Microsoft Power BI vs Zoho Analytics comparison

Microsoft and Zoho are both solutions in the Reporting category. Microsoft is ranked #1 with an average rating of 7.9, while Zoho is ranked #10 with an average rating of 7.6. Microsoft holds a 26.7% mindshare in RT, compared to Zoho’s 0.5% mindshare. Additionally, 93% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of Zoho users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Microsoft Power BI and Zoho Analytics based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Reporting solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft Power BI vs. Zoho Analytics Report (Updated: November 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Power BI vs. Zoho Analytics

November 2024

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Categories and Ranking

IBM Cognos

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of IBM Cognos is 4.6%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Power BI is 26.7%, up from 25.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zoho Analytics is 0.5%, down from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Reporting

Featured Reviews

Carlos Larrad Salgado

Deputy Director Operations Management Control at Mapfre

Improved the quality of our KPIs, while reducing calls to the IT department

I don't like that when we use Colab packages, we get less functionality. For example, you can make groups of data with Excel or with the data sets from the packages, but when you use the Colab packages directly, you can only group the data when you analyze it with Analysis Studio. I think Cognos needs to improve more on this functionality. The user experience is also very important. Cognos is not very easy to understand sometimes, especially when they change the layout but keep the functionality the same. The help is not very graphic and they have no examples. Cognos has to make a big effort to help with understanding the functionality by improving the documentation. There is a lot of documentation, but the examples are hard to find and they should make their help section easier to understand for non-technical users.

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Amol Rane

Solutions Architect M365 at Sogeti UK

Supports AI initiatives in terms of predictive analytics

The only issue is with permissions. Sometimes, despite granting granular permissions, dashboards are visible to people who shouldn't have access. It's difficult to understand why the permissions slip out. Sometimes dashboards are visible to stakeholders even though they should not have permission. It's a bit difficult to understand why the permissions slip out. The dashboards lack a user-friendly appearance, and the permissions should be easier to understand. At this point, we have to go through a lot of details. It takes a lot of time to understand the permissions, so if there were better options available within the Power BI setup, it would be quite beneficial, especially for admins. So, there should be a more user-friendly dashboard appearance and easier-to-understand permissions.

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Yogesh Kumar Mali

Managing Director at ALPHA LABS TECH PVT LTD

An easy-to-set up solution that helps in the scheduling of reports and dashboards

A lot of integrations are available with Zoho Analytics. There is a limitation that we cannot create more than 300 columns in a worksheet on Zoho Analytics. The data can be in millions. There are some limitations on the reports that depend on the various combinations of data you get. So there is always an error that gets thrown out if you are building complex reports.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the strong suits of Cognos is its robust corporate reporting capability."

"The main difference that I like about Cognos compared to other solutions is its data splitting functionality. We have all our company data inside the Cognos environment and so we prefer to split the information Cognos itself. It's more efficient this way."

"The product is a very good reporting tool and is very flexible. It allows for the users to get a scheduled report."

"The initial setup was straightforward."

"Cognos' most valuable features are the bundled studios, simple UI, and advanced features like the ability to create data modules."

"The initial setup is very straightforward."

"Security administration tools are powerful and flexible."

"Comparing IBM Cognos to other applications, once a person is trained on it or they have developed a skill set to operate the application, it is best in its category."

More IBM Cognos pros

"It's a powerful platform."

"Ease of development and maintenance."

"It integrates better with other Microsoft products. It is very easy to use and has very powerful visualizations. It has also got a lot of development going on."

"The tool is very flexible so it allows creativity."

"I think the visualization part is valuable."

"MS SQL & SQL Server Analysis Services."

"There are some great automation elements in the product."

"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."

More Microsoft Power BI pros

"I like the way I can share dashboards and embed dashboards. I normally use embedding. So, I create a dashboard, and I embed it into specific websites. Sharing of the dashboard is seamless, and it is easier than any other visualization platform, even Tableau."

"Ask Zia is a great feature that I use to quickly decide what improvements I need to make in order to present the data that I want to show."

"Zoho Analytics's most valuable feature is the ability to provide excellent analytics through a single platform."

"Scheduling of reports and dashboards is the most valuable feature of Zoho Analytics."

"The integration interface is very easy to use and allows you to directly connect to a variety of APIs."

"It's a very strong analytics tool."

"The initial setup is straightforward."

"The solution’s dashboard is very good."

More Zoho Analytics pros

Cons

"There are some small features that are missing. It would be nice if the graphics were better. You can use external sources for charts, but it's quite complex to use and not easy to implement. If you want a new chart, you can download it from multiple tools and implement it into IBM Cognos."

"It could have more options for themes."

"There are some problems with how Cognos handles huge data sets and when connecting with multiple sources and searching the data."

"They should provide improved visual reporting."

"The performance is a bottleneck and something that can be improved."

"Cognos is quite slow - it's missing the performance of the PowerPlay cubes."

"Extending dynamic cubes aggregate awareness with calculated measures."

"The data uploads that we do, such as Excel files, have a lot of restrictions. If we can make it a bit more user-friendly, allowing us to have more flexibility it would be a great help."

More IBM Cognos cons

"I cannot comment on the stability as we haven't yet used it for a big project."

"It would be nice to use other connectors to link with the data."

"Microsoft needs to provide more drivers to connect other data sources in a native way."

"The accounting data needs improvement."

"There are some problems with the functionality of this solution. The dashboard is not very user friendly and is quite complicated."

"BI is scalable, but there are some problems with limited online storage."

"When there are large amounts of data being processed there are additional tools needed to handle it."

"If you need data in real-time, it's not an ideal solution."

More Microsoft Power BI cons

"There should be more types of graphics available for use in the reports."

"This solution does not support manufacturing facilities."

"There is a limitation that we cannot create more than 300 columns in a worksheet on Zoho Analytics."

"The solution does not provide call center facilities for customer support."

"The customer service and support for this solution could be improved by faster response times."

"The navigation on the interface is not intuitive."

"The improvement needed is regarding the number of API calls. Currently, Zoho Analytics only allows us to update data hourly. It would be much better to have updates more frequently every half an hour."

"In terms of improvement, they have a limited number of graphs available in their store. They should come up with more graph style forms. They should have more charts and at the same time, you can't create panels like with Microsoft BA."

More Zoho Analytics cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM Cognos price is on the higher side of the spectrum. However, with the features that it brings, such as correlation analysis, it's worth the money. They should look at the pricing more clearly because it's a little on the higher side."

"There is need to assess the purchase license accordingly so as to avoid audit penalties."

"On a scale from one to ten where one is low pricing and ten is high pricing, I would rate this solution at eight."

"It is my understanding that the cost is very low. It's not very expensive."

"Cognos is super expensive compared to Tableau ($70/month) and Power BI ($20/month) — I think Cognos is roughly $200 a month."

"There is a standard license required to use this solution. There are some additional tools but I am not sure if they are an extra cost."

"It is pretty expensive."

"I don't know the exact cost, but I believe Cognos is quite expensive, especially when it comes to the support consultants and the procedures that need to be applied."

More IBM Cognos pricing and cost advice

"Compared to others, I think it is reasonable."

"We're charged a monthly subscription fee of 500 rupees per person."

"The current licensing model that Microsoft BI has is expensive. My customers have told me the cost is approximately $20 per user and this can get expensive fast. There should be a one-time purchase option if the customer has a lot of users."

"They have a free Power BI Desktop version, but it has limitations."

"There is room for at least 45% discount as compared to the initial price."

"Downloading Power BI Desktop is free."

"The solution's costs are quite reasonable given the range of features provided."

"It is reasonably priced."

More Microsoft Power BI pricing and cost advice

"I don't feel that price is an issue for this product."

"I rate the tool's pricing seven out of ten. The licensing costs are yearly."

"The tool's pricing is similar to other Zoho applications and is affordable."

"The product is expensive."

"The pricing is okay. It is fair compared to the market."

"I would recommend looking at your usage and whether the Zoho One license model would work for your organisation. It is very cost effective if you use other Zoho tools."

"The price is high. The solution advertises that it provides products for 55 AED per user, but these products contain only the basic features. Most of the features are locked. The version of the product that includes Zoho Analytics costs around 199 AED per user per month."

"For one license the pricing is about $35 a user."

More Zoho Analytics pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Reporting solutions are best for your needs.

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Comparison Review

it_user79932

Senior Manager - BI Head at NVidia

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…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

55%

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Government

Educational Organization

42%

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

79%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Seeking lightweight open source BI software

It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik ...

See all answers

What do you like most about IBM Cognos?

The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Cognos?

I need improvements, particularly with the Framework Manager, which has an outdated user interface from older version...

See all answers

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 wou...

See all answers

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 info...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

What do you like most about Zoho Analytics?

Zoho Analytics's most valuable feature is the ability to provide excellent analytics through a single platform.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zoho Analytics?

I rate the tool's pricing seven out of ten. The licensing costs are yearly.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Zoho Analytics?

The improvement needed is regarding the number of API calls. Currently, Zoho Analytics only allows us to update data ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Tableau vs IBM Cognos

Compared 10% of the time

Oracle Hyperion vs IBM Cognos

Compared 10% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs IBM Cognos

Compared 8% of the time

SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform vs IBM Cognos

Compared 7% of the time

SAP Analytics Cloud vs IBM Cognos

Compared 5% of the time

More IBM Cognos Competitors

Tableau vs Microsoft Power BI

Compared 16% of the time

Domo vs Microsoft Power BI

Compared 9% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs Microsoft Power BI

Compared 8% of the time

Databricks vs Microsoft Power BI

Compared 6% of the time

Workday Prism Analytics vs Microsoft Power BI

Compared 3% of the time

More Microsoft Power BI Competitors

Apache Superset vs Zoho Analytics

Compared 24% of the time

Tableau vs Zoho Analytics

Compared 19% of the time

Looker vs Zoho Analytics

Compared 13% of the time

SAP Analytics Cloud vs Zoho Analytics

Compared 11% of the time

More Zoho Analytics Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cognos

December 2024

Download IBM Cognos product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Power BI

December 2024

Download Microsoft Power BI product report

Buyer's Guide

Zoho Analytics

November 2024

Download Zoho Analytics product report

Also Known As

Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics

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

Zoho Reports

Learn More

IBM

Microsoft

Zoho

Overview

IBM Cognos Business Intelligence provides a wide range of tools to help you analyze your organization's data. IBM Cognos BI allows businesses to monitor events and metrics, create and view business reports, and analyze data to help them make effective business decisions.

IBM Cognos applies techniques to describe, summarize, and compare data, and draw conclusions. This allows users to see trends and discover anomalies or variances that may not be evident by simply reading data. Data sources that contain information from different areas of a business can be stored in separate packages. Users can see only information that they have been granted access to, based on their group or role.

IBM Cognos BI consolidates the following business intelligence functions into a single web-based solution:

IBM Cognos Insight: Create personal and managed workspaces for data analysis. Using these interactive workspaces, you can share insight results with managers. Cognos Insight supports write-back, and you can also use these workspaces to capture and integrate management goals, commitments, and forecasts.
IBM Cognos Workspace: With IBM Cognos Workspace, you can create rich, interactive workspaces using IBM Cognos content as well as data from external sources. You can view and open your favorite workspaces and reports, edit content in your workspaces, and share your workspaces via email.
IBM Cognos Analytics: IBM Cognos Analytics utilizes built-in AI and intuitive searches which helps users to quickly create the visualizations and a wide range of reports. Cognos Analytics provides cognitive and managed self-service, enabling you to gain insights from controlled and trusted data.
IBM Cognos Report Studio and IBM Cognos Query Studio: Easily create structured and query reports. IBM Cognos allows users to create application and report templates. In addition, report authors can reuse report objects to apply filters, fields, and styles to reports. Users can set the language of the user interface and report content according to the user's native language.
IBM Cognos Event Studio: Receive notifications of events that occur within your organization in real time. Event Studio enables the creation of agents that detect the occurrence of business events, failures, or anomalies, based on the change of specific events or data conditions. Notification can be sent via email, publication in the portal, or by triggering reports.
IBM Cognos Connection: This is the Web portal for IBM Cognos BI and is the central area for accessing all the IBM Cognos functions. In the web portal, users can schedule and distribute reports, create tasks, administer the server and the access permissions, and more.

Reviews from Real Users

IBM Cognos stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Two major ones are its powerful analysis tool and its reporting capabilities.

Prasad B., a senior software engineer at a financial services firm, notes, “The product is a very good reporting tool and is very flexible. It allows for the users to get a scheduled report. We can receive automated reports as well. They are easy to schedule on a weekly or monthly basis. It is very fast. I mean in means of report output, it's very fast compared to the actual clients involved.”

Microsoft Power BI is a powerful tool for data analysis and visualization. This tool stands out for its ability to merge and analyze data from various sources. Widely adopted across different industries and departments, Power BI is instrumental in creating visually appealing dashboards and generating insightful business intelligence reports. Its intuitive interface, robust visualization capabilities, and seamless integration with other Microsoft applications empower users to easily create interactive reports and gain valuable insights.

Zoho Reports is a powerful, easy-to-use and highly scalable cloud-based reporting and business intelligence platform for small to medium-sized businesses. Its flexible pay-as-you-go pricing model and scope for customization allow businesses to tailor it to their unique needs.

Sample Customers

More than 23,000 leading organizations across multiple industries use Cognos. Some examples of Cognos customers include BMW Financial Services, Quinte Health Care, Troy Corporation, Michigan State University, and GKN Land System.

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

Suzuki, American Pacific Mortgage, KPMG, Air Canada, University of Michigan, BricozOr, WorldWide Express, The University of Melbourne, Novartis, SAIC

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Power BI vs. Zoho Analytics

November 2024

Free Report: Microsoft Power BI vs. Zoho Analytics

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Power BI vs. Zoho Analytics and other solutions. Updated: November 2024.

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