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Microsoft Power BI vs Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 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

Microsoft Power BI
Ranking in Reporting
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
331
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (1st)
Oracle Business Intelligenc...
Ranking in Reporting
17th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of Microsoft Power BI is 14.1%, down from 26.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer is 1.1%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Reporting Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Power BI14.1%
Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer1.1%
Other84.8%
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

Hemanthreddy Vakiti - PeerSpot reviewer
Data engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Interactive dashboards have transformed restaurant data into faster daily business decisions
Microsoft Power BI has many features and there is not a lot to improve. However, the licensing can be confusing. When deciding between Pro and Premium, I find it difficult to distinguish what features are offered by Pro and what features are offered by Premium, including the particular differences to choose between both licensing models. Additionally, some features such as DAX, which I mentioned previously, involve DAX calculations and complex data modeling, which are somewhat advanced and not easily understandable. Prior knowledge is required or you need to go through the documentation. If the documentation is made comprehensive so that anyone with no knowledge on DAX can easily use it by going through the documentation, it would be really helpful. Additionally, if the integration with non-Microsoft tools is improved and performance is optimized, then Microsoft Power BI can become a top-ranked visualization tool. The user experience with Microsoft Power BI is quite good. The intuitive user interface makes it easy for both technical and non-technical users to create reports. However, only the advanced features are somewhat complex, and if the documentation is improved, it can be easily accessible.
Useful for business reports and helps to drill down accounting information
The tool's most valuable feature is table creation. One of the most important capabilities is the supplier assessment reports. These reports provide a balance during transactions, which is crucial for auditing. This feature is not standard in other ERP systems, making it highly valuable. The solution helps to drill down details from sources like payables and inventory, which the accounting department requires.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is easy to set up."
"Microsoft SSAS is one of the best BI suites on the market."
"It integrates better with other Microsoft products, is very easy to use, and has very powerful visualizations, with a lot of development going on."
"Users already using Excel can generate new reports and dashboards within minutes."
"The product is user-friendly."
"The most valuable features are the flexibility, how many ways you can interrogate the data, and the the graphical visualization."
"I like the flexibility it offers."
"Its connection to every database: Whatever and wherever it is."
"Discoverer has been very stable and we've had no real issues."
"The tool's most valuable feature is table creation. One of the most important capabilities is the supplier assessment reports. These reports provide a balance during transactions, which is crucial for auditing."
 

Cons

"For our reporting services, it would be good to have the capability for email-based subscriptions. I want to be able to change the sender dynamically, without having to rely on running through an exercise passage."
"The UI looks awkward once the graphs have been generated in the console. This is what Microsoft can work on."
"One opportunity for improvement would be on the Power Query side. As a consultant, I know Power Query is not the main strength of Power BI. It is not where Power BI shines, but many customers use Power Query to do full ETL workloads for deliverable cookies."
"From an improvement perspective, I think if the Power BI developers of that platform would really focus on being more detailed and specific on the error messages, it would help a lot of developers troubleshoot and maintain the report ECT or the dashboard ECT."
"here are still better UI designs they can go through. I'm assuming they are focusing more on capabilities rather than look-and-feel designs."
"Its desktop tool is a little bit memory CPU intensive, and it can be improved, but the machines nowadays come with a lot of memory. For the desktop users who are using it on the desktop, we recommend that they do an upgrade. It is a minor issue. We can fix it on the desktop."
"I think that there should be visuals for financial reporting videos. It should just be a plug and play because there is a lot of coding that goes into it with different clients."
"The reporting needs to be improved."
"They need to try to develop reports to tie different tables together. Currently, to pull the data into one nice, neat report takes a more advanced technically minded person to develop."
"Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer needs to improve its performance and HTML reports."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its pricing is reasonable for the desktop stuff, but for enterprise-level, it is a little expensive."
"Microsoft BI is free for the personal edition, but there is also a paid-for professional version."
"Regarding cost, the initial investment wasn't too high, but ongoing licensing could add up."
"The costs are small and the benefits are high."
"Our license is paid yearly and we have found that we have to be careful not to over-extend our usage in order to avoid upgrading our capacity plan."
"The cost of this product is very low, at approximately $8 or $9 per month for a developer."
"Compared to what's available on the market, I think we pay a fair price."
"Setup is easy, and the cost is economical. You do sometimes need to pay additional costs for third party products which "plug-in" to Microsoft BI."
"Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer is more expensive than its alternatives. You need to pay additional costs for implementation."
report
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894,738 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager - BI Head with 5,001-10,000 employees
Feb 4, 2015
Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho
1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business136
Midsize Enterprise59
Large Enterprise171
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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...
Is Power BI a complete platform or only a visualization tool?
Power BI is an advanced visualization tool oriented to big data with a very complete set of widgets to visualize information, control users accessing information, the configuration of governance po...
How does Oracle OBIEE compare with Microsoft BI?
Oracle OBIEE is great in allowing design and creativity per the individual needs of the organization. Dashboards are fully customizable and very user-friendly. This solution is very stable. Oracle ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer?
Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer is more expensive than its alternatives. You need to pay additional costs for implementation.
What needs improvement with Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer?
Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer needs to improve its performance and HTML reports.
 

Also Known As

SSRS, SSAS, MSBI, MS Reporting Services, Microsoft BI Tools, Microsoft Big Data, Power BI Pro, MS BI
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Accenture Adidas Aetna AIG Airbus Alibaba Allstate Amazon American Express Aon AT&T Audi Bank of America BASF Bayer Berkshire Hathaway Boeing Coca-Cola Comcast Cisco Coca-Cola Dell Disney Emirates Equinix FedEx Ford GE Google H&M Home Depot Honda IBM Intel JPMorgan Chase Kellogg's Kroger L'Oréal McDonald's Merck MetLife Microsoft Nike Oracle P&G PepsiCo Procter & Gamble Prudential Financial SAP Siemens Snapchat Spotify Starbucks Target Toyota T-Mobile Unilever Visa Walmart WeWork World Bank Xerox
Georg Fischer Central Plastics
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Power BI vs. Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
894,738 professionals have used our research since 2012.