We performed a comparison between IBM Cognos and Tableau based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: In this comparison, IBM Cognos comes out on top. Users are happier with the support than Tableau users are, and IBM Cognos users also report an ROI.
"Using custom controls, it is possible to extend the application with even more functionality and make the application intuitive and attractive."
"Self-service is possible through the use of dashboards, which are also very intuitive. Stories can be used to pin snapshots, tell the story for meetings, etc."
"Cognos is the best application with dashboards,batch reporting, jobs, events and ad-hoc reporting for business users."
"This solution allows you to input a wide range of file formats."
"Integration with Office can enable the 'download' mode of storytelling."
"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."
"The solution's initial setup process is easy."
"Even while a user is using a cube for reporting, there will not be a situation as ' Cube file locked; unable to build or deploy'."
"I like the calculation feature. I would not say it's such a good feature in Tableau, but if you have the knowledge, you can make that feature visible to everyone. It's not a feature that we can drag and drop and get the information. But whatever the data, whatever the calculation, I'm able to do. It's basically the knowledge base. Whatever knowledge I have, I can make that information public and publish it for management."
"A valuable feature of Tableau is that it is a useful tool for small setups. I shuffle between Tableau and MicroStrategy, so I use Tableau for personal purposes more than enterprise. I like the light version of Tableau for personal usage and doing some use cases on my own. When it comes to something small, I use Tableau for setups, rather than any other tool."
"We frequently utilize visualizations using maps and different objects, all with rich coloring options. And tooltips are absolutely essential for us. Tooltips, like the pop-up descriptions when you hover over some object or graph. Those tooltips in Tableau are great features."
"While using this solution I have found the valuable features to be ease of use and the visualization. It is a complete solution."
"Tableau's most valuable feature is its ability to connect with various data sources and display real-time data on three different dashboards."
"From my perspective, it enables clients to better understand our data and make better decisions based on that information."
"It's very easy to use and users don't need any IT support to access it as the information is right there."
"Tableau is a fantastic tool that provides impressive dashboards and customized reports."
"Need improvement towards Visualization."
"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."
"There are some small features that are missing. It would be nice if the graphics were better. You can use external sources for charts, but it's quite complex to use and not easy to implement. If you want a new chart, you can download it from multiple tools and implement it into IBM Cognos."
"It would be better if it is was easier to implement without extensive training for it."
"This product could use improvement in terms of usability for those with less technical know how."
"The high cost of a license makes it hard to scale up on a budget."
"Data modeling needs to be improved. We use the ETL process, and when we get errors, we then need to identify which structural change is required. The error messaging should be better. They should be descriptive rather than semantic."
"Extending features on dashboards so it becomes a real dashboard building application, not only a data exploration tool."
"I would like Tableau Prep to be integrated with Tableau Desktop. I would also like more customizations for tables."
"The integration with other program languages, like Python, needs to be better."
"It's already using 32 gigabytes of memory, but the performance is not so good. It's very heavy."
"When compared to Power BI, it is less user-friendly."
"There could be improvements on the mobile application, it is lacking features."
"The pricing is a bit higher than the competition. They'll need to lower it to stay competitive."
"The customization requires a lot of effort and should be simplified. The performance could be better."
"They need to improve the icons and the filters, because they look too old, resembling Excel from 1997."
IBM Cognos is ranked 7th in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 132 reviews while Tableau is ranked 2nd in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 293 reviews. IBM Cognos is rated 8.0, while Tableau is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of IBM Cognos writes "Improved the quality of our KPIs, while reducing calls to the IT department". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Tableau writes "Provides fast data access with in-memory extracts, makes it easy to create visualizations, and saves time". IBM Cognos is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, Oracle OBIEE, SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform, Oracle Hyperion and Amazon QuickSight, whereas Tableau is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, Amazon QuickSight, Domo, SAS Visual Analytics and QlikView. See our IBM Cognos vs. Tableau report.
See our list of best BI (Business Intelligence) Tools vendors and best Reporting vendors.
We monitor all BI (Business Intelligence) Tools reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.