Board vs Knowage comparison

Board International and Knowage are both solutions in the Reporting category. Board International is ranked #18 with an average rating of 8.3, while Knowage is ranked #26. Board International holds a 0.7% mindshare in RT, compared to Knowage’s 0.8% mindshare. Additionally, 94% of Board International users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Knowage users who would recommend it.

Board

Read 37 Board reviews

347 Views
67 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Knowage

Read 18 Knowage reviews

430 Views
63 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

Board

Knowage

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

Knowage and Board are competitors in the business intelligence market. Data comparisons show a preference for Board due to its advanced features and perceived value.

Features: Knowage offers open-source versatility, integration capabilities, and customization, making it cost-efficient. Board provides comprehensive analytics, planning, and simulation tools with a robust unified platform.

Room for Improvement: Knowage needs improvement in simplifying its setup process and user interface. Its reporting capabilities could be enhanced. Board requires better data integration flexibility, more customization options, and a simpler interface for non-technical users.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Board supports both cloud and on-premise deployments with extensive support ensuring a smooth onboarding process. Knowage, while flexible, demands more initial setup and technical expertise, potentially slowing down deployment.

Pricing and ROI: Knowage attracts price-sensitive businesses with lower setup costs. Board's higher initial costs can be offset by greater ROI from its enhanced features and integrations.

To learn more, read our detailed Board vs. Knowage Report (Updated: May 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Board vs. Knowage

May 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

Board

Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

21st

Ranking in Reporting

18th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Business Performance Management (9th)

Knowage

Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

34th

Ranking in Reporting

26th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of Board is 0.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Knowage is 0.8%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Reporting

Featured Reviews

Wiboon Thabsuwan

Senior Consultant at IMD Company Limited

Easy to use and requires less time to learn or understand its features

I think the product is good in terms of ease of use. The interface looks really nice and very easy to use. Every command appears in the icon. It looks like you don't have to understand everything about the command. You do not necessarily have to know more, or I would say that there is less time for our study about the products. Functionality-wise, it is quite easy to use and requires less time to understand or learn about the product. I am a software vendor, so I do not use the tool myself. I use it for my clients. My clients mostly use it for budgeting and timing purposes. I would say that's really less maintenance at all because they can do everything by themselves. It is good in terms of ease of use.

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AbdulshukoorMohammed

General Manager Information Technology & Enterprise Applications Manager at OXFORD HOLDING

Easy to customize, cross-platform capable, and very stable

The only challenge here is that it's a Java-based platform. It requires very high technical skills. When we come to the integration with the single sign-on facilities, that part is very challenging. In Power BI and other tools, it's very easy to integrate with active directory and single sign-on, and identity management is very easy in other business intelligence tools. However, when it comes to Knowage, it's a bit heavy, it's time-consuming sometimes, it's not very fast, and definitely not as fast as other business intelligence tools in terms of getting graphical reports. The solution could be cheaper.

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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

"Primary valuable features are its flexibility and versatility and, obviously, functionality goes along with that. Plus, it does that at a small footprint in the file servers, and does it very efficiently."

"By using Board we can do a lot of free analysis. We can change the layout of a table and even the end-user can change the layout of a table. And in Board 11.2 you can save the layout. That's very useful for the customer, it's a very good function."

"The flexibility and the user-experience are the most valuable features of the solution."

"we are able to easily export data. When directors need financial information, we can go in the system and export the data, then send it out so they have it ready and available. If they are not in the office, we can email it to them. In addition, all the managers are now more on top of their expenses and their budget."

"I find Board to be simple and easy to use."

"Our data is now more structured. Between our data warehouse and BOARD, which are both brand new, we now have a more structured data view with more accurate, timely data."

"It allows people to quickly create dashboards with reports."

"The ability to do write back and visualization, with minimal IT development orientation."

More Board pros

"The embedding feature is great."

"I can't name the features the way the Knowage community calls them because I still don't know the lingo. However, I can describe them. I like the ability to join more than one report, set all fields on one end, and replicate that on the other reports. I like that a lot. I think it's one of the features that got me using Knowage. They have tables, and I like that too. They took SQL scripts and many other scripts and enabled them to even correlate with Python. That's also one of the best things about Knowage. You could also decide to get information per user role, and this is also a feature that I like in Knowage."

"We can easily do our own customizations."

"The concept of engines is quite powerful allowing the user to work with report authoring/provisioning tools of their choice."

Cons

"Board's integration could be a bit more robust, but what we have works. If the design isn't right, the flexibility of Board can negatively impact performance."

"It needs more export to Excel functionality. Right now, we're having to build within the cloud-based platform, as well as build within the Excel add-in, because the export to Excel is somewhat ugly."

"We would like to see better logging in the procedural world."

"One of the things that I would like to see is the ability to have a rule directly referenced on the cubes."

"It's very powerful, but there is also a big learning curve. It should be a little more intuitive."

"The initial setup was very complex for us."

"It would be nice to see truly transferable processes from model to model, as well as a method of building repetitive processes."

"What could be better is the manual... nowadays, most people use a web client, but on the Board manual website, a lot of the information is only about the Windows client. If they could update that, it would be helpful."

More Board cons

"The only challenge here is that it's a Java-based platform. It requires very high technical skills."

"It would be better if more resources were available to help us learn how to use it. I wanted to use Knowage for a more extended period, but learning materials around the product were not really available and were not really straightforward. I've also seen inconsistencies between versions. For example, under the tools, especially in the cockpit, the way you create reports is now different. You will also find some configurations within a particular state, like a line chart, which differs from version to version. I think consistency is an essential feature in a product, especially for business intelligence products."

"Development of SpagoBI has now been moved to Knowage. Users interested in further developments of the platform will have to look there."

"The dashboard components could be better."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In terms of the pricing, it was reasonable. BOARD is not the lowest in the market, but it was reasonable for us."

"The solution is quite expensive, if it is made cheaper then we can have more clients. I rate it four out of ten."

"The tool's price is a bit high compared to other solutions."

"Find a partner who will take responsibility for the implementation, and be available for support."

"It is not the cheapest product on earth, but you get so much. It provides good value for money."

"It allows the implementation of an effective reporting system using internal skills at a limited upfront cost."

"Knowage is open-source, and an enterprise edition is also available."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Government

16%

Real Estate/Law Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Hospitality Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Is Board better than Anaplan as a Business Intelligence (BI) solution?

We've had several FP&A departments include Anaplan in their analytics discussions, and while BI information IS generated, the focus is generally on compiling input from various sources and simu...

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What do you like most about Board?

All the reports are prepared automatically.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Board?

Board's integration could be a bit more robust, but what we have works. If the design isn't right, the flexibility of Board can negatively impact performance.

See all answers

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Comparisons

Anaplan vs Board

Compared 29% of the time

Pigment vs Board

Compared 14% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Board

Compared 10% of the time

Oracle Hyperion vs Board

Compared 8% of the time

Jedox vs Board

Compared 8% of the time

More Board Competitors

Microsoft Power BI vs Knowage

Compared 51% of the time

Procurify vs Knowage

Compared 32% of the time

Tableau vs Knowage

Compared 16% of the time

More Knowage Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Board

June 2025

Download Board product report

Buyer's Guide

Knowage

June 2025

Download Knowage product report

Also Known As

No data available

SpagoBI

Overview

BOARD International - headquartered in Switzerland - is a leading global provider of software for improving business results through better decision making. By unifying Business Intelligence and Corporate Performance Management into a single product, BOARD enables companies to achieve a shared vision of their performance across the entire organization, and thus a single version of the truth.

BOARD provides seamless solutions for • Reporting & Analysis • Budgeting, Planning & Forecasting • Profitability Modelling & Optimization • Simulation & What-if-Analysis • Scorecarding & Strategy Management • Financial Consolidation. Based on visual modelling, BOARD has enabled global companies to deploy BI and CPM applications without a single line of code in a fraction of the time and cost associated with traditional solutions.

Board International

Knowage (formerly SpagoBI) has a 14-years history. The actual release is the 6.3.

Knowage offers FULL ANALYTICAL CAPABILITIES, with a special focus on big data analytics and comprehensive support to rich and multi-source data analysis. Knowage provides different modules, each one focused on a specific domain but mutually combinable (Big Data, Smart Intelligence, Enterprise Reporting, Location Intelligence, Performance Management, Predictive Analysis). Moreover, Knowage is an OPEN SOURCE solution: the source code is freely accessible, everyone is allowed to join the community and build the own business solution to ensure strategic decision-making and improved productivity.

Knowage suite is supported by Engineering Group, the leading Italian software and services company, with about 10,000 people and more than 50 offices worldwide. Maintenance and support services (such as trainings, migration support, proof-of-concepts, etc) are provided by Engineering Group (KNOWAGE Labs) under subscription.

Knowage

Sample Customers

Coca-Cola, Puma, Desigual, Ricoh, KPMG, H&M, Groupe SEB

FIAT Group, Italian air navigation service provider, Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation, Telecom Italia, ASL Genovese, San Giovanni Battista University Hospital

Buyer's Guide

Board vs. Knowage

May 2025

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