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Qlik Sense vs TIBCO Spotfire comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Qlik Sense
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
115
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (2nd), Embedded BI (2nd)
TIBCO Spotfire
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
69
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (16th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. Qlik Sense is designed for Data Visualization and holds a mindshare of 7.4%, down 10.3% compared to last year.
TIBCO Spotfire, on the other hand, focuses on BI (Business Intelligence) Tools, holds 1.1% mindshare, down 1.2% since last year.
Data Visualization
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Yogesh_Pawar - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use but needs to improve the user interface part
Qlik Sense is not meant for writing something from the user interface, which is a major challenge because our company wants users to interact with the reports and to input some comments or data that should get stored into some database. The aforementioned area can be considered for improvement in the product. With Qlik Sense, there is a need for it to provide good performance because if there is a large volume of data, then its performance becomes slow. User interaction or user experience is not that great in that case if the data size or reports are huge. The aforementioned area can be considered for improvement in the product. Right now, we are trying to follow up with some best practices recommended by Qlik Sense, but to be honest, it is not helping us much because we have very large data in a single application, and we are struggling with it. The product should have an interactive and friendly user interface. The use of APIs is not as friendly as it should be in the first place, especially when considering Python scripts and all other scripts, making it an area where improvements are required. There should be some easy way to integrate the product with the aforementioned areas.
Mohsin Pathan - PeerSpot reviewer
Flexible, offers a single pane of glass, and is highly customizable
There's one area I see that specifically needs improvement. That is when you do the data loading. It is slow. For historical data, when you talk about gigabytes of data, terabytes of data, then it becomes prolonged. Loading could be improved. That's one part. That is actually there with every tool. I would not say that this is a specific problem with Spotfire. However, it is a problem with all the BI tools. That is one area which can be improved. When you are doing analytics, you see that the value has to come perfect. There was a missing feature of alerting out of the box within Spotfire. However, they have released this in version 12.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has improved our organization by providing data to decision-makers in a safe visual environment."
"My organization now has data from disparate systems at their fingertips in a way that lets them get the answers they need when they want it."
"The most valuable feature is the mobile platform."
"The product is very stable."
"Faster time to delivery utilizing useful charts and graphs, which allows for on-demand generation of analytical data in tables, graphs, and charts."
"The reports are better looking than in QlikView."
"Takes the super features of QlikView ETL capabilities to a whole new level with its new drag and drop feature, and extension capabilities derived from the robust Qlik API."
"Obviously and considering that Qlik Sense is a data visualization application, the most attractive feature is the fast handling of large amounts of data and the attractive visualization of the same."
"The ability to create a real-time data mark, using just one piece of software, is the best feature of this product."
"The two features that I have found most valuable are its ability to customize the dashboards when it comes to the evaluation. The second feature is its ability to handle a large amount of data, which is also something very unique about it."
"The solution is an affordable one."
"It's scalable."
"The out-of-the-box features are simple and easy to use across the board."
"We used it pretty heavily in gathering data, which goes to our VPs. They are able to base their next revenue planning based on this metric. So, it has been invaluable."
"This solution allows us to integrate data from across all client departments, for effective reporting via a single dashboard."
"The ability to connect to many different data sources is one of the key features. The other would then be the different ways in which that data can be visualized."
 

Cons

"The product could be improved by implementing a user-feedback ranking system."
"Reload failure alerts on the application within the Qlik Management Console without any use of extensions. QlikView is able to handle these alerts directly through the QlikView Management Console. We would appreciate a similar solution that is easy to set up and use. Simple formatting options in the pivot and straight tables such as adjusting line thickness and font selection and size."
"Some of the charts are still a bit basic and screen rendering on different sized monitors can be an issue."
"Even though a huge set of learning material is available, anyone starting his/her journey on learning the software doesn't even know where to start it. The so-called Continous Classroom service is not cheap, but there are many free tutorials, they are not sorted or enlisted adequately though."
"The SaaS offering is being enriched quickly in order to attract new customers to that space and encouraging existing customers to make the switch. The Enterprise solution is therefore lagging behind SaaS in features."
"Qlik Sense requires one to have a lot of technical knowledge."
"Qlik dashboards are not friendly with end-users, but they have been enhancing this shorted in some recent releases and next releases hopefully."
"The use of APIs is not as friendly as it should be in the first place, especially when considering Python scripts and all other scripts, making it an area where improvements are required."
"The way TIBCO Spotfire is designed, in my opinion, is the reason why it lags a bit, especially compared to other BI tools like Qlik."
"The initial setup of TIBCO Spotfire is in the middle range of difficulty. The initial setup of Power BI is easier."
"The solution might be generic."
"When you do the data loading, it is slow."
"When it comes to data manipulation, there are features which are good, but one of the features which has really been missing in Spotfire is an offline ability for data manipulation."
"The initial setup can be difficult."
"The layered features within Spotfire can make it a bit complicated sometimes as compared to Power BI."
"We encountered difficulties connecting the special data sets, as the post data set did not contain any shared columns, making it difficult to establish a connection between the data sets."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Qlik Sense and its pricing model can follow any scalability."
"Licensing: Review the named model and move towards a usage model (e.g., cores, memory, computers, API calls, etc.)."
"It is a little expensive for the Italian market. Normally, Qlik Sense has two types and costs. The medium cost is around 700 euros per year."
"Currently, our ROI is clear and concise decision-making. This timely addition will easily add $15 million to our bottom line in 2017."
"Start small with tokens. You can always buy more."
"The product is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"QlikSense offers a Hybrid environment architecture, which is very cost effective based on where the enterprise data resides."
"Licensing can start to get expensive, but compared to other tools in this space it is about average."
"I would describe TIBCO Spotfire as an averagely-priced product."
"The ROI is nearly impossible to calculate."
"This product carries a monthly licensing charge, with the amount depending on the features that are to be included. This costs also covers the use of technical support."
"The solution is affordable one."
"The cost is a few hundred dollars per user per year."
"The price-point for this solution is negotiable depending on usage levels."
"The cost of TIBCO Spotfire could improve. It should be less expensive. It's the most expensive visualization tool in our company."
"In comparison to other solutions such as IBM Cognos, TIBCO Spotfire is more affordable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
59%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Energy/Utilities Company
10%
 

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 Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
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...
What do you like most about Qlik Sense?
The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are its speed and seamless development of web technologies.
What do you like most about TIBCO Spotfire?
TIBCO Spotfire is easy to use. We initiated Spotfire as POC, with support from a tech team based in South Africa. While they assisted with the setup, we conducted the POC ourselves.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Spotfire?
Compared to other tools, Spotfire's pricing is competitive, especially with its enterprise licensing.
What needs improvement with TIBCO Spotfire?
Spotfire requires better documentation. Unlike competitors like Power BI and Tableau, Spotfire lacks comprehensive metadata dictionaries. This makes it difficult to generate usage metrics, which ar...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

QlikSense
Spotfire
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Abbvie, Airbus, Barclays, BT Openreach, BMW, Daimler AG, HSBC, IKEA, Nationwide Building Society, Royal Mail Group, Sanofi, Siemens, Wendy'', Vodafone, Volvo
Allergan, ASSS de Montreal, Avantium, Blue River, Bank of Montreal, Citibank, FrieslandCampina, Hellmann Logistics, Merck, Novartis
Find out what your peers are saying about Qlik Sense vs. TIBCO Spotfire and other solutions. Updated: March 2020.
831,265 professionals have used our research since 2012.