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BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

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

BiZZdesign HoriZZon
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
7th
Ranking in Business Process Design
13th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Sparx Systems Enterprise Ar...
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
4th
Ranking in Business Process Design
7th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
99
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the mindshare of BiZZdesign HoriZZon is 4.9%, up from 4.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is 8.9%, down from 13.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Architecture Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect8.9%
BiZZdesign HoriZZon4.9%
Other86.2%
Enterprise Architecture Management
 

Featured Reviews

Maamoun Hasuneh - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Enterprise Architect at EVC
Architecture repository has strengthened data‑driven decisions and supported risk‑aware planning
BiZZdesign HoriZZon needs to publish its integration scenarios and integration points with other digital transformation tools such as IT service management, risk management, asset management, customer service, and ERP. The company should first build the scenario and define its integration points in business and technology to make customers more confident about having a complete solution. Currently, there is a challenge with the company to offer transparent and documented integration. They offer five integration points at a fixed price, but other things come at additional costs. However, specific information about what those additional items are, what the scenarios entail, what the schemas are, what the workflows include, and what the application integration involves is not provided. The learning portal does not include integration documentation at a high level or in detail. The portal does have comprehensive resources explaining how to make their website, how to create dashboards, and how to publish EA content, which are clear. The high-end tool on the laptop is also explained in detail, covering elements, relations, and everything as standard.
Milan Sterba - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Enterprise Architect at Deepview S.r.o.
Efficient documentation generation through organized model structure with a good price-performance ratio
Whenever I begin a new project with Sparx, I have to spend time training people on how to use it since it is not straightforward. Although it's a powerful product with plenty of features, it's not easy for even experienced users to find their way without guidance. This is not the most user-friendly solution.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"t's a good tool. My colleagues that are making use of it for application, business processes, or data modeling, are very satisfied with it. They find it easy to use. The graphical representation is simple but therefore efficient, so I know that they are planning a very good commencement on the use of these tools."
"Among the valuable features is the ability to document standards. For example, we have mandatory operating standards that need to be followed by every application and every architecture. We use things like table charts and pie charts for documenting the costs incurred across the systems. All of these are good features."
"It is very easy to use. I can just click on an application component and find out if we are using this particular component. This provides us flexibility."
"BiZZdesign Architect separates model from views and has a quite extensive set of analytical stuff built in to be very useful in complex environments."
"The most valuable features of BiZZdesign HoriZZon include the diagrammatic representation of BPMN models, which I find good for modeling, and things such as capability maps."
"The feature I find most valuable is that the start times and loading times are short, it takes only a few seconds to load the repository and whenever I want to open diagrams, they are there almost immediately."
"The initial setup of this solution was very straightforward."
"It's a good tool, my colleagues that are making use of it for application, business processes, or data modeling are very satisfied with it, they find it easy to use, and the graphical representation is simple but therefore efficient."
"It is an excellent way for a company to start or an organization to start using an enterprise architecture discipline."
"Its traversability is most valuable. I can use ArchiMate, and I can create a UML model. ArchiMate is for logical enterprise architecture, UML is for software engineering, and BPMN is for business processes. I can build it to have multiple models, and they are also traversable, which is not something that every tool allows. If there is a huge organization, you can segment it and have separate models for business technology or internal resource management system. You don't need to keep them in one model, and you can decide to segregate them."
"The installation was very easy."
"EA is a good, cheap, flexible, and capable tool."
"The product overall is quite good."
"Customizable and tailored to the environment. Several template frameworks are provided."
"The solution saved a lot of time, about 30%."
"When I confronted the developer team that I plan to switch from JIRA to EA, they were not really happy, but now, after a short while, they love it because they immediately see changes, have access to all the diagrams (ERDs, Sequence Diagrams etc.), always have the big picture, and wherever they are, they can simply right-click an element, click "Find in Diagrams" and see this element in context."
 

Cons

"There could be simpler modelling."
"Scalability is a bit of a problem for BiZZdesign. There is always a possibility it will failover."
"This tool is something of a beast - it takes a long time to learn, and it isn't possible for casual users and most architects. Unless a person spends 500 or 1,000 hours on the tool or does very concentrated sessions using all its functionalities, it's very difficult to master."
"This tool is something of a beast - it takes a long time to learn, and it isn't possible for casual users and most architects."
"The repository of duplicate objects is bad."
"The users of BiZZdesign should be able to enter their data or make modeling changes via HoriZZon."
"There's room for improvement. When I finished using it over a year ago, I discussed implementing C4 notation with BiZZdesign HoriZZon.They've likely done this now, but I haven't seen it. Setting up interactive views for stakeholders to score services was a bit difficult."
"The visibility of things and the user experience in HoriZZon are horrible."
"I'd like Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect to be more stable, and have a more improved performance."
"Not visually appealing."
"It is weak in regards to data modelling. It does not provide logical or physical data modelling or the ability to migrate from conceptual to physical and back."
"Weak in regards to data modelling. No logical or physical modelling or migration from conceptual to physical."
"Sparx can be a bit slow. If you are trying to design software architecture, sometimes we run into issues and need to refresh."
"The database management area was not usable."
"In a database-server deployment there are performance/locking issues when multiple users make changes simultaneously."
"The user interface could be more intuitive and support for a Mac, iOS or at least a browser version would be very welcomed."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I haven't found any issues with the scalability and licensing parts that are access-related."
"If one is very cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the product price as a seven out of ten."
"We were customers and bought licenses from them. We used their remote instance initially but upgraded to the on-device version due to lag. For pricing, we paid about 2200 pounds a year per seat for the client installation at an educational rate. I'm not sure about commercial rates. I managed to get a free copy at BBC since it was for evaluation purposes."
"First and foremost within the scope of improvement for the solution would be the cost. It's very costly..."
"The pricing model is slightly on the high side and could be more competitive for long-term partnerships."
"[The] Orbus... pricing model was based on every single functionality having a price. The pricing was comparable but if we wanted to scale, it would have ended up being a lot more expensive. BiZZdesign gave us one price with all of the functionality, and we could scale as much as we needed."
"The price is reasonable."
"In terms of this particular product usage, my clients currently only use per-user licenses."
"Pricing and licensing is very attractive, simple, and straightforward."
"Enterprise licensing is competitive. What would be helpful if they load the pricing for consultants, you know, people who are consultants for clients. So the license is fine for end-user organizations. Still, they should consider lowering the license to support this adoption, particularly for people who are consultants like myself."
"We have an annual license, and it's very affordable."
"Pricing and licensing are suitable even for small companies."
"The licensing is not as expensive as some of the other data modeling tools such as Erwin."
"I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten."
"The license I use is on-premise. We haven't gone to the cloud where we have to pay monthly or something like that. Sparx is cheaper than most similar tools."
"It's reasonably priced for large organizations."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
21%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Energy/Utilities Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise10
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business39
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise58
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
BiZZdesign HoriZZon needs to publish its integration scenarios and integration points with other digital transformation tools such as IT service management, risk management, asset management, custo...
What is your primary use case for BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
BiZZdesign HoriZZon is primarily used as a repository for Enterprise Architecture and is also utilized in broad portfolio management including project management and other applications, but the mai...
What advice do you have for others considering BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
BiZZdesign HoriZZon's reporting and dashboard functionalities are good and very good; they compete well with other solutions and are simpler, but they have scripting and programming tools to produc...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
One of the reasons many public sector institutions in the Czech Republic use it is that it provides a very good price-performance ratio. While it might be cumbersome to learn, it still delivers exc...
What needs improvement with Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
Whenever I begin a new project with Sparx, I have to spend time training people on how to use it since it is not straightforward. Although it's a powerful product with plenty of features, it's not ...
What is your primary use case for Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
We are mostly using the ArchiMate language to describe enterprise or solution architecture, along with a bit of use cases. We are producing quite large models, with over 10,000 elements and relatio...
 

Also Known As

HoriZZon
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

T-Mobile, Shell, HSBC, Erasmus University, VIVAT Insurance
OmniLink
Find out what your peers are saying about BiZZdesign HoriZZon vs. Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,915 professionals have used our research since 2012.