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Oracle OBIEE vs Tableau comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 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

Oracle OBIEE
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
4th
Ranking in Reporting
3rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
157
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Tableau
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
2nd
Ranking in Reporting
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
295
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (1st), Embedded BI (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of Oracle OBIEE is 3.9%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tableau is 18.2%, down from 18.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

VishnuReddy - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles large datasets and easy to interact with and handle but performance could be better
Oracle's technical support usually recommends to upgrade when you contact them for support. They don't focus on fixing the issue at hand or providing guidance on how to do it. If you are in a lower environment, like one version down, they will blindly suggest upgrading. Additional patches are given for other Oracle products like WebLogic, databases, and apps. They fix issues and create patches based on client needs. But from an OBIEE point of view, they mostly provide bundle patches of around 5 to 6 GB that need to be applied and tested end-to-end. It's not an easy way to get small patches, and if issues arise after applying the patches, you have to contact Oracle again.
ROMIL SHAH - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides fast data access with in-memory extracts, makes it easy to create visualizations, and saves time
When it comes to visualizations, Tableau has a limitation as compared to Power BI. It has a limited set of visualizations. Power BI has the entire marketplace, so you can connect and import many visualizations and use them, whereas Tableau has only 10 or 15 visualizations. There should be more visualizations, and there should also be data integration with more cloud providers. Tableau has recently launched a paid version for the documentation. So, documentation has become a little bit challenging when it comes to Tableau development because we do not have any tool to export the data out of it. It is a license-based feature that you need to purchase to prepare documentation. So, on the documentation front, for preparing clear documentation for any dashboard, it would help if we get an embedded option, rather than buying a license for each user for the documentation. To document anything, if I have to connect to each workbook and see what has been written as a formula and then document in the Word document, it is pretty time-consuming. We have the Microsoft stack, and we are currently evaluating Power BI because Tableau has a limitation of 50 columns for a drill-down report. If we want more than 50 columns, we have found a hack, but there is no ready-made option for doing it. So, we have to use another tool in case we need a drilled report with more than 50 columns. There are many instances where users need 80 or 90 columns for their analysis, and switching between two technologies becomes a challenge. It is not a cost-effective approach for us. Their support should be improved. We are not happy with their support. Whenever we raised queries, we were pointed to a few blogs, and we didn't get a proper solution from them. Their licensing should also be improved. They want us to purchase a Tableau Creator license for business users, whereas Power BI Desktop is free for business users. They should come up with a basic license with one or two connectors that our business users can use for preparing their visualizations. Tableau also charges us per user for users who want the data only through email.

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 cloud deployment feature. There are about 20 new features, and they are available on mobile and more. I haven't used any of them, but these features are highly attractive."
"It has helped to consolidate data and report on a single version of the truth."
"It provides excellent stability."
"The most valuable feature is the reporting."
"The most valuable feature is the visualization."
"There are some great new features in the latest version."
"The most valuable feature of Oracle OBIEE is it's designed for Oracle. It works well in the Oracle environment and can sit on top of any application."
"The “Business Model & Mapping” layer in the Administration Tool, because the maintenance and evolution processes are greatly facilitated."
"It most valuable feature is its ease of developing visualizations, not just charts and graphs."
"Compared to other products, visualization features are really good."
"Tableau has improved my organization in a variety of ways, one of its uses being that of data analysis. A feature I have found most valuable is the ease of use and straightforwardness, in addition to the flexibility of Tableau."
"The most valuable part of the solution is the general dashboard features."
"Its performance is pretty good, and the development time is very low."
"It has made the reporting stage simple and enabled us to focus mainly on the ETL part"
"The most valuable features are the visualizations, the way they show the combination charts."
"The most valuable feature is the richness of its visualization and from a self-service standpoint, the ease of use."
 

Cons

"Oracle OBIEE is lagging in data visualization."
"The pricing of the solution should be bettered."
"The complexity of this product means that you need to have a technical team to develop the reports, although this is also true for products like Microsoft BI and Zoho."
"They should develop greater visualization because their visualization isn't industry leading at the moment. The way you pull the data and see the data compared to other platforms, they're lagging a little bit behind. Also, their cost. I've got Oracle account managers trying to persuade me every day to purchase these licenses. Once you purchase OBIEE, then you have to purchase the virtualization and then you have to purchase the mobile license to operate on the mobile. It's really expensive."
"Its functionality is lacking."
"It needs a better security management system."
"Oracle OBIEE only displays KPIs, but it does not include strategic objectives or display risk in a strategic map."
"It takes a lot of maintenance to support the architecture, which is something that should be improved."
"Tableau is difficult to scale because of the cost, which makes it difficult to scale."
"When it comes to large datasets, the data should be extracted faster."
"We need big servers to perform the operations that we are doing. They should probably relook at its architecture."
"I would like Tableau Prep to be integrated with Tableau Desktop. I would also like more customizations for tables."
"Reports should be downloadable as PDF files."
"I would like to be able to set the parameters in a more specific manner."
"The architecture should be improved to better handle the data."
"It would be nice if we could export more raw data. Currently, there is a limit as to how much data you can export."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Simplifying the data integration process would save our clients considerable costs."
"The price of Oracle OBIEE is expensive, it is difficult for a small business to afford."
"I would rate it a 4 out of 5 in terms of pricing."
"Oracle products are extremely expensive."
"It's comparable to the current technology we're using, Qlik Sense."
"This is a very costly product."
"Its licensing is yearly."
"The company had twenty-five Oracle OBIEE licenses and never expanded. Price-wise, the solution is expensive."
"One of the biggest drawbacks of Tableau is the price, it is expensive. The price should be reduced."
"At $70 per month, I think the price is a bit scary. I have a small consulting firm in Ghana, working in about 15 different African countries, and when it comes to our part of the world, $70 a month is a lot of money for software."
"Its licensing cost should be improved."
"Tableau is an expensive solution."
"There is a license for this solution and we pay on an annual basis."
"For our organization, the cost hasn't been an issue."
"Tableau's prices are relatively high for our market. I am from Serbia, so many companies in this market don't have the ability to pay for expensive software. My clients are quite satisfied with a lot of Tableau's qualities except for the prices."
"I wish there was more of a subscription model with the pricing when it comes to Tableau, so you can get all the latest version upgrades/features if you pay monthly/annually."
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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
Financial Services Firm
18%
Government
13%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
44%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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 Oracle product is better - OBIEE or Analytics Cloud?
Oracle OBIEE is designed to be relatively easy to set up and has a helpful customer support staff at the ready to assist customers. These are two attributes that make this system quite valuable. OB...
What do you like most about Oracle OBIEE?
The most valuable feature of Oracle OBIEE is its ability to handle large volumes of data and provide traditional BI functionalities that developers can easily understand.
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 Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
Tableau vs. Business Objects - Which is a better solution for visualization and analysis?
Both tools have their positives and negatives. First, I should mention that I am relatively new to Tableau. I have been working on and off Tableau for about a year, but getting to work on it consta...
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 ...
 

Also Known As

OBIEE, Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition, Oracle BI, Oracle BI EE 11g
Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Online
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Banca Transilvania, BeckmanCoulter, Hong Kong Housing Society, HealthShare, Ivanhoe Cambridge Unifies, and Home Credit, and Finance Bank.
Accenture, Adobe, Amazon.com, Bank of America, Charles Schwab Corp, Citigroup, Coca-Cola Company, Cornell University, Dell, Deloitte, Duke University, eBay, Exxon Mobil, Fannie Mae, Ferrari, French Red Cross, Goldman Sachs, Google, Government of Canada, HP, Intel, Johns Hopkins Hospital, Macy's, Merck, The New York Times, PayPal, Pfizer, US Army, US Air Force, Skype, and Walmart.
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle OBIEE vs. Tableau and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
837,501 professionals have used our research since 2012.