erwin Data Modeler by Quest vs iServer comparison

erwin by Quest and Orbus Software are both solutions in the Enterprise Architecture Management category. erwin by Quest is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.2, while Orbus Software is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.0. erwin by Quest holds a 10.2% mindshare in AM, compared to Orbus Software’s 4.5% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of erwin by Quest users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Orbus Software users who would recommend it.

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Read 39 erwin Data Modeler by Quest reviews

3,669 Views
2,004 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

iServer

Read 18 iServer reviews

1,801 Views
886 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

iServer

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

iServer and erwin Data Modeler by Quest compete in data modeling and enterprise architecture. erwin Data Modeler by Quest has a competitive feature edge, while iServer is more attractive in terms of pricing and support.

Features: iServer offers seamless integration with various enterprise architecture frameworks, efficient reporting capabilities, and flexible deployment options. erwin Data Modeler by Quest has advanced data modeling, comprehensive metadata management, and powerful collaboration tools.

Room for Improvement: iServer could enhance its ease of use and speed of deployment and provide more user-friendly interfaces. It might also benefit from more advanced collaboration features. erwin Data Modeler by Quest could improve its pricing structure, adaptability to budget-conscious businesses, and offer simpler integration with non-Microsoft products.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: erwin Data Modeler by Quest provides a straightforward deployment process with robust customer service for smooth transitions. iServer's scalable deployment process may have a steeper learning curve, but it offers thorough support once understood.

Pricing and ROI: iServer is generally more affordable with quick ROI, appealing to budget-conscious buyers. erwin Data Modeler by Quest, with a higher initial cost, offers significant long-term ROI due to its extensive features.

To learn more, read our detailed erwin Data Modeler by Quest vs. iServer Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

erwin Data Modeler by Quest vs. iServer

June 2025

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Helped 859,687 peers since 2012

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

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management

3rd

Ranking in Business Process Design

10th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

iServer

Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management

8th

Ranking in Business Process Design

17th

Average Rating

7.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the mindshare of erwin Data Modeler by Quest is 10.2%, up from 10.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of iServer is 4.5%, up from 4.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Enterprise Architecture Management

Featured Reviews

JorgeSanz

Data Governance Senior Advisor at Abu Dhabi National Oil Company

Streamline data modeling and automate network changes for increased efficiency

The initial setup depends on the tool if you are using the data model environment. Stopping the server could be complex and require strong expertise. If you have everything set up and configured, Erwin is straightforward. You can deploy it in a few hours. In our case, it took a couple of months to address internal conditions, assign machines, and set up everything for the services. I rate the initial setup a six out of ten, where one is difficult and ten is easy.

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Antonios Lazanakis

Senior IT Solution Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Flexible, easy to use, and easy to import data

We use iServer to establish an enterprise architecture function in our organization iServer is a very flexible platform for defining your own enterprise architecture model. It is very easy to import data, and we also have good integration with Visual Drawing Tools and SharePoint. The solution is…

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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

"We use the Forward and Reverse Engineering tools to help us speed things up and create things that would have to be done otherwise by hand. E.g., getting a database into a data model format or vice versa."

"erwin has versioning so you can keep versions, over time, of those models and you can compare any version to any version. If you're looking at a specific database and you want to see what changed over time, that's really useful. You can go back to a different version or connect that to your change-control processes so you can see what was released when."

"The solution’s code generation ensures accurate engineering of data sources, as there is no development time. Code doesn't even have to be reviewed. We have been using this solution for so long and all the code which has been generated is accurate with the requirements. Once we generate the DDLs out of the erwin tools, the development team does a quick review of the script line by line. They will just be running the script on the database and looking into other requirements, such as the index. So, there is less effort from development side to create tables or build a database."

"The data lineage feature is very valuable."

"It reduces monthly savings by hundreds of thousands of dollars. Think about a company like Costco and all of the points of sale systems in Costco, all of the systems, the applications, but if all the applications in Costco all had their own data model, trying to integrate those, upgrade them and manage their different versions of the same model throughout the store, is an absolute nightmare. It's phenomenally expensive. This helps reduce that cost significantly. I'm talking on the orders of hundreds of thousands of dollars."

"The solution is good for organizing the data and the scripting part is very powerful. It's easy to create technical scripts for models."

"Being able to point it to a database and then pull the metadata is a valuable feature. Another valuable feature is being able to rearrange the model so that we can display it to users. We are able to divide the information into subject areas, and we can divide the data landscape into smaller chunks, which makes it easier to understand. If you had 14 subject areas, 1,000 entities, and 6,000 columns, you can't quite understand it all at once. So, being able to have the same underlying model but only display portions of it at a time is extremely useful."

"The generation of DDL saved us having to write the steps by hand. You still had to go in and make some minor modifications to make it deployable to the database system. However, for the data lineage, it is very valuable for tracing our use of data, especially personal confidential data through different systems."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pros

"iServer has valuable features for workflow and document management."

"Integrating the Microsoft documents to the product and visualization matrix where we can see the end-to-end relationship of the network is of great importance to our company."

"Good and effective reporting features, which help in decision making."

"iServer is a solution that helps catalog enterprise architect solutions and catalog information."

"The solution is easily modified to suit your needs."

"The most valuable features of iServer are the integration with Microsoft Office and the interface is similar to Microsoft applications making them easy to use."

"iServer is a very flexible platform for defining your own enterprise architecture model."

"I have to think less with this solution. It's simple."

More iServer pros

Cons

"I would like the solution to be less rigid in terms of its theory."

"The Bulk Editor needs improvement. If you had something that was a local model to your local machine, you could connect to the API, then it would write directly into the repository. However, when you have something that is on the centralized server, that functionality did not work. Then, you had to export out to a CSV and upload up to the repository. It would have been nice to be able to do the direct API without having that whole download and upload thing. Maybe I didn't figure it out, but I'm pretty sure that didn't work when it was a model that sat on a centralized repository."

"Although Quest Software has made tremendous strides in recent years, they need to evolve more in the big data arena; erwin Data Modeler could use a little more work when it comes to big database designs."

"erwin generally fails to successfully reverse engineer our Oracle Databases into erwin data models. The way that they are engineered on our side, the syntax is correct from an Oracle perspective, but it seems to be very difficult for erwin to interpret. What I end up doing is using Oracle Data Modeler to reverse engineer into the Oracle data model, then forward engineer the DDL into an Oracle syntax, and importing that DDL into erwin in order to successfully bring in most of the information from our physical data models. That is a bit of a challenge."

"The erwin ETL functionality has room for improvement when it comes to mapping databases with a classic entity-relationship model to a data warehouse model."

"It is not a very stable solution. I rate the stability five out of ten."

"I love the product. I love the ability to get into the code, make it automated, and make it do what I want. I would like to see them put some kind of governance over the ability to make changes to the mart tables with the API, so that instead of just using the modeler's rights to a table -- it has a separate set of rights for API access. That would give us the ability to put governance around API applications. Right now a person with erwin and Excel/VBA has the ability to make changes to models with the API if they also have rights to make changes to the model from erwin. It's a risk."

"I would like to see the reporting capabilities be more dynamic and more inclusive of information. The API is very sparsely understood by people across the user community."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest cons

"The one issue is that if you want to import predefined work, you need to put the licensing model in. So if you wanted to import work that was done before, you then need to buy a separate product for that."

"Enhancing integration options with ERP or ITSM-related solutions for triggering automated requests for process definitions, changes, and tracking them in the iServer."

"iServer is a solid tool. Occasionally, we needed to contact the vendor to clarify details such as porting issues, missing components, and model specifics."

"There are other solutions out there that have a better user interface."

"The performance is slow, which is something that should be improved."

"The modelling needs improvement, specifically forecasting capabilities and scenarios."

"There can be some performance issues using the solution that should be improved. When you make modifications modify to files there are embedded data within that can take a while to process."

"iServer should invest in enhancing the capabilities of the embedded drawing tool, draw.io."

More iServer cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of the solution is cheap. I rate the pricing a five out of ten."

"The primary reasons that erwin was selected were that it was much more affordable for us [than Embarcadero] and it was easily maintainable."

"The price should be lower in order to be on the same level as its competitors."

"Price-wise, erwin Data Modeler is okay. You can purchase a single license and it is not very expensive."

"The solution is expensive."

"Pricing is very high compared to any other product."

"I wish it wasn't so expensive. I would love to personally buy a copy of my own and have it at home, because the next job that I'm looking at is probably project management and I might not have access to the tool. I would like to keep my ability to use the tool. Therefore, they should probably have a pricing for people like me who want to just use the solution as an independent consultant, trying to get started. $3,000 is a big hit."

"The price of erwin Data Modeler is very expensive, in particular for this part of the world."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pricing and cost advice

"The product has a moderate pricing."

"The solution is cheaper than its competitors."

"They offer annual subscriptions for developing countries, which are not affordable for small or medium businesses."

"Aim for the exact number of people who shall define/review approve and view the processes, as it will impact the cost."

"It's about 13K to set up and 9K for the license for three months. I think it's about 20K a year, but we haven't firmed up on pricing yet because the price depends on how long we commit to the solution."

"The price of iServer is reasonable compared to other solutions."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Educational Organization

14%

Government

11%

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

Forward engineering, DDL generation, reverse engineering, and reporting are the most valuable features of the solution.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

The product is expensive. I rate the product’s pricing a nine out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with erwin Data Modeler by Quest?

As a documenting tool, it's solid, though its reporting could be more robust. The reporting mechanisms could be more intuitive regarding report creation. It can generate reports in CSV files, displ...

See all answers

What do you like most about iServer?

iServer has valuable features for workflow and document management.

See all answers

What needs improvement with iServer?

iServer should invest in enhancing the capabilities of the embedded drawing tool, draw.io. draw.io is a drawing tool used to draw architectural diagrams, flow diagrams, etc. It is an alternative to...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for iServer?

We use iServer to establish an enterprise architecture function in our organization.

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 34% of the time

IDERA ER/Studio vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 20% of the time

Lucidchart vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 13% of the time

Visio vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 7% of the time

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Compared 6% of the time

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest Competitors

LeanIX vs iServer

Compared 25% of the time

OrbusInfinity vs iServer

Compared 15% of the time

Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs iServer

Compared 14% of the time

BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs iServer

Compared 9% of the time

ARIS BPA vs iServer

Compared 8% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

June 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Enterprise Architecture Management

June 2025

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Also Known As

erwin DM

No data available

Overview

erwin pioneered data modeling, and erwin Data Modeler (erwin DM) remains trusted, award-winning software for data modeling and database design, automating complex and time-consuming tasks. Use it to discover and document any data from anywhere for consistency, clarity and artifact reuse across large-scale data integration, master data management, metadata management, Big Data, business intelligence and analytics initiatives – all while supporting data governance and intelligence efforts.

erwin by Quest

iServer is a unified software platform and enterprise modeling environment that extends and enhances the familiar, market leading Microsoft Visio and Office products. Core capabilities provided by iServer include an enhanced Microsoft Visio diagramming interface, a powerful central repository for all enterprise architecture or business process models and documentation, and a range of tools for visualization, analysis and decision making.

Orbus Software

Sample Customers

Premera, America Honda Motors, Aetna, Kaiser Permanente, Dental Dental Cali, Cigna, Staples

Barclays, Cathay Pacific, Deloitte, British Gas, MasterCard

Buyer's Guide

erwin Data Modeler by Quest vs. iServer

June 2025

Free Report: erwin Data Modeler by Quest vs. iServer

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