Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Birst vs Qlik Sense comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 29, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
8.3
Birst offers substantial returns by providing visualization tools that impact the organization through enhanced sales and data access capabilities.
Sentiment score
6.3
Companies achieve quick and substantial ROI with Qlik Sense, citing cost savings, increased revenue, and enhanced decision-making efficiency.
In my organization, we moved from OBI to Qlik Sense due to limitations with OBI, resulting in very high ROI.
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.0
Birst's technical support is mixed; praised for responsiveness and customer service but faces challenges with time zones and reliance on forums.
Sentiment score
5.3
Users appreciate Qlik Sense stability, community resources, and consulting services, despite mixed reviews on technical support response times.
While tech support is comprehensive, the stability of Qlik Sense means I generally do not need it.
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
In Turkey, the consultant firms are very professional, and they support you.
Business Intelligence Architect at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
I think they lack in the support system.
Associate Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.4
Birst's scalability receives mixed reviews; some praise it, while others face challenges, costs, and complexity, yet cloud solutions impress.
Sentiment score
7.7
Qlik Sense efficiently scales with ease of adding RIM nodes, though licensing is costly, favored by large enterprises.
It is easily scalable with Microsoft, with other services Azure and other tools they provide.
student at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees
Qlik Sense helps analyze data and can handle larger amounts of data compared to other BI tools.
Solution Architect at Predoole Analytics
It performs well in terms of performance and load compared to others.
Associate Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.3
Birst users experience varying stability, with issues during upgrades and large datasets, though some report smooth performance improvements.
Sentiment score
7.6
Qlik Sense is highly stable with reliable performance, minor setup issues, but excellent support and consistent updates.
The stability is very good.
Associate Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
 

Room For Improvement

Birst struggles with performance, customization, UI, visualization features, inefficiencies, and support, requiring enhancements and modernization in various areas.
Qlik Sense needs enhanced statistical functions, data integration, ETL, customization, visualization, governance, efficiency, and user-friendly interfaces.
There should be more comprehensive documentation and explanatory videos available to help clients understand and calculate capacity-based pricing, making it easier to predict costs before implementing Qlik Sense Cloud.
Solution Architect at Predoole Analytics
Power BI has better visualizations and interactions with updates in 2023 that provide ease of use.
Business Intelligence Architect at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Providing an API feature to access data from the dashboard or QEDs could be beneficial.
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
 

Setup Cost

Birst offers market-standard pricing with a subscription model, providing comprehensive solutions and flexibility despite high entry costs.
Qlik Sense offers competitive pricing with flexible, scalable licensing, offsetting initial costs for enterprises considering its fast implementation.
It is just about how expensive it is to implement.
student at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees
Core-based licensing operates on a subscription mode, allowing unlimited users.
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
Compared to Power BI, it is definitely costly.
Associate Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
 

Valuable Features

Birst provides scalable data visualization, cloud-based architecture, and integrates ETL, reporting, and dashboards for efficient data-driven decisions.
Qlik Sense excels in user-friendly data visualization, rapid integration, and insightful analytics with advanced features like GeoAnalytics and AI.
From an end-user perspective, it's convenient and performance-oriented, providing something meaningful from all the organization's data.
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
It is a single product that I can use as an ETL database, BI, and more.
Associate Director at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
It has an interactive interface with Qlik graphs, pivot, and interactivity, which makes it easier to use than other tools.
Business Intelligence Architect at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Birst
Ranking in Embedded BI
18th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Reporting (30th)
Qlik Sense
Ranking in Embedded BI
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
124
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (4th), AI Data Analysis (16th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Embedded BI category, the mindshare of Birst is 1.2%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qlik Sense is 10.4%, up from 10.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Embedded BI Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Qlik Sense10.4%
Birst1.2%
Other88.4%
Embedded BI
 

Featured Reviews

SK
Principal Engineering Manager I at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
Offers dashboards and self-service reports. The report performance is very slow.
Dashboards and self-service reports. These are widely used by customers in the EPM domain Most of our customers are interested in dashboards and self-service reports. We are able to offer them these features with this solution. Customer support takes lot of time to get a solution The report…
reviewer2592669 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
In-memory data storage boosts performance
The advantages compared to other BI tools show architectural differences. The main feature is that it keeps all the data in memory. It doesn't retrieve the data from data sources when I need it on the dashboard; instead, it quickly provides the desired data, making it very fast compared to other BI tools. The ROI is very high using Qlik Sense. It offers many benefits of BI. It is flexible from a developer's point of view, allowing me to accomplish many tasks compared to other BI tools. From an end-user perspective, it's convenient and performance-oriented, providing something meaningful from all the organization's data.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Embedded BI solutions are best for your needs.
879,768 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise12
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise40
Large Enterprise86
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
There are many...It would rather depend what System BI architecture or Enterprise legacy you have at your end...I would recommend as follows: 1) If you have legacies of SAP, Oracle - look for SAP...
What do you like most about Qlik Sense?
The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are its speed and seamless development of web technologies.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
QlikSense, Qlik Analytics Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Citrix Systems, Jive Software, SunnyD, Toshiba Medical Systems, Cisco OpenDNS, RB, Sunny D, Vertafore
Abbvie, Airbus, Barclays, BT Openreach, BMW, Daimler AG, HSBC, IKEA, Nationwide Building Society, Royal Mail Group, Sanofi, Siemens, Wendy'', Vodafone, Volvo
Find out what your peers are saying about Birst vs. Qlik Sense and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,768 professionals have used our research since 2012.