MicroStrategy vs ThoughtSpot comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

MicroStrategy
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
9th
Ranking in Embedded BI
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
156
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
ThoughtSpot
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
15th
Ranking in Embedded BI
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2024, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of MicroStrategy is 3.8%, down from 4.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ThoughtSpot is 2.0%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
Unique Categories:
Embedded BI
61.8%
Data Visualization
3.0%
 

Featured Reviews

Pietro Saglietti - PeerSpot reviewer
Sep 26, 2023
A robust solution for powerful data analytics
I use its Discovery Analytics feature, particularly in the context of KPI analysis for management It plays a vital role in establishing a connection with predictive continuous improvement. This approach proves highly valuable for teams involved in continuous improvement efforts, especially in…
Kevin McAllister - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 18, 2023
You can also create custom analytics even if you aren't an experienced data analyst
We invested much effort into providing a feature in a product that the user said they needed in a particular region. When the product owner checked the usage of that feature in ThoughtSpot, they found that the customers had not even adopted the version of the product with that feature in it. With that knowledge, they could work with those customers to understand what was happening. Maybe they didn't know the feature they requested was in the product, or was there another reason they did not adopt the feature? It allowed the product owner to follow up with the customer on product adoption.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We are embedding multimedia content in our apps... You can embed streaming video from websites, or you can host the video files on your internal media servers. The video is clear, absolutely."
"I like the user interface and the experience has been great."
"With all the APIs it's very scalable."
"Semi-automatic support of implementing date dimensions, including delta to prior year implementation."
"We leverage it, not only for reporting but for analytics and also for geospatial reporting."
"Technical support has sent us to rapid response before, when we really needed them."
"It is definitely customizable. We have been able to put in key metrics and performance indicators, thus it is customizable."
"The most valuable features are drill down, dashboards, documents, bringing everything under one roof, and visualizations."
"ThoughtSpot takes the modifying of existing reports out of our hands."
"The scalability is good."
"I like ThoughtSpot's search capabilities. You can also create custom analytics even if you aren't an experienced data analyst. We have users with no data analytics experience making some of the dashboards we've created, copying components, and customizing them to their specific use cases."
"The ability to do ad hoc explorations of data has been most valuable."
"The initial setup was very straightforward."
"It's easy to drill down or expand data to get more details right out of the box."
"I would say the return on investment is good. Whatever we invested, we got results. We have been finding it easy to use and onboard new use cases."
"It is easy to set up the solution."
 

Cons

"I think they're still lacking on customer service. I think historically, MicroStrategy's customer service was a lot better than it is today."
"From a stability standpoint, from MicroStrategy, I would say it's fairly consistent. I would give it a "B" because there are times where we have issues that are just inexplicable. They go away and then we have no resolution. To me, that's not acceptable. There are just times where our users can't access things and we're not sure why, and that's a problem to me."
"Something I would be interested in is more visualizations, because right now we use SDK to create some. If there were more out-of-the-box options, we would be happy with that."
"I would like to see a feature where migrations are easier. When you migrate from certain environments, it could probably be a little cleaner. Sometimes it seems to be somewhat clunky when you migrate from one environment, say a development to a test or production environment."
"I would try to make it a little more basic, user-friendly. In terms of the UX, it's a bit sluggish there."
"I would like to see the enterprise version available in a demo or as a trial version."
"They should provide more tutorials and include some project files."
"They need to improve the web."
"The dashboards could give you more ability to fine tune the appearance. You get a great deal more control over how something looks in Power BI than you do in ThoughtSpot."
"I would like to see more flexibility in adding the pins. Currently, we have four different sizes in which I can add pins, but I would like to be able to resize my pins."
"The most difficult thing I found is that it only deals with the files and does not have direct connectivity to databases."
"If I want to order columns, this feature is not there."
"In terms of features, I'd like to be able to pivot data - for example, going from rows to columns. It's not easy to do."
"A customized visualization is lacking in this product."
"The one area of the solution that I do hear needs improvement is on the visualization front."
"ThoughtSpot is a fairly new product, so some usability aspects aren't as mature as we'd like them to be. One example is their organizational methodology, like how objects are organized in their dashboards inside the product. They're all on a flat list, which works if you've got five or 10 dashboards. However, it's insufficient when you're a large enterprise with multiple groups looking at the same dashboards. It isn't organized well."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"MicroStrategy's licensing cost is higher than that of other tools in the market. My company uses the enterprise edition of the product."
"We have a license with packages, and there are additional costs for extra components."
"I am unsure what the licensing costs are for this solution however, development costs are around $100,000 per year."
"The price was good. We have had great support along the way."
"They offer yearly as well as perpetual licenses."
"They need to work on their license structure. They are not competitive against somebody like SAP BusinessObjects. We had a quote that was almost a third the price, coming from SAP BusinessObjects, and it's not a better platform. It's not cheaper. They do concurrent user licensing, while MicroStrategy does named user licensing, and that was literally the only difference. But it made a $500,000 difference. They've got to do something to make themselves more competitive. Maybe it's assessing your business users and what you really expect them to use, and maybe giving a reduced price on that. But they are already giving us a 60% discount and they were still a million or so above, over a three-year time period. That doesn't account for synergies as we get from on-site resources that are already available, but I thought that that was a big, big deficit for them."
"They made a change in the licensing module some time ago and we can now use all the enterprise tools for free."
"While initial cost of MicroStrategy is still on the higher side, the long-term benefits brings down overall cost of ownership significantly as compared to other tools like Tableau/Cognos."
"I give the pricing a six out of ten."
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Comparison Review

it_user6330 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
11%
Retailer
9%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
24%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about MicroStrategy?
The stability of the product is good.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MicroStrategy?
MicroStrategy's licensing cost is higher than that of other tools in the market. My company uses the enterprise edition of the product. For beginners, there are trial accounts that are provided by ...
What needs improvement with MicroStrategy?
The solution provider should take some initiatives to grow the MicroStrategy community because, presently, it's quite small, and I wasn't able to find a solution to my problem by searching in the c...
What do you like most about ThoughtSpot?
It's easy to drill down or expand data to get more details right out of the box.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ThoughtSpot?
I like the pricing structure. I get billed by how much data I put in, not how many people are looking at the data. It's better for me as I can control pricing a bit more easily.
What needs improvement with ThoughtSpot?
We'd like more flexibility with the calendar as our fiscal year does not align with the calendar year. We have to load or create our own custom calendar to actually need our fiscal year-end. With o...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Allstate Insurance, Barneys New York, Boston Children's Hospital, Buenos Aires Department of the Treasury, Campbell Soup Company, DHL, eBay, eHarmony, Facebook, Four Seasons Hotels Inc., Godiva, Hard Rock International, LinkedIn, Netflix, Pfizer, SECO (Swiss Government Unemployment Agency), Starbucks, Texas A&M University, Thomson Reuters Markets, US House of Representatives, and the US Postal Service.
Primary Capital Mortgage, Sterling Backcheck, RichRelevance, Rambus, Batteries Plus Bulbs
Find out what your peers are saying about MicroStrategy vs. ThoughtSpot and other solutions. Updated: May 2024.
787,817 professionals have used our research since 2012.