SAP Crystal Reports vs Tableau comparison

SAP and Salesforce are both solutions in the Reporting category. SAP is ranked #9 with an average rating of 8.4, while Salesforce is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.7. SAP holds a 2.8% mindshare in RT, compared to Salesforce’s 23.7% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of SAP users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 89% of Salesforce users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between SAP Crystal Reports and Tableau 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 SAP Crystal Reports vs. Tableau Report (Updated: December 2024).

Buyer's Guide

SAP Crystals vs. Tableau

December 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 SAP Crystal Reports is 2.8%, down from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tableau is 23.7%, up from 22.1% 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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MVD Prasad

Assistant General Manager at Soma Enterprise

Helps analyze your data by creating richly formatted, pixel-perfect, and multiple reports from virtually any data source, delivered in over a dozen formats

It has significantly enhanced security features, especially when compared to the standard security features of the earlier PeerSpot version I purchased. I've observed improvements in security, and overall, it's quite commendable. Regarding potential enhancements for the next release of this solution, I haven't closely examined SAP Crystal Reports 53. I've only encountered it briefly, perhaps once or twice. However, I anticipate that it likely offers advanced features distinct from its predecessor. I believe there may be notable improvements and additions in the latest version, and I look forward to exploring them further.

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ROMIL SHAH

Deputy General Manger - Information Technology at Nayara Energy

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.

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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

"It's enabled us to report directly from our main application systems. We're removing islands of data and we're removing inefficiencies, where people or small divisions had their own store of information."

"Integration with Office can enable the 'download' mode of storytelling."

"Using custom controls, it is possible to extend the application with even more functionality and make the application intuitive and attractive."

"We use the account statement report. When you use an account in HSBC, you receive various types of accounts, such as the stock market, fixed accounts, credit cards, and business accounts. We can create one consolidated report called CCS support, which includes all these accounts. In that statement, we are consolidating all those accounts."

"The correlation analysis is excellent. It's one of the best that I have used to date."

"A positive feature is Report Studio, where we create beautiful, complex reports."

"This solution allows you to input a wide range of file formats."

"If they want dashboarding, storytelling, and analyzing why KPIs are met or not, then Cognos is a better candidate than Qlik Sense."

More IBM Cognos pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is a fantastic way of generating reports."

"SAP Crystal Reports offers a plethora of features, many of which were available much earlier than in the Crystal Reports we previously used. We extensively use its capabilities for generating general reports, working with Kaspersky data, and even incorporating images into our reports. The range of functions available in SAP Crystal Reports is diverse, and we leverage them across various systems for our needs."

"It is an user-friendly solution."

"I find Crystal Reports very easy to use, even for a non-technical person."

"We use SAP Crystal Reports for operational reporting."

"The most valuable feature is that from a user's point of view, it is easy to use and requires just a simple click to generate a report."

"The overall environment is the best. Data management, graphs, and layout – everything is the best, in my opinion."

"The initial setup of the solution is pretty easy."

"The most valuable feature is the geographic data analysis."

"The best thing I like about Tableau is that you don't have to go for creating; it is calculated free."

"The solution deployment was straightforward."

"Partner support is very good."

"The solution is easy to use, flexible, our clients enjoy seeing the data on maps, and you do not need to be an expert in SQL to use it."

"Tableau is an advanced specialized tool. One of the best features I've seen is the lack of an intermediate semantic layer. I think that's an advantage compared to any other tool like BusinessObjects or Power BI, which are Tableau's biggest competitors."

"Tableau has comprehensive, insightful charts, which allow you to build stunning dashboards and enrich your support decision-making."

"It provides supporting data for critical policy and operational changes"

More Tableau pros

Cons

"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."

"I would like for the platform to become more standard. If we make a development on our report and our dashboard, it will not be used in another solution. That means there is no portability for the developers."

"IBM Support can be slow at times, but they can usually deliver in a timely manner."

"This product could use improvement in terms of usability for those with less technical know how."

"The solution's support could be better."

"The charts and graphics are weak."

"Chart quality: many other competitors have charts and graphics that look much better and that provide dynamic effects. Cognos doesn't."

"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

"It has significantly enhanced security features, especially when compared to the standard security features of the earlier PeerSpot version I purchased. I've observed improvements in security, and overall, it's quite commendable. Regarding potential enhancements for the next release of this solution, I haven't closely examined SAP Crystal Reports 53. I've only encountered it briefly, perhaps once or twice. However, I anticipate that it likely offers advanced features distinct from its predecessor. I believe there may be notable improvements and additions in the latest version, and I look forward to exploring them further."

"SAP Crystal Reports has some compatibility issues with third-party products."

"SAP Crystal Reports should provide better support for dynamic connectors."

"If at all possible, a little bit of improvement on the analytical side is needed."

"Maybe some Power BI-related features could be added, like dashboards or direct editing in reports."

"There could be improvements made to the analytics capabilities."

"A real improvement would be a simpler system that allows users to play with the visualization without needing specialized skills and code."

"The financing part needs improvement."

"The product's features for cloud integration need improvement."

"When I've done presentations in the past, I've had issues with uploading the cartography."

"What is happening, with so many tools coming up in the market, is that people have to continuously get educated in order to use some of the more advanced features."

"More integration with Python or something related to machine learning would be a good improvement."

"We have products like Tableau, Power BI, Cognos, and QlikView in the data visualization segment. Compared to those, Tableau is quite costly."

"The pricing is a bit higher than the competition. They'll need to lower it to stay competitive."

"Tableau's integration with Einstein Analytics could be better."

"Implementation requires a technical background."

More Tableau cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of IBM Cognos it's more or less the same as most of the other solutions on the market. They're very competitive with the rest of the market and it is not the most expensive product."

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

"Pricing should be improved."

"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."

"The pricing and licensing policies are comparatively cheaper than other products in the market ."

"The solution is affordable."

"It's more expensive than similar solutions like Tableau and Power BI."

"My company uses IBM Cognos with another IBM product, so I think only one license is used."

More IBM Cognos pricing and cost advice

"This product costs a lot of money."

"The cost of licensing can be a significant factor to consider when upgrading or transitioning to a new version of SAP Crystal Reports. It's important to evaluate the benefits and features offered by the new version against the associated costs to ensure it aligns with your organization's needs and budget."

"We pay fifteen hundred dollars as licensing fee."

"I feel that SAP Crystal Reports is a reasonably priced product."

"SAP Crystal Reports is a very expensive solution."

"It is more expensive than other solutions."

"It is reasonable and cheap as compared to other major tools. It has a good price, and people go for it because of its pricing."

"This solution is a bit expensive. The pricing options have become more difficult over the years. I think they are bordering on pricing themselves out of the market. They need different pricing options for various-sized businesses. Where my organization is a large organization, we are happy to pay a higher price because we can leverage the products very extensively. For smaller enterprises, different pricing options would be good."

"Its price is higher than Power BI and QlikView. Tableau costs around $70 per user per month, whereas Power BI is around $8 to $9. QlikView is around $30. Tableau has various prices for various models such as Creator, Designer."

"We always consider pricing when considering a new solution. We are a non-profit and price is a huge concern."

"The price of Tableau could improve. The license is too expensive."

"Best advice on pricing is to anticipate the desire for more licenses once the results of this product are acknowledged in other parts of your company."

"There is a license required, we pay an annual license which is priced fair."

More Tableau pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user6330

Product Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

May 2, 2013

MicroStrategy vs. Tableau

After a recent presentation, several attendees asked me about the applications of Visual Insights and Tableau. Many companies are investing in both tools and are trying to figure out the right tool for specific applications Tableau has found its sweet-spot as an agile discovery tool that analysts…

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

55%

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

42%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Computer Software Company

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 ...

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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...

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What needs improvement with SAP Crystal Reports?

Maybe some Power BI-related features could be added, like dashboards or direct editing in reports. We use query langu...

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What is your primary use case for SAP Crystal Reports?

We use SAP Crystal Reports for reporting. We use it for financial reports like statements of accounts, trial balances...

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What do you like most about SAP Crystal Reports?

We use SAP Crystal Reports for operational reporting.

See all answers

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 be...

See all answers

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....

See all answers

What do you like most about Tableau?

Tableau is a fantastic tool that provides impressive dashboards and customized reports.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Power BI vs IBM Cognos

Compared 13% 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

Databricks vs IBM Cognos

Compared 2% of the time

More IBM Cognos Competitors

Microsoft Power BI vs SAP Crystal Reports

Compared 21% of the time

TIBCO Jaspersoft vs SAP Crystal Reports

Compared 20% of the time

Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services vs SAP Crystal Reports

Compared 10% of the time

MicroStrategy vs SAP Crystal Reports

Compared 8% of the time

Windward Core vs SAP Crystal Reports

Compared 3% of the time

More SAP Crystal Reports Competitors

Microsoft Power BI vs Tableau

Compared 19% of the time

Domo vs Tableau

Compared 12% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs Tableau

Compared 8% of the time

Databricks vs Tableau

Compared 5% of the time

Oracle Hyperion vs Tableau

Compared 2% of the time

More Tableau Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cognos

December 2024

Download IBM Cognos product report

Buyer's Guide

SAP Crystals

November 2024

Download SAP Crystal Reports product report

Buyer's Guide

Tableau

November 2024

Download Tableau product report

Also Known As

Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics

No data available

Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Online

Learn More

IBM

SAP

Salesforce

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.”

Turn information from almost any data source into a sophisticated, interactive report with SAP Crystal Reports. This powerful, user-friendly application for small businesses and departments can help you deliver key insights to the right decision maker, at the right time, in the right format.

Click here for a free trial

Tableau is a tool for data visualization and business intelligence that allows businesses to report insights through easy-to-use, customizable visualizations and dashboards. Tableau makes it exceedingly simple for its customers to organize, manage, visualize, and comprehend data. It enables users to dig deep into the data so that they can see patterns and gain meaningful insights.

Make data-driven decisions with confidence thanks to Tableau’s assistance in providing faster answers to queries, solving harder problems more easily, and offering new insights more frequently. Tableau integrates directly to hundreds of data sources, both in the cloud and on premises, making it simpler to begin research. People of various skill levels can quickly find actionable information using Tableau’s natural language queries, interactive dashboards, and drag-and-drop capabilities. By quickly creating strong calculations, adding trend lines to examine statistical summaries, or clustering data to identify relationships, users can ask more in-depth inquiries.

Tableau has many valuable key features:

Tableau dashboards provide a complete view of your data through visualizations, visual objects, text, and more.
Tableau provides convenient, real-time options to collaborate with other users and instantly share data in the form of visualizations, sheets, and dashboards.
Tableau ensures connectivity to both live data sources and data extraction from external data sources as in-memory data. This gives users the flexibility to use data from more than one source without any restrictions.
Tableau gives many data source option, ranging from spreadsheets, big data, on-premise files, relational databases, non-relational databases, data warehouses, and big data, to on-cloud data.
Tableau has a lot of pre-installed information on maps, such as cities, postal codes, and administrative boundaries.
Tableau has a foolproof security system based on authentication and permission systems for data connections and user access. Tableau also gives you the freedom to integrate with other security protocols.

Tableau stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Some of these include its fast data access, easy creation of visualizations, and its stability. PeerSpot users take note of the advantages of these features in their reviews:

Romil S., Deputy General Manager of IT at Nayara Energy, notes, "Its visualizations are good, and its features make the development process a little less time-consuming. It has an in-memory extract feature that allows us to extract data and keep it on the server, and then our users can use it quickly.

Ariful M., Consulting Practice Partner of Data, Analytics & AI at FH, writes, “Tableau is very flexible and easy to learn. It has drag-and-drop function analytics, and its design is very good.”

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.

City of Buenos Aires, ASR Group, Citrix, EarlySense, Usha International Limited, Automotive Resources International (ARI), LivePerson, Coelba (Grupo Neoenergia), RZD Russian Railways, National Basketball Association - NBA, TALLY WEiJL, El Machetazo, Young Heroes, Mozzart, Mitsui Knowledge Industry (MKI) , Surgutneftegas Open Joint Stock Company, The VELUX Group, AOK Bundesverband, AL-KO KOBER GROUP

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.

Buyer's Guide

SAP Crystals vs. Tableau

December 2024

Free Report: SAP Crystal Reports vs. Tableau

Find out what your peers are saying about SAP Crystal Reports vs. Tableau and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.

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