Ardoq vs erwin Data Modeler by Quest comparison

Ardoq and erwin by Quest are both solutions in the Enterprise Architecture Management category. Ardoq is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.5, while erwin by Quest is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.1. Ardoq holds a 3.4% mindshare in AM, compared to erwin by Quest’s 10.5% mindshare. Additionally, 50% of Ardoq users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of erwin by Quest users who would recommend it.

Ardoq

Read 2 Ardoq reviews

1,018 Views
645 Comparison Views

50% willing to recommend

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Read 39 erwin Data Modeler by Quest reviews

3,806 Views
2,074 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Ardoq

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Erwin Data Modeler by Quest and Ardoq are products in the enterprise data management category. Ardoq has the upper hand with its extensive feature set and perceived value, despite higher costs.

Features: Erwin Data Modeler provides comprehensive data modeling capabilities, strong integration with database environments, and data governance functionalities. Ardoq maps and visualizes enterprise architecture dynamically, facilitates real-time collaboration, and adapts to agile environments flexibly.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Erwin offers a straightforward deployment model, focusing on integration with existing data ecosystems and technical implementation support. Ardoq's cloud-based deployment ensures seamless scalability, and its proactive support enhances user adoption.

Pricing and ROI: Erwin Data Modeler uses a traditional licensing structure with predictable costs, appealing to enterprises with established budgeting strategies. Ardoq's subscription-based pricing offers flexible investments, leading to potentially higher ROI due to its agile features.

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

Buyer's Guide

Ardoq vs. erwin Data Modeler by Quest

June 2025

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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

Ardoq

Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management

12th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

5.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management

3rd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Business Process Design (9th)

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the mindshare of Ardoq is 3.4%, up from 3.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of erwin Data Modeler by Quest is 10.5%, up from 10.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Enterprise Architecture Management

Featured Reviews

Anthony Houghton

Data Architect at UK Research and Innovatio

Provides stable performance and scalability but not intuitive for data modeling

Overall, I would rate it around six out of ten. The training environment wasn't very intuitive, but maybe with more use, it will get better. We need to learn to navigate it. So, there is a potential learning curve in this tool. I use it once in a blue moon, and not very frequently because I have not found it very intuitive.

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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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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Snapshots are the most valuable feature."

"It is a stable solution."

"The data lineage feature is very valuable."

"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."

"One of the best aspects of the tool is its reverse engineering capability."

"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 modeling portion of the tool is the most valuable. There are some notes, naming standards, and other functions that we use as well. There's a whole boatload of functionality in this thing and we use maybe 10% of it. It seems to be pretty common that not all the functionality is fully utilized. But it's just got gobs and gobs of stuff that you can implement if you so choose to."

"The most valuable feature is the physical or visual representation of the database, showing the tables, the columns, the foreign keys, and the ability to generate DDL, so you can physically implement databases."

"It allows us to create logical data models. We can represent a database model in business terms, which is very useful for us."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pros

Cons

"Scalability as a standalone system is good, given the information that has been described inside Ardoq. But not the scalability as a third-party system or with integration with other systems. Because in this direction, the scalability is about zero for Ardoq."

"The training environment wasn't very intuitive, but maybe with more use, it will get better."

"The only real complaint I have is the time it takes to do a database comparison on a large model. If they could speed that up, that would be the only thing I can think of that needs improvement."

"This is a very complex product."

"Some Source official systems give us DDLs to work with and they have contents not required to be part of the DDL before we reverse engineer in the erwin DM. Therefore, we manually make changes to those scripts and edit them, then reverse-engineer within the tool. So, it does take some time to edit these DDL scripts generated by the source operational systems. What I would suggest: It would be helpful if there were a place within the erwin tool to import the file and automatically eliminate all the unnecessary lines of code, and just have the clean code built-in to generate the table/data model."

"I would like to see improved reporting and, potentially, dashboards built on top of that. Right now, it's a little manual. More automated reporting and dashboard views would help because currently you have to push things out to a spreadsheet, or to HTML, and there aren't many other options that I know of. I would like to be able to produce graphs and additional things right in the tool, instead of having to export the data somewhere else."

"I am not so happy with its speed. Sometimes, it can have problems with connections."

"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 modeling product itself is far and above anything else that I've seen on the market. There are certain inconsistencies when it comes to keeping up with other platforms' databases in the reverse-engineering process. It should also support more database platforms."

"We can only get licenses through partners."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We pay for extended support."

"We've continued to use the product for many years and compared it with others on the market. The pricing is reasonable considering what the solution offers and what we pay. There are cheaper tools, but they may not be as robust and easy to use, so it's worth the money."

"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."

"There are no costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."

"There are two license options and the pricing is reasonable."

"Likewise, the solution is a little pricey."

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

"It is not a very expensive solution. Only the licensing and maintenance fee needs to be paid."

"There is either a one-year or three-year license. It is not a pay-as-you-go license like a SaaS solution. It’s more of a traditional licensing. They are a little bit on the pricier side."

More erwin Data Modeler by Quest pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

Government

Insurance Company

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

Any experience with Strategic Project Portfolio Management Solutions?

Hi @Cheryl Joseph Looking at the crossover between Project and Portfolio management with EA, then Planview could be a good choice. If looking at Portfolio Management from an EA perspective then Le...

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What do you like most about Ardoq?

It is a stable solution.

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What needs improvement with Ardoq?

It doesn't seem good for data modeling. So, I would like to see some features related to that in future releases.

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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.

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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.

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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...

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Enterprise Architecture Management

June 2025

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Buyer's Guide

erwin Data Modeler by Quest

June 2025

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Also Known As

No data available

erwin DM

Overview

A Dynamic and Data-Driven Approach to Enterprise Architecture
Engage and connect stakeholders across the organization with business-friendly visualizations understandable to all.

Ardoq

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

Sample Customers

Schibsted, Government of Malmo, Torvald

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

Buyer's Guide

Ardoq vs. erwin Data Modeler by Quest

June 2025

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