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SAP Information Steward vs SAP PowerDesigner comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 3, 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

SAP Information Steward
Ranking in Metadata Management
6th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Data Quality (9th)
SAP PowerDesigner
Ranking in Metadata Management
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Metadata Management category, the mindshare of SAP Information Steward is 3.8%, up from 3.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP PowerDesigner is 4.2%, up from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Metadata Management
 

Featured Reviews

FranciscoSantos - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides accurate data that is validated against a personalized reference tool
For most SAP customers, Information Steward is enough because it is able to build quality data rules to detect issues in the source systems like SAP HANA, Business Warehouse, or other systems. A business user can first organize their data into several data domains. For example, procurement, human resources, and logistics setup. The domains can build data quality dimensions where you can describe the kind of rule that you are going to use. The user then can immediately see if something is wrong with their data using traffic lights. Another great feature of SAP Information Steward is the accuracy that the content is followed by validating against the reference tool. With the solution, you are creating data quality dimensions. Within these dimensions, you are creating business data quality rules that are looking for specific fields. From these rules, you can create a scorecard. The scorecard will highlight the percentage of good data and ensure the user can feel confident that the data is accurate within predetermined limits. SAP tables have field names that are very cryptic, making them hard to understand the meaning of the fields. Metapedia helps describe these fields in business terms.
JorgeSanz - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective in terms of validating everything, but sometimes they don't allow us some flexibility and GUI could improve
I would recommend SAP PowerDesigner to others for data architecture management. It provides all the functionalities in terms of data modeling, so it's also a good tool for that. I see trends in terms of data classification, but I don't see this tool with the intelligence to do that automatically. So, like, with artificial intelligence. Overall, I would rate the solution a six out of ten because there are too many validations. Also, I found some gaps in terms of relationships; they didn't appear when you do reverse engineering. Also, this tool lacks artificial intelligence that should be very good in terms of automatically identifying the classification of elements and maybe also to incorporate some artificial intelligence in providing descriptions for each data element included in the solution.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Initial setup was straightforward."
"The Data Cleansing and the scorecard dashboard are very valuable. Additionally, the financial aspect of SAP Information Steward is very good. When a rule is incorrect then it will show how much is it costing the business. These features are very valuable."
"The scorecard will highlight the percentage of good data and ensure the user can feel confident that the data is accurate within predetermined limits."
"The solution is very fast."
"The most valuable features are data quality insight, metadata management, and metadata dictionary."
"Ability to collect information, monitor user access and to plan storage capacity."
"The data profiling was excellent, as was the ease of generating the dashboards."
"Data insight is the most valuable feature."
"I've used the reverse engineering feature a lot. I can take a look at the structure of the database and what relationships it has."
"The most valuable feature is the way you can extend it and customize it. With most modeling tools, you fit your modeling process to fit the tool. In PowerDesigner, you can make the tool fit the way you want to work."
"I do a data-centric design, so for me, the data analysis and design tools are the most valuable features."
"I like the connectivity or the lineage between the models and usability."
"I mostly work on the conceptual and logical side of things, and I enjoy how easy it is to use."
"It is more flexible than other tools and user-friendly, making it easy to adapt."
"SAP PowerDesigner is an excellent tool that does what I need it to do. What I like most about it is that it's stable, fast, and easy to understand."
"It can automate many routine tasks and save human resources to focus on real problems."
 

Cons

"The solution could improve by incorporating other applications, such as Power BI to show more visualization. More interaction with other solutions would be a good benefit."
"The support team is not very responsive."
"The user experience of metapedia could be improved."
"A problem with the solution is that it does not allow us to review the results of Information Stewards for other analogies."
"Granularity could be reduced from an application level to the object level."
"Needs to be more powerful on rules."
"We'd like to see some manipulation techniques included in SAP Information Steward."
"SAP Information Steward could be improved by offering a cloud version of the product."
"Connectivity can be improved because it's not very good."
"The focus is more on mainstream development environments, and I see a lack of focus on the open source world. I think SAP PowerDesigner probably interfaces better with SQL Server and Db2 but not with open source databases like PostgreSQL and MySQL."
"Regarding improvements, I suggest enhancing the connection between objects in process and data models. It's crucial to define the structure of objects, especially when dealing with standard frameworks like VMM. There should be better visualization of arrows between BPM and data modeling objects, specifying their structure and impact. For future versions, a feature similar to Bizagi, allowing users to see forms or SQL representations of objects, would be valuable for demonstrating and presenting project details to stakeholders."
"In the future, I would like to see data manipulation capability where you can actually write SQL queries and manipulate data from directly within the tool."
"This product does not have a good BPMN Modeler."
"In terms of improvement, the pricing is a bit high."
"The data governance should be improved, like ER/Studio."
"Pricing for small consultancies needs improvement. They sustain prices to competing tools. The competing tools tend to do special offers. PowerDesigner SAP doesn't pay much attention to the pricing of it and there are no special offers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I do not know if there were additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."
"SAP Information Steward is an expensive solution compared to others."
"A bit pricey, and better tools are available for a lower price."
"Smaller-sized organizations may not be able to invest in SAP Information Steward because of the cost."
"The price of the solution is too expensive. When we asked for certain licenses in different countries it was unattainable."
"I bought the software outright and do not pay a licensing fee."
"The ROI has been 43%."
"Regarding costs, SAP PowerDesigner is pricey, as I've heard from my team manager, which is why the company has been thinking of bringing another solution on board."
"SAP PowerDesigner is cheaper than eriwin."
"I would like SAP to prove free licenses to professionals that are using the solution. The free version is limited."
"PowerDesigner is not the cheapest solution on the market, so make sure that you are using it to its full potential."
"When you purchase the license for SAP PowerDesigner, you have to buy one year of support. The tool is worth the money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
21%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Government
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Government
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What do you like most about SAP PowerDesigner?
It allows us to have proper documentation in terms of the databases.
What needs improvement with SAP PowerDesigner?
Based on my experience with SAP PowerDesigner, I'd like to see improvements in the DMM feature. Even if I have an ETL tool, I'd like the DMM options to directly connect to ETL tool repositories lik...
 

Also Known As

Information Steward, SAP Data Insight
Sybase PowerDesigner
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Water, Graphic Packaging International, OSRAM Licht AG, Maxim Integrated
Medtronic, Cirque du Soleil, Antarc, B&G Manufacturing, EarlySense, eBay, Ferrero, James Austin Company, Lenovo, Sagem, RAK Ceramics, Vodafone
Find out what your peers are saying about SAP Information Steward vs. SAP PowerDesigner and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,767 professionals have used our research since 2012.