization, streamlining operations and enhancing governance…
JorgeSanz - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective in terms of validating everything, but sometimes they don't allow us some flexibility and GUI could improve
I would recommend SAP PowerDesigner to others for data architecture management. It provides all the functionalities in terms of data modeling, so it's also a good tool for that. I see trends in terms of data classification, but I don't see this tool with the intelligence to do that automatically. So, like, with artificial intelligence. Overall, I would rate the solution a six out of ten because there are too many validations. Also, I found some gaps in terms of relationships; they didn't appear when you do reverse engineering. Also, this tool lacks artificial intelligence that should be very good in terms of automatically identifying the classification of elements and maybe also to incorporate some artificial intelligence in providing descriptions for each data element included in the solution.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like the tool’s integration and maps."
"The most valuable feature would be application portfolio management, which is where they came from, but over time, they have got artificial intelligence. They built up a very good repository. If I identify a system by name, from historical information, oftentimes, they can tell me that this is deployed with this number of CPUs and they can give me a really good profile of the application for me to put it into a change management database with very little effort."
"We've been able to develop some nice looking reports, and the dashboard's capability to map is very easy compared to Enterprise Architect."
"The solution provides a single window view of business, application, data, and technology views of the IT ecosystem."
"My favorite feature of LeanIX is its ability to induct attribute-driven surveys."
"One of the product's most valuable features is its ability to configure hardware devices."
"The most valuable features include the reporting capabilities and the LeanIX Academy's educational resources."
"The most valuable features are the clean user interface and the fact sheet feature in Application Portfolio Management. The tool integrates well with ServiceNow, which is the usual CMDB platform."
"SAP PowerDesigner is an excellent tool that does what I need it to do. What I like most about it is that it's stable, fast, and easy to understand."
"Provides the flexibility to create logical and conceptual data models."
"The most valuable feature of SAP PowerDesigner is the testing of the models, it has the best function. Reverse engineering is very helpful too."
"Very good repository features."
"The solution is a very pragmatic tool. It's quite easy to use."
"This solution has good tools for big data, where you can manage large and complex databases."
"I like the property sheet capability and the user-defined attributes that you can set up."
"It's a stable system. It never crashes."
 

Cons

"What would make LeanIX better is more variety in terms of reporting, and more flexibility with its data importing feature."
"The whole integration architecture view of interfaces/data exchange could be improved."
"I think the tool's main issue might be direct integrations."
"Another area for improvement is that when you're starting to look into more advanced information, using the solution's APIs and its customizations, documentation for that specific aspect is not very good. There is not too much support built into the offering for that aspect, for a developer."
"The initial setup has room for improvement."
"It would be beneficial to have additional features and capabilities to enhance mapping between applications, especially across domains where the relationships may not be direct."
"Does a poor job of being able to allocate detailed costings to components within the network."
"The solution uses Gartner's time-based framework for application rationalization. One more thing that you can consider is having some add-on frameworks for the same, not just Gartner."
"Technical support needs improvement."
"The tool lags in the area of customer service."
"Regarding improvements, I suggest enhancing the connection between objects in process and data models. It's crucial to define the structure of objects, especially when dealing with standard frameworks like VMM. There should be better visualization of arrows between BPM and data modeling objects, specifying their structure and impact. For future versions, a feature similar to Bizagi, allowing users to see forms or SQL representations of objects, would be valuable for demonstrating and presenting project details to stakeholders."
"The solution itself does not need to be improved. However, they could add support for different languages."
"SAP PowerDesigner could improve by making the repository easier to understand. It is difficult to understand how the repository works because when I used logical models as part of the team, we wanted to use them together and update the older versions of the data model version but it was confusing. The repository needs to be explained."
"In the future, I would like to see data manipulation capability where you can actually write SQL queries and manipulate data from directly within the tool."
"The portal of SAP PowerDesigner could be better. The tool also needs more features and integration with other products, such as Collibra. It would be interesting for SAP PowerDesigner to have more integration."
"There are many areas of this solution that needs to be changed."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"LeanIX uses application-based account licensing, where the cost is multiplied by the number of applications in the software implementation."
"As the tool is cloud-based, its cost is more affordable."
"I would rate the pricing a one out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"The solution's pricing is based on a licensing model that is competitive and in line with other products."
"The pricing is very good. We definitely get good value for the money."
"There is a sweet spot of where they need to be on pricing right now. They could go up a little bit in pricing, but it has to do with the cost savings, and it has to do with the practitioners using it. I use it where I get cost savings and I can justify it, but they probably have the ability to flex a 10% up channel on their sales on that. So, they could increase their settle price, not their offering price, when they sell. They can probably hold that up a little bit higher than it is because there are cost savings that we can drive from it."
"The tool needs to include more flexible licensing options. We do not use the tool all the time. So pricing should be considered only when we use the tool."
"It cost me $91,000 a year for 300 applications. For any enterprise, 300 applications are minimal, as many have well over 1,000 applications."
"SAP PowerDesigner is cheaper than eriwin."
"The price of the solution is low."
"Regarding costs, SAP PowerDesigner is pricey, as I've heard from my team manager, which is why the company has been thinking of bringing another solution on board."
"I would like SAP to prove free licenses to professionals that are using the solution. The free version is limited."
"The pricing varies based on functionality and users."
"I bought the software outright and do not pay a licensing fee."
"The price of the solution is too expensive. When we asked for certain licenses in different countries it was unattainable."
"PowerDesigner is not the cheapest solution on the market, so make sure that you are using it to its full potential."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
26%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Any experience with Strategic Project Portfolio Management Solutions?
Hi @Cheryl Joseph ​Looking at the crossover between Project and Portfolio management with EA, then Planview could be a good choice. If looking at Portfolio Management from an EA perspective then Le...
What do you like most about LeanIX?
The ability to import data and generate reports from it. That's where its power lies.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for LeanIX?
LeanIX is associated with high costs. It cost me $91,000 a year for 300 applications. For any enterprise, 300 applications are minimal, as many have well over 1,000 applications. The first pricing ...
What do you like most about SAP PowerDesigner?
It allows us to have proper documentation in terms of the databases.
What needs improvement with SAP PowerDesigner?
Based on my experience with SAP PowerDesigner, I'd like to see improvements in the DMM feature. Even if I have an ETL tool, I'd like the DMM options to directly connect to ETL tool repositories lik...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sybase PowerDesigner
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

adidas, Bosch, Chico's, Haworth, Helvetia, KuKa, Osram, Telekom, TUI, Santander, Swarovski, Vaillant, 7Eleven, and Zalando.
Medtronic, Cirque du Soleil, Antarc, B&G Manufacturing, EarlySense, eBay, Ferrero, James Austin Company, Lenovo, Sagem, RAK Ceramics, Vodafone
Find out what your peers are saying about LeanIX vs. SAP PowerDesigner and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
847,862 professionals have used our research since 2012.