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Oracle Exadata vs SAP BW4HANA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 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

Oracle Exadata
Ranking in Data Warehouse
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
127
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAP BW4HANA
Ranking in Data Warehouse
9th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of Oracle Exadata is 18.4%, down from 18.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP BW4HANA is 4.4%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Anand_Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
A solid data warehouse for transactional data that needs to be priced more competitively
Since the product is an appliance, it is very costly. And in the current age, people are cautious about spending this amount of money on any of these types of backend products. Some use cases are in real-time, where all other databases are much faster, but if you talk about the data warehouse, business intelligence, and all other perspectives in the transactional world, Oracle has to reduce the cost. Otherwise, a customer wouldn't want to continue this. If the same thing can be done at half or one-third of the cost, why would people stay with Oracle? Oracle Exadata would not have great value in front of a CFO. Other solutions can guard your data and address security concerns. Security, volumetrics, and so on are also provided by other databases, which are not that costly. Apart from Exadata, Oracle has other tools for business intelligence and other things, which they add on top of Exadata when they're selling a general license. For example, the Vertica database, an HP data warehouse. They have come up with their own analytic engine within the database, which gives an edge for the client to use the data analytics engine as a part of their database. Exadata does not have an analytic engine. Even MySQL has some statistical tools within it. If Exadata integrates analytical tools, it will be good for them.
Csaba Grünblatt - PeerSpot reviewer
Performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities
SAP BW4HANA improved data reporting processes significantly. Performance on HANA database is good. Well-built data models ensure consistent and fast reporting. Reusable models enhance efficiency, even for SaaS services. In-memory computing, especially since HANA, has greatly improved performance in data analysis tasks. It eliminates the need for complex optimizations like creating indexes or aggregates. Queries that once took minutes now run in seconds, enabling real-time reporting, especially for SAP ECC on HANA. SAP BW4HANA's integration capabilities are streamlined with a simplified architecture and more virtual layers. You can directly load data into optimized layers, reducing the need for extra storage. The introduction of Open ODS Views allows for additional logic and master data inclusion, making integration faster and simpler. The learning curve for SAP BW4HANA is much faster now compared to ten years ago, thanks to abundant free resources like documentation, videos, blogs, and learning journeys provided by SAP. It is simpler to learn with these resources available compared to the past when you had to attend courses and rely on books. I would recommend SAP BW4HANA to users looking to implement it, especially if they want to keep their systems on-premise and already have SAP systems. Those with BW on HANA have two choices: BW4HANA or DataSphere, depending on their cloud strategy. If they are advanced in their cloud strategy and want to migrate off-premise, DataSphere is a good choice. However, for a robust solution on-premise or in a private cloud, BW4HANA is an excellent option. Overall, I would rate BW4HANA as a nine out of ten. It performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities. We use it traditionally, with complex transformations and models but with less emphasis on real-time processing and third-party sources.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Regarding features, there are so many that we can offer to customers. When we sell Exadata Cloud, there are many options to choose from, especially when it comes to enterprise database options. In my experience, the main features that are appreciated are various ones like GPS and the assortment of security options."
"Exadata is also a very stable environment. Their Smart Scan feature is great for every banking environment and financial institutions willing to implement it."
"It offers a significant advantage for accommodating a large number of users."
"Exadata with the In-Memory option is several levels about SAP HANA."
"The product is flexible."
"Before using this machine, we took no less than two days to run a report. Now, we can do it within five hours. So, there is a lot of improvement."
"The most valuable feature is that you have the same familiar environment of an Oracle database but with the additional performance you get from this architecture."
"The most valuable feature is the time to solution."
"SAP BW4HANA aids in managing data from ER to front-end analysis, contributes to ROI, and fosters business growth understanding. I like that the solution breaks down components to a very granular level, allowing for customization and implementation based on specific requirements. The solution is stable. The solution is scalable."
"One significant advantage of SAP BW/4HANA is the direct integration with the SAP HANA database, providing seamless access to real-time analytics. Additionally, it enables real-time data integration. We don't need to rely on historical data alone; we can provide reporting and features based on real-time information."
"You can do hierarchical alert slicing and dicing out-of-box, which is not available in other solutions. I haven't come across that in Oracle or any other software provider."
"The solution is based on SAP ERP, so there's some business content already included. For customers who use SAP ERP, SAP BW4HANA is a good choice for their DW implementation."
"The solution's performance is really good. Also, it's easy to operate, easy to administer, and relatively simple to install."
"It's quite scalable."
"I like that it's quite quick."
"We can get good visualization and less redundant data."
 

Cons

"I would like to see more database features and maybe more archiving features, because we need to do data archiving."
"The cost of the solution is high and can be improved."
"It's too expensive per terabyte. It's complex."
"Oracle Exadata could improve the platform performance tuning should be easier, automated, and user-friendly."
"The scalability can be improved as it is not a parallel execution."
"In a future release, I would like to see some upgrade analysis advisors to help with a clear roadmap on steps that need to be taken and some of the automated processes."
"The solution's pricing is very high."
"The solution lacks a visualized console."
"Pricing would be a good improvement. A lot of customers think that it's very expensive and especially support is very expensive."
"The tool is not easy to use for an end user."
"The solution is not scalable. It does not have a data streaming feature as well."
"One thing that could be enhanced in SAP BW4HANA is the user interface for process chains."
"There's one area where the other vendors have an upper edge, which is the data lake. I think SAP is trying to figure out whether to stick with IQ, their own data lake solution, or push customers toward customer-preferred vendors, like Azure Data Lake, AWS, or any other provider."
"There's the complexity in migration from BW to BW/4HANA, especially with data migration."
"The cost of the product might be an area that might introduce some restrictions or limitations to customers, making it one of the aspects where improvements are required."
"It takes too long to escalate problems from the first level of support."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"You have to pay for the storage and the database in Oracle Exadata. It cost a lot, but it is worth it. It would be a benefit if we could reduce the price for the number of CPUs and extend the memory."
"The cost of the solution is high."
"The majority of our customers are in government or big enterprises, and the projects that we sell come out to several million USD. With this amount of money on the table, it's always better to have an experienced team of consultants, who know Exadata very well, handle the implementation."
"I think it's free."
"The price of the solution has been expensive to implement."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is quite expensive."
"The solution’s cost is a little bit more than the traditional databases."
"Price wise, this solution is on the higher side."
"It is an expensive product."
"The tool is affordable."
"We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses."
"For the on-premises version of the product, the solution offers a perpetual-based licensing model to its users. In general, SAP offers a monthly subscription-based licensing model to its users."
"SAP BW/4HANA is expensive."
"The cost of ownership is higher. It's resource-intensive, and naturally, that increases costs."
"The product is free if we have the ECC license."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
31%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Retailer
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Oracle Exadata?
It is the best solution for OLTP and data warehousing.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Exadata?
The pricing of Exadata is high. It is more expensive than usual, making it suitable only for big enterprises or businesses that can afford it.
What needs improvement with Oracle Exadata?
Also considered an advantage, the main drawback is the inability to cluster two Exadata systems across sites. For example, with one node on one site and another node on a different site, I cannot c...
What do you like most about SAP BW4HANA?
One significant advantage of SAP BW/4HANA is the direct integration with the SAP HANA database, providing seamless access to real-time analytics. Additionally, it enables real-time data integrati...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP BW4HANA?
We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses.
What needs improvement with SAP BW4HANA?
The interface could be more user-friendly, as we often need to do low-level coding to get things done.
 

Also Known As

No data available
SAP BW/4HANA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PayPal, EBS, Organic Food Retailer, Garmin, University of Minnesota, Major Semiconductor Company, Deutsche Bank, Starwood, Ziraat Bank, SK Telecom, and P&G.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Exadata vs. SAP BW4HANA and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,296 professionals have used our research since 2012.