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Microsoft Power BI vs SAP Analytics Cloud comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 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 BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
318
Ranking in other categories
Reporting (1st)
SAP Analytics Cloud
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
69
Ranking in other categories
Predictive Analytics (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of Microsoft Power BI is 22.6%, up from 22.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP Analytics Cloud is 5.1%, down from 5.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Shoury Priyanshu - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates seamless data aggregation with some outdated visual elements hindering user appeal
Real-time data integration is an area for improvement. Although I've worked on several solutions involving real-time integration, it's not very user-friendly and often lags, especially with over a million data rows. This makes Power BI difficult to manage as loading times can reach one or two minutes, which is problematic today. There are challenges with scalability, requiring multiple pages in dashboards to manage these issues. Visualization could be improved as it appears outdated. Users, especially newcomers, find it unappealing and not user-friendly.
RamasamyTelungupalayam - PeerSpot reviewer
Seamless integration, collaborative features, and enhances data exploration
There are several areas for improvement in SAP Analytics Cloud. Firstly, features available in SAP Lumira are missing in SAP Analytics Cloud. Secondly, the predictive analytics functions, although promising, are currently only suitable for Proof of Concepts (POCs) and not for industrial-scale use. Lastly, the pricing model for the planning functionality is quite high and presents an entry barrier.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ROI is high for small teams or basic use cases with limited datasets."
"We have found the product to be scalable."
"I liked that Microsoft Power BI handles a large amount of data. I can handle hundreds of rows from Postgres in a few minutes. I also like how it detects the relationship between the tables without explicitly saying that. It just detects the relationship automatically. That made it easier to work with the data."
"The solution's initial setup isn't too complicated."
"Power BI is more powerful than other tools because it is new for us. Each new version has more capabilities, and we're expecting AI and ML features in the next version."
"What I like about Power BI is how fast you are able to create dashboards and how fast you are able to fetch the data. You can connect to the database or data source, and then you can design your dashboards very easily."
"The solution makes it easy for me to develop reports and publish them."
"The dashboard is very nice and it is very simple to understand every single component."
"I like the connectivity the solution provides with other products."
"If 85-90% of your data comes from SAP, then it's the best solution."
"The most valuable features are the analytical application and the user story."
"The new Application Design option offers lots of customization options by being able to script in Typescript (similar to Javascript)."
"There is a really nice insight feature that I enjoy using."
"The most valuable features are on the application side, where you can design applications into your analytics on the platform."
"SAP is very scalable."
"One of the most outstanding features is being able to use the dashboard with a touch screen."
 

Cons

"Power BI shows reports on actual data, not metadata."
"The solution should increase the API functionality so that we can use Microsoft Power BI for other purposes and aggregate things."
"Actionable insights could be better."
"The licensing needs improvement. There needs to be a middle option between Pro and Premium versions."
"If you need data in real-time, it's not an ideal solution."
"Licensing could be improved."
"I would like to see better, undisturbed stability without any interruptions."
"The only concern I have faced with Microsoft BI is the time it takes to find out an issue and rectify it."
"SAP could add some more visualization features to Analytics Cloud, like charts and analytics. I would also like to see some more data cleaning and ad hoc functions added to this solution."
"The technology used by the tool is old, making it an area where improvements are required."
"They need more support for more languages, Python for example."
"One area for improvement in SAP Analytics Cloud is incorporating Python into the coding. That functionality is available, but it's not as efficient, and it's a bit difficult sometimes to do it, so that could be improved."
"I think it would be easier if there was another module created to retrieve only data."
"When it comes to planning there is a concern about the ability to match the exact requirements of the customer with what the product offers."
"I would like to see improved support for third-party systems, lower cost of acquisition, and better graphics and interface design."
"Currently only one data modeler can work at a time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"MS BI comes with all the tools and it is, to the best of my knowledge, the most affordable solution."
"I am satisfied with its price. Its price is very less as compared to Tableau and QlikView."
"I would rate them 4 out of 5 for their current pricing. There are no additional costs to the standard licensing fees."
"As far as I am aware you do not need a license for the solution."
"We have a premium Power BI license in-house that's quite an expensive license. It's $10 a month for four users and then I think 35,000 at the premium rate."
"Power BI is subscription-based, and you have three options. The Pro edition, which is the standard one, is about $9 per user. The Premium edition, which provides AI and cloud capabilities but at a limited size, is for small to medium enterprises. It is about $20 per user. For large enterprises, such as manufacturing facilities, there is an option for the capacity. The capacity subscription is about $4,000 per capacity level. They also have an option for the on-premises version, but it is not common to see someone going for the on-premises version. The on-premises version requires a specific license that is attached to SQL Server. I believe it is about $17,000, but I'm not sure about it."
"Costs less than most competing solutions."
"The solution’s pricing is reasonable."
"This solution offers value for money and you get what you pay for."
"The premium option is very expensive at five thousand dollars. I use the nine hundred and ninety-nine dollar option."
"It's not that costly as such for the time being."
"The pricing of this product is reasonable."
"The product is expensive."
"SAP pricing tends to be premium, so it is slightly higher."
"SAP Analytics Cloud is expensive. The price is a big issue if you compare it with other solutions from different vendors."
"Its price is slightly on the higher side."
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Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
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
Educational Organization
42%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Educational Organization
25%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 ...
Which would you choose - Tableau or SAP Analytics Cloud?
Tableau is easy to set up and maintain. In about a day it is possible for the entire platform to be deployed for use. This relatively short amount of time can make all the difference for companies ...
What do you like most about SAP Analytics Cloud?
In the data warehouse, you're free to make changes. You can make everything text, meaning it's always a string. Even numbers appear as text, giving you the flexibility to work with all columns.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP Analytics Cloud?
The pricing model for SAP Analytics Cloud is quite competitive, but the cost for the planning functionality is high and can be a barrier to entry. The overall cost can be managed with better billin...
 

Also Known As

SSRS, SSAS, MSBI, MS Reporting Services, Microsoft BI Tools, Microsoft Big Data, Power BI Pro, MS BI
SAP BusinessObjects Cloud
 

Learn More

 

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
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Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Power BI vs. SAP Analytics Cloud and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
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