Visio vs Visual Paradigm comparison

Microsoft and Visual Paradigm are both solutions in the Business Process Design category. Microsoft is ranked #1 with an average rating of 7.9, while Visual Paradigm is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.3. Microsoft holds a 12.5% mindshare in BPD, compared to Visual Paradigm’s 6.7% mindshare. Additionally, 80% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 88% of Visual Paradigm users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Visio and Visual Paradigm are competing in the field of diagramming and modeling tools. Visual Paradigm seems to have the upper hand due to its extensive support for multiple modeling standards and features that support complex project collaboration.

Features: Visio is known for its seamless integration with the Microsoft Office Suite, an extensive library of shapes, and templates like BPMN 2.0, flowcharts, and network diagrams, enabling swift diagram creation and automation with external data. Visual Paradigm offers a comprehensive set of modeling standards including UML and TOGAF, process simulation, project collaboration, and integrates different models supporting extensive diagram types.

Room for Improvement: Visio could improve by enhancing XPDL support, advancing pen input features, and improving mobile compatibility. The layering and user interface aspects need refinement. Visual Paradigm could enhance integration with additional diagram standards, improve process mining, automation capabilities, and provide more flexible pricing for small businesses or individual users in different regions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Visio allows deployment across Private Cloud, Public Cloud, and on-premises environments, fitting well in enterprise settings with strong Microsoft ecosystem integration. Its technical support varies but benefits from extensive documentation and community resources. Visual Paradigm offers deployment on-premises and hybrid clouds but lacks the extensive support network of Visio.

Pricing and ROI: Visio has Standard and Professional editions, aligning with Microsoft 365 options, which can be costly but justified by document consistency and Office integration value. Visual Paradigm is budget-friendly, with subscription models catering to varied business needs, providing significant ROI through its comprehensive feature set, despite higher costs for advanced features.

To learn more, read our detailed Visio vs. Visual Paradigm Report (Updated: December 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Visio vs. Visual Paradigm

December 2024

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Categories and Ranking

IBM Blueworks Live

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of IBM Blueworks Live is 3.5%, up from 3.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Visio is 12.5%, down from 13.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Visual Paradigm is 6.7%, up from 6.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Business Process Design

Featured Reviews

AjarMathur

Global Innovation Director at Ernst & Young

An easily scalable and affordable solution that enables users to document and digitize processes with ease

IBM Blueworks is BPMN 2.0 compliant, but it does not adapt to the overarching BPMN 2.0 concepts. There is only one kind of BPMN 2.0 diagram. It is a process diagram. It doesn't have the concept of separate tools, which other products offer. If I had to do a hardcore BPMN 2.0 modeling, the product would have its own reservations. There were features we could not explore from a BPMN 2.0 perspective. Most of the time, people who are shifting from Microsoft Office tools to a digitized way of working still want the reporting capabilities to be strong. Some tools, like ARIS or Signavio, offer customized solutions from the reporting perspective. If I have documented my whole finance process and want to fetch out a complete SOP report in a very customized manner, IBM Blueworks cannot provide it. We have to rely on some other services. So that's one area in which we always struggled, how to really customize the reporting aspects. I understand that we need to keep the tool a little more asset-light. It's very difficult to keep adding many options, but at least a few BPMN 2.0 options were needed. We have been suggesting to IBM that we should have some way of customizing the reporting. At least we should get a custom way of reporting it into different formats like Excel or putting up a logo for one of the clients so that their SAP can be printed that way.

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IckyDu Buisson

Enterprise Architect at Employment and Labour; Compensation Fund, Unemployment& Insurance Fund

Good modeling and flexibility but object oriented features needed

Visio should be object-oriented to enable the reusability of objects across different models. Currently, changes made in one model do not automatically reflect in other related models. Having a repository behind the objects would significantly improve its utility, providing a structured environment for managing various architectural components and their relationships.

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DominicMackenzie

Senior data architect at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees

Very flexible and easy to use with a good pricing model

I have used erwin and Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect. The first time I used Visual Paradigm was when I was a university student. I didn't want to pay a lot of money and Visual Paradigm had a very good pricing model, so it meant that I could effectively pay for the level of sophistication that I was using at the time and dial it back down to a simpler version.

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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

"Valuable features include real-time modeling and design work, the ability to perform workshops with clients in real-time with the tool, and getting instant output."

"I like the two-tiered approach, that is, discover and then drill down to the main steps. You can right click and attach risk, policies, and much more. It is a user-friendly solution."

"The business process discovery is excellent. The diagram or blueprinting functionality of the solution are very good. It's quite easy. You can link the sub-processes and get a big overview of the whole process then."

"Business users understand it really well, which means we can then help them automate their business processes."

"The licenses are transferrable between different users."

"The reporting that we can generate from IBM Blueworks Live has been interesting. We found the KPIs, risks, process modeling, format, and colors, to be very good. We use the EY template and it is interesting to generate reporting in this format."

"This solution is good at utilizing standards rules for connectivity."

"The ease of documenting and digitizing the processes was valuable to us."

More IBM Blueworks Live pros

"It is easy to learn and implement."

"The product provides a lot of flexibility in writing graphs and customizing them."

"The most valuable feature is the set of diagramming tools."

"It is a useful tool to map data flows, network objects, and computer science technology and show to clients. It does what I need it to do. It's a tool I've used the longest, so I know it the best, and that's probably the claim to fame."

"The solution is finely stable."

"The most valuable feature is the ability to draw models quickly."

"What I like best about Visio is that it's flexible. Sometimes, if I need to draw quickly, I use Microsoft PowerPoint, but if I need icons, which Visio has, I use Visio. I also like that the solution gives me a much more powerful range of options."

"It is pretty easy to use if you are looking for this type of solution."

More Visio pros

"The solution is the best application for data modeling. It helps to architect business processes. Its best features are pricing and functionality."

"The solution is very user-friendly. It's easy to just open it and start working."

"Visual Paradigm is simple and easy to use."

"The solution is stable. It hasn't crashed, stopped or caused any issues in any way."

"The most valuable feature of Visual Paradigm is the ability to design form flows, add libraries, create organizational charts, and connect them all together."

"The initial setup is extremely straightforward."

"It is a scalable solution since it can be used at an individual level as well as for enterprise-sized businesses."

"The pricing model is attractive."

More Visual Paradigm pros

Cons

"Some of the import functionality was a bit restrictive, in terms of loading data in from other data sources. Something as simple as Excel, loading data tables from Excel, wasn't great. And vice-versa. Some of the export and import functionality with something like Visio - which, I know it's a slightly different tool - but being able to work seamlessly with those other tool sets would've been quite useful. I know it was something that was in the pipeline to be looked at. So that would be useful."

"Spaces are not well organized; space controls are lacking."

"In the solution Signavio, they have a customer journey mapping feature that should be added to IBM Blueworks Live. It's valuable to map or document the customer journey to identify the pains and opportunities in this process."

"The ability to create a very structured rule. With the capability that we have right now, Blueworks Live is more process focused. We should be able to enhance it to include a lot more of decisions as well."

"The APIs are great, except the normal business user doesn't know how to create APIs. So it's hard because IBM comes to us as the business users and tell us to create reporting with APIs, except we don't know that, so we have to turn around and flip it to our IT people."

"There should be an option to import from and export to Microsoft Visio. Being able to move files back and forth between Blueworks Live and Visio would be good."

"We'd also like to see it be Six Sigma or Lean compatible, a lot of people have asked about that."

"It is BPMN-compliant but the tool needs to be more involved to get into a completely 2.0 oriented tool. It has a few things but it's not the complete BPMN model."

More IBM Blueworks Live cons

"The auto-routing feature could be better."

"Its support team could be well-equipped with the required information."

"One issue I've noticed is that when working on a shared video link with a friend for Visio, there can be a delay in changes reflecting on their screen after I've made them. This also occurs when we're working on the same document. It would be beneficial if changes could be reflected in real-time. Additionally, I've experienced some text size issues with the flow task feature. Sometimes when I enter text, it appears very small, and increasing the size causes it to extend beyond the diagram, creating formatting issues. It would be helpful if these text and formatting issues could be addressed."

"It's a very large install that uses many gigabytes."

"The solution should be included in Microsoft Office 365. For some reason, it's not. It should be bundled in with everything else."

"I would like to be able to present diagrams in multiple ways, such as a Swimlane diagram."

"The one particular thing which I would like to see improved is in comparison to other products in the market, and is still lacking in Visio, is publishing on a web application. For example, there is a freeware application business process modeling tool, Bizagi."

"The solution should have better integration capabilities with MacOS and Linux."

More Visio cons

"It's still early for me to comment since I've only been using it for two months, but the responsiveness when diagramming needs to be improved."

"There is room for improvement in the licensing model. I would suggest implementing country-specific pricing, as many other products in India do. This would make Visual Paradigm more affordable and accessible."

"The solution could be more compatible with other products in the future."

"More flexibility when choosing the type of diagram would be nice."

"Visual Paradigm's initial deployment was difficult since we did it for the first time. It is challenging to learn to use the product."

"The solution is not user-friendly. It uses a lot of memory and CPU. You have to have a good computer to use it."

"There are some connectivity issues that crop up rarely when used with SQL Server."

"There is a certain inherent complexity when creating UML diagrams."

More Visual Paradigm cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We are seeing ROI from this solution. The solution has saved us time."

"The solution is very, very cost-effective."

"Making it less expensive would be good."

"Price wise, IBM Blueworks Live is in the middle range, and I would give it a five out of ten."

"Based on the licenses purchased, from a footprint perspective, you can have as many people as you want. You have multiple different categories of licenses to keep the cost low."

"There are editor licenses that are around 50 euros per month, and contributor licenses that are around 30 euros per month."

"They have a free subscription model that gives a lot of power to the users."

"The solution is not very expensive."

"The pricing is reasonable and I would rate it 6 out of 10."

"The pricing of Visio is much better. It has a free version of the cheapest functionality which is enough for us."

"You have to purchase a license to use the solution."

"The yearly cost is approximately $400 CAD ($300 USD)."

"It is a free solution for us. It is integrated with our pack. We are trying to use the solutions that we already have."

"I think costs are on a per user basis."

"Now we pay about $200, which is maybe $10 per user per month."

"It has a lower price point than the competition."

More Visio pricing and cost advice

"Visual Paradigm costs $99 per license. I chose the cheapest option from the pricing list."

"I rate Visual Paradigm's pricing a five out of ten."

"This is an open-sourced solution, it is free to use."

"You can move between the tiers from month to month so you are not restricted to one pricing model."

"In terms of pricing, I find Visual Paradigm's subscription services reasonable, especially for the modern and standard editions. However, the premium products can be a bit pricey, especially considering our location in the Middle East. Currently, paying around a hundred dollars per user translates to almost six hundred Egyptian pounds, which can add up. For enterprise licensing, I think the perpetual license option could be more affordable. If it were cheaper, say around five hundred dollars, I would have invested in multiple perpetual licenses long ago. Sometimes, to manage costs, we share accounts among team members or switch access on and off for certain members who aren't actively working on projects. As for additional costs, there are charges for cloud services, which I'm considering because I've already exceeded the free capacity."

"Visual Paradigm has two models available. One of them is the educational edition, and another is the business edition. For my personal usage, I use the educational version mostly. In a project, my customers have to purchase a license."

"Over the years I've seen an increase in price, and it makes it difficult for a single person company, like me, to decide whether to extend the license."

"I rate the pricing a three on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."

More Visual Paradigm pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

15%

Government

12%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Educational Organization

11%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Blueworks Live?

The solution is easy to operate. Also, there is an automatic mode to make the business flow. You don't have to put an...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Blueworks Live?

The solution costs around 600-700 dollars/year, which is quite affordable.

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What needs improvement with IBM Blueworks Live?

Sometimes, the tool is automatic, which can complicate it, but once you're accustomed to manipulating it, you can use...

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How easy is it to migrate process flow charts (modeled using tools like Visio) into Bizagi?

I have been using Bizagi with a major project for a state government agency for about four years now. It is pretty st...

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What do you like most about Visio?

The diagrams Visio creates are quite impressive in the sense that we can cooperate with more colleagues in one task a...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Visio?

One of the main problems with Visio is its licensing options and associated issues, which lead to discussions about t...

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What do you like most about Visual Paradigm?

The solution is the best application for data modeling. It helps to architect business processes. Its best features a...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Visual Paradigm?

I mentioned using the free version. The free version of Visual Paradigm does not incur any setup costs and offers a s...

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What needs improvement with Visual Paradigm?

I didn't use it so deeply that I found areas that needed improvement or features that were missing. So far, its exist...

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Comparisons

SAP Signavio Process Manager vs IBM Blueworks Live

Compared 17% of the time

Lucidchart vs IBM Blueworks Live

Compared 15% of the time

ARIS Cloud vs IBM Blueworks Live

Compared 9% of the time

Camunda vs IBM Blueworks Live

Compared 8% of the time

ARIS BPA vs IBM Blueworks Live

Compared 5% of the time

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Bizagi vs Visio

Compared 16% of the time

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs Visio

Compared 14% of the time

Lucidchart vs Visio

Compared 7% of the time

Camunda vs Visio

Compared 7% of the time

SAP Signavio Process Manager vs Visio

Compared 5% of the time

More Visio Competitors

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs Visual Paradigm

Compared 38% of the time

Lucidchart vs Visual Paradigm

Compared 15% of the time

Bizagi vs Visual Paradigm

Compared 8% of the time

No Magic MagicDraw vs Visual Paradigm

Compared 6% of the time

Camunda vs Visual Paradigm

Compared 4% of the time

More Visual Paradigm Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Blueworks Live

December 2024

Download IBM Blueworks Live product report

Buyer's Guide

Visio

November 2024

Download Visio product report

Buyer's Guide

Visual Paradigm

November 2024

Download Visual Paradigm product report

Also Known As

IBM Lombardi Blueprint

Microsoft Visio

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IBM

Microsoft

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Visual Paradigm

Overview

IBM Blueworks Live is a cloud-based business process modeling tool that helps you discover, map and document your processes. It is easy to use, allowing you to learn and perform business process modeling in minutes.

With Blueworks Live you can:

Simplify business process modeling
Quickly build business processes in a straightforward, cloud-based interface designed for both IT and business users.

Improve process efficiency and accuracy
A central process repository eliminates version control and consistency issues by providing users real-time access to process workflows.

Enhance cross-team collaboration
A shared team workspace engages all business process owners, encouraging cross-team participation and continuous process improvement.

Visio is an innovative collaborative solution that enables users to quickly visualize data-connected business process flows with a host of integrated intuitive features that bring the power of Microsoft 365 to Visio. Visio allows users to easily create professional diagrams, graphs, and other visual data, easily anywhere, anytime, and with anyone. Users are able to confidently and easily transform data into creative powerful visuals. Visio provides dozens of easy-to-use templates along with thousands of customizable colorful shapes that bring a user's best ideas to life. Visio is available for all Microsoft 365 commercial users and is available on desktop and Web applications.

Visio Features

Visio can easily create visual data for today’s business needs. Some of its most useful visual data include:

Flowcharts: Users can easily bring business concepts to fruition with Visio’s robust flowchart features. Visio provides a huge library of shapes, stencils, and templates to transform numbers and data into impactful, easy-to-understand business stories.
Organizational charts: Visio makes it easy to design articulate org charts to better visualize team, reporting, and hierarchy structures. Users are then able to seamlessly share the charts with stakeholders, teams, and employees.
Network diagrams: Users are able to creatively display how a system design processes function and visually illustrate how devices and networks interact with each other using a variety of network shapes, templates, and connector tools.
Brainstorming: Visio makes brainstorming simple and actionable with a wide range of templates designed specifically for interpreting problems and mapping out solutions, including fishbone and Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) diagrams.
Floor plans: Users can design ergonomic workspaces, retail store layouts, new homes, and more with accurate, scalable templates and tools to help them better visualize function, flow, and overall aesthetic appeal.
Accessible: Visio is able to integrate with a wide variety of accessibility tools, such as Narrator, Accessibility Checker, and high-contrast support, to ensure Visio diagrams are available to your entire team.

Reviews from Real Users

“Visio has improved my workflow by making it easy to create charts, diagrams, and essential illustrations to use in my client reports and proposals. It has saved me a lot of time I would otherwise spend creating visuals for clients manually.” - Michael B., Principal Consultant at Lexington Consulting

“I use it for diagramming networks, racks, data centers, data flow applications, etc. It is a useful tool to map data flows, network objects, and computer science technology and to show to clients. It does what I need it to do. It's a tool I've used the longest, so I know it the best, and that's probably the claim to fame.” - Greg S., Director of Solution Architecture at Winslow Technology Group

“We use Visio for architecture modeling. We also use it to facilitate communication with other people. The feature I like most about Visio is that it acts as a facilitator of communication, as it displays information in a way that's easier to understand.” - Guy M., IT/Business Architect at a financial services firm

Visual Paradigm is a UML tool. The tool is designed for a wide range of users including software engineers, system analysts, business analysts and system architects, or for anyone who is interested in reliably building large-scale software systems using an object-oriented approach. In addition, Visual Paradigm supports the latest standards of UML notation.

Sample Customers

Cloudsoft Corp. Ltd., Bayer, S¾SS, Essex County Council

Thomas College, Hamburg Port Authority, Portigon AG, Conseil G_n_ral du d_partement des Hautes-Alpes, AAA Auto a. s., Commonwealth Financial Network, ICA, Abu Dhabi National Energy Company

Adobe, Apple, at&t, Caterpillar, Intel, NASA, Nokia, Toyota

Buyer's Guide

Visio vs. Visual Paradigm

December 2024

Free Report: Visio vs. Visual Paradigm

Find out what your peers are saying about Visio vs. Visual Paradigm and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.

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