ARIS Architect and Designer vs erwin Evolve by Quest comparison

ARIS Architect and Designer vs. erwin Evolve by Quest

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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

ARIS Architect and Designer

Ranking in Business Process Design

16th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

5.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

erwin Evolve by Quest

Ranking in Business Process Design

18th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Architecture Management (11th)

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of ARIS Architect and Designer is 0.8%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of erwin Evolve by Quest is 0.8%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Business Process Design

Featured Reviews

Angie Ibrahim Eissa

Founder & Managing Partner at BBL

Utilizing advanced features to optimize and improve process modeling capabilities

ARIS Architect and Designer needs to improve its cloud version reliability, as I experienced data corruption that reverted diagrams to earlier versions. This issue, especially with large-scale diagrams, led to significant inconvenience due to the lack of partial data restoration capability. Additionally, an academic license would be beneficial to accommodate educational purposes.

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ScottLawson

Director IT Architecture at QAD

Enables us to present data and objects visually, in diagrams, and to make them available via the web. Also enables web-based editing of data.

We tried their collaborative web modeling and we used it with a few people but we tend to not use that piece. We tend to collaborate with the people and then my team of architects draws up the diagram using the modeling tool. We then iterate through those. I would like to use it, but it was a little clunky when they first rolled it out. Overall, it's more about the company having room for improvement. What they need to do is to consolidate more of their products. For example, I was just looking and I couldn't figure out what erwin DT is. It's on the website but it would help if they could put information together and make it more clear as to what products they have and how they work with other things. I hear them talking in the support forums and, when I talk to the representative, they say they're going to do a bunch of stuff but it seems the progress is slow. The changes they need to make are to take their old, legacy product, which we use, and focus a lot on it so they can transform it into a modern cloud tool so that we have fewer little pieces to deal with. They could also fix their security model. It's very confusing to get new people onto the tool and to make sure that your content isn't being exposed to the wrong people.

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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

"The user interface is easy to work with."

"One of the most valuable features is how user-friendly ARIS is, compared to other BPM tools. This tool has very diverse types of assets available. ARIS also has a lot of customizable options, different model types, object types, a number of attributes, and a lot of customization is possible. In comparison, Signavio is very limited in terms of model types and object types. So these customizations ARIS offers are really valuable to any client who wants to create a BPM repository."

"The most important feature is ARIS's ability to turn a process design into data to analyze anything you want. For example, we have some analysis reports in ARIS that can guide us when we want to change a system. It shows us how this change will affect all of the organization's processes."

"It's really fast. It's much faster compared to Enterprise Architect."

"Its user interface is highly regarded, especially when compared with Visual Paradigm."

"One of the standout features for me is its synchronization to a publication server. It makes sharing diagrams and links with non-users easy."

"The support team is very responsive."

"It is suitable for banks, insurance companies, public administration, etc. The method is very adaptable and can be applied independently of the business."

More ARIS Architect and Designer pros

"The feature that stands out for me is the ease of configuring objects and the screens to show them. It's really easy to add a new type of object in this reference. Creating a new type of object, using it, and evolving it a little bit in terms of what we can document about it are the main features that made us decide to use this provider."

"Evolve's reverse engineering ability is quite useful."

"By placing the data and the metadata into a model, which is what the tool does, you gain the abilities for linkages between different objects in the model, linkages that you cannot get on paper or with Visio or PowerPoint. That is a huge discriminator."

"We can efficiently deploy business models into the databases and generate SQL scripts."

"We use erwin Evolve to publish to the website. This allows us to enable publishing our website using parameterisation features. In a very fast, quick way, we can publish a table or chart onto a website."

"Workgroup Repository collection of data models allows research across models without worry about platform incompatibilities and provides easy KPIs about corporate data assets."

"The initial setup was really straightforward and the deployment was done within one day."

"One of the most valuable features is the website that sits on top of the database. There's a database of objects and how they are related, and you can make views and diagrams and visual elements out of that information on the website. The website is the part that is called Evolve and we use the Evolve Designer and publish the website out to our employees. They can click around and navigate and search, etc."

More erwin Evolve by Quest pros

Cons

"Even with a formal modeling language, users can still draw freely and make a bit of a mess in your repository. It should also improve usability."

"Sometimes, it's not easy to convince customers to use this methodology because it's a bit rigid."

"The product is not flexible."

"You can have a collaboration feature, but it's necessary to have ARIS Connect which is a separate, costly product."

"The customer service of ARIS Architect and Designer was disappointing. It took forty days to conclude that partial data restoration was not possible, and it was suggested that the data might have been accidentally deleted, despite evidence to the contrary."

"The simulation part still has some way to go. It's a good feature, and it's something that other vendors don't have right now, but it can still be improved. Some features are needed in ARIS Architect, so advanced users can do things through drag-and-drop functionality."

"We face problems when the product's capacity is increased."

"This product could be improved by lowering the licensing cost. More organizations could use ARIS if they slashed the licensing costs even a little bit."

More ARIS Architect and Designer cons

"What they need to do is to consolidate more of their products. For example, I was just looking and I couldn't figure out what erwin DT is. It's on the website but it would help if they could put information together and make it more clear as to what products they have and how they work with other things."

"The solution's integration capabilities with other tools in our system has not been all that well done. We have people who use ARIS, who use System Architect and, of course, Visio. erwin has very limited ways to import and export from those kinds of tools. It's not a very easy thing to do."

"erwin Evolve by Quest could have additional features to manage the architecture of enterprises and businesses."

"They have improved the search engine a little bit but it can always be improved more. The more data you put inside it, the more you want to use it."

"The solution needs to focus on allowing for more integrations."

"Add some ability to do conditional Visualization on the models and in reports (some ideas) – maybe as a specialized Theme or Diagram or Display."

"I would like to see an improvement in the output of the solution."

"Evolve is primarily focused on the entity's licenses diagrams, but it would be nice if erwin could integrate case development, so that it shows the ER diagram plus certain inputs on the use cases and how the data is used. That deviates somewhat from the overall scope, so maybe they could call it a different product."

More erwin Evolve by Quest cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Many customers find the licensing configuration confusing. There are many different sub-details in the licensing, making it very difficult for us to understand what we are buying and what we are using with what."

"The product is expensive."

"The tool is a little bit expensive."

"The licenses are very costly. I've seen many people who are hesitant or not able to use ARIS Suite just because of the license cost. Even though they like all the functionalities and understand the value of everything ARIS provides, they aren't able to implement it."

"I estimate that we pay between $40,000 and $50,000 a year for the solution, not including the upfront costs to buy things the first time."

"Unless you are a one person shop – always go with the Workgroup edition and Concurrent licensing."

"On a yearly basis, our licensing costs are 50,000 euro. There are no additional costs because we are on a SaaS model."

"I think erwin is quite expensive. I have difficulty selling the portal, in fact."

"Yearly, our cost is €100,000."

"The licensing enables you to differentiate between people who edit the content and the people who consume it. We are able to keep the licensing costs down by keeping the "contributor" licenses to a minimum, and we then just roll out the content in a read-only version for the rest of our users."

"The cost is something like $15,000, per license. But I haven't looked at those numbers in three years. It was over $100,000 to initially set everything up and get it all configured."

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850,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

23%

Computer Software Company

11%

Insurance Company

Government

Computer Software Company

19%

Financial Services Firm

16%

Government

11%

Educational Organization

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ARIS Architect and Designer?

The support team is very responsive.

What needs improvement with ARIS Architect and Designer?

What is your primary use case for ARIS Architect and Designer?

I use ARIS Architect and Designer ( /products/aris-architect-and-designer-reviews ) for process modeling, enterprise architecture, and business process design. I only use it for customers because i...

What advice do you have for others considering erwin Evolve?

I rate erwin Evolve by Quest a nine out of ten.

What do you like most about erwin Evolve by Quest?

We can efficiently deploy business models into the databases and generate SQL scripts.

What needs improvement with erwin Evolve by Quest?

erwin Evolve by Quest could have additional features to manage the architecture of enterprises and businesses.

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Product Reports

ARIS Architect and Designer

Download ARIS Architect and Designer product report

erwin Evolve by Quest

Download erwin Evolve by Quest product report

Also Known As

ARIS Architect & Designer, ARIS Architect, ARIS Designer

erwin EA, erwin Business Process, erwin Enterprise Architecture

Overview

ARIS is the market-leading solution for professional business process management and modeling. Whether you want to document the "as-is" state of your operations for quality or certification reasons or design the "to-be" in terms of continuous improvement in your transformation program, ARIS is the best choice for establishing a single source of truth regarding all process excellence topics in your organization. It is for any organization looking to digitally transform their business, increase operational excellence and customer experience and ensure compliance in execution. ARIS helps you to make the most out of your processes with Process Mining, Risk & Compliance Management, RPA and much more.

What makes the difference?

The most comprehensive platform for process excellence in the market
Easy to use
Covers business & IT architecture from all angles
Full flexibility and >100 diagram types
Customer-driven development based on best practices
Strong partner ecosystem

ARIS is the market-leading solution for any organization and ideally suited to digitally transform the organization, increase operational excellence and customer experience and ensure compliance in execution.

Software AG

erwin is used by more than 50,000 professionals in 60+ countries to get big results from their enterprise data initiatives. erwin is the #1 choice in virtually every industry, from government and healthcare to retail and finance.

erwin Modeling provides a collaborative environment to manage enterprise data through an intuitive, graphical interface. With a centralized view of key data definitions, you can leverage information as a strategic asset and more efficiently manage your data resources to save time and money.

erwin by Quest

Sample Customers

Tesco, Weifu, Airbus, Siemens, Proximus, Alicorp, Sekerbank, Bancor, Philips,Sky, Emirates NBD, Dubai Municipality, Suva, U.S. Army, Australia Post, Westfalen Weser Energie - ARIS serves customers across all industries and of every size worldwide. Companies trust ARIS as the market leader for process excellence with more than 30 years of experience in the market, 10 million users worldwide, from 1 user companies to the Fortune 500.

AT&T, Bank of America, Chevron, Duke University, ESPN, Fidelity, GE, JP Morgan Chase, KPMG, McGraw Hill, NASA, Pfizer, Royal Bank of Scotland, Teradata, Union Pacific, Vodafone, Wells Fargo.

ARIS Architect and Designer vs. erwin Evolve by Quest