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IBM Cognos vs RStudio Connect comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

IBM Cognos
Ranking in Reporting
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
134
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (7th)
RStudio Connect
Ranking in Reporting
19th
Average Rating
6.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (17th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of IBM Cognos is 4.5%, down from 5.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of RStudio Connect is 0.5%, down from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

AMOL JAJU - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers ad hoc analysis reports and good for operational dashboarding
There used to be many valuable features, but in the last three or four years, whatever IBM is doing with enhancements, it has taken a lot of time to build and develop. But the best usage of Cognos is the ad hoc analysis reports. I really like that. Our customers also like that. But now the usage of Cognos and OBIE is reduced by various business users because people and business users are now more focused on analytics, slice and dice, and the dashboard, and the widgets.
GY
Offers ease of use, affordability, cloud options, and many open sources,
Our model has used various tools together. It should make sense for them to use these tools in conjunction with RStudio Connect. Currently, they use none or only PSN and a couple of other devices. There should be integration with these tools or the ability to integrate various statistical tools, both open source and proprietary, with RStudio Connect. RStudio Connect should ideally provide an add-on library where modules can be utilized. There's no need to introduce something entirely disconnected but beneficial for statistical modeling. If some popular tools they use, such as Norman or PSF, were bundled and made available as add-ons, it would create a centralized place. This centralized platform would allow individual vendors to ensure compatibility of their products with RStudio Connect and provide them on the marketplace. Customers could then choose these validated additional tools, integrating them seamlessly with RStudio Connect.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup is quite straightforward."
"The most valuable features of IBM Cognos are governance and enterprise reporting."
"A positive feature is Report Studio, where we create beautiful, complex reports."
"The comprehensiveness or broadness of the software functions or business intelligence functions that it provides is valuable. It is also quite easy to use and user-friendly."
"The most valuable feature is developing reports from different data sources, making it a reliable data source."
"We are able to generate quality reports easily which allows us to decrease response time."
"The Report Studio that is aimed at professional report writers."
"The initial setup is very straightforward."
"RStudio Connect is very powerful statistically and can handle large datasets, even on a free version on a laptop."
 

Cons

"We would like to see development of the product's UI function, to make it more of a UI tool that can be configured as required."
"I would like to have predictive and forecasting capabilities in Cognos. It's one thing to do reporting, and another thing to easily predict or forecast certain data points, which is very important for all the clients."
"It could have more options for themes."
"Need improvement towards Visualization."
"I would like to see the introduction of mapbooks for supporting some geographical information."
"I need improvements, particularly with the Framework Manager, which has an outdated user interface from older versions like IBM Cognos 10 or 8. Additionally, the Event Studio, which offered great flexibility in previous versions, is no longer available in IBM Cognos Analytics 12. These are areas that could be improved to enhance the product."
"Compared to Tableau and PowerBI, the IBM interface is easier to use. However, the drag-and-drop functionality isn't as straightforward. Formatting is also more challenging in the cloud than in other applications, like Power BI. Also, if you encounter an issue, it takes more time to resolve it on the formatting side."
"Tableau and Power BI are faster than Cognos."
"I rate my experience with RStudio Connect as average because I am not yet comfortable enough to provide a definitive assessment."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a standard license required to use this solution. There are some additional tools but I am not sure if they are an extra cost."
"It is quite pricy. I think Microsoft BI is cheaper. Tableau might also be cheaper, but it also depends on the usage. If you have very many users, Cognos can be a problem. It could be cheaper than Tableau but not for so many users. If you have a few thousand users, Tableau, which is generally quite expensive, can be cheaper than Cognos."
"It is pretty expensive."
"The pricing of this product is meant for medium to large-scale enterprises."
"On a scale from one to ten where one is low pricing and ten is high pricing, I would rate this solution at eight."
"I don't know the exact cost, but I believe Cognos is quite expensive, especially when it comes to the support consultants and the procedures that need to be applied."
"There is some additional licensing that we needed to purchase because we were touching data outside of our core data platform. The cost was approximately $25,000 for the additional licenses, which were approximate 45 licenses. For the application itself, updates, and the core platform it was approximately $50,000. Giving a total cost of $75,000 annually for our usage of IBM Cognos."
"My company uses IBM Cognos with another IBM product, so I think only one license is used."
Information not available
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Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 4, 2015
Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho
1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
53%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Government
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What do you like most about IBM Cognos?
The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools.
What needs improvement with IBM Cognos?
There is room for improvement in self-service analytics and predictiveness.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for RStudio Connect?
The product is not very expensive. When the number of licenses grows, the procurement team should come in and negotiate to get a better price and discount. I rate the product’s pricing a three out ...
What needs improvement with RStudio Connect?
Our model has used various tools together. It should make sense for them to use these tools in conjunction with RStudio Connect. Currently, they use none or only PSN and a couple of other devices. ...
What is your primary use case for RStudio Connect?
We use the solution for statistical modeling.
 

Also Known As

Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 23,000 leading organizations across multiple industries use Cognos. Some examples of Cognos customers include BMW Financial Services, Quinte Health Care, Troy Corporation, Michigan State University, and GKN Land System.
ENERGETIC INSURANCE, PRECISION ANALYTICS, REDFIN, TWO SIX CAPITALSTACK OVERFLOW, LIBERTY MUTUAL, EDUCATION SUPERHIGHWAY, UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Oracle and others in Reporting. Updated: April 2025.
850,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.