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IBM DOORS vs Jira comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 27, 2025

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 DOORS
Ranking in Application Requirements Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Jira
Ranking in Application Requirements Management
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
275
Ranking in other categories
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites (1st), Project Management Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Application Requirements Management category, the mindshare of IBM DOORS is 30.6%, down from 34.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jira is 13.7%, down from 15.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Requirements Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Jira13.7%
IBM DOORS30.6%
Other55.7%
Application Requirements Management
 

Featured Reviews

UweSeufert - PeerSpot reviewer
Old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements
I use IBM DOORS because my customer wants it for managing their requirements IBM DOORS is a tool from the 20th century. It is very old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements. It helps to manage requirements efficiently, which significantly improves the way requirements…
AmitUbale - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient project management that's comprehensive and and helps with time efficiency
We use Jira primarily for project management within the organization. It helps us manage tasks, bug management, and tracking tickets effectively. We assign tickets to individual team members and track them easily For project management, Jira has helped facilitate efficient task segregation and…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I really enjoyed the API."
"The next-generation features are good."
"Compared to other tools that I have used over the past 20 years, DOORS is the best of the best."
"I would say that the best feature of the solution is that since everything is in one place, and if you make any changes, then they are recorded or tracked."
"The shell scripting is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"Very customizable and can be as powerful as you want it to be."
"Traceability on requirements for a huge project in an organization is a big gain."
"It is a stable solution."
"The dashboards are useful."
"What I really like about Jira is that it ticks off all the boxes for any agile project. It's easy to set up, easy to use, and it has excellent notification features. Jira is the top choice for anyone working on agile projects like ours."
"Most of my work is keeping track of what's been going on and identifying what is blocking future work. What I like about this solution is you can create a consolidated customized dashboard out of your files to identify what's been going on and identify who has how much data assigned to them."
"The product's initial setup phase is easy."
"The board has been a very valuable feature because it can be very simple for teams that are not technical. It can also be highly technical and have lots of data for teams that are technical. So we use it for both instances."
"The product's initial setup phase was straightforward."
"We like team collaboration and cross-functional collaboration."
"I like seeing which tickets are open and what our response rate is. They have a lot of good metrics in their system to see what's going on."
 

Cons

"Not all Rational Team Concert operations are available from the web client. Certain operations, like creating streams or components, still require using the desktop application. They're not accessible through the web interface. And in my opinion, this limitation should be removed."
"There needs to be quicker access to tech support. When I have a two minute question that takes two minutes to answer, it shouldn't take me 45 minutes and/or a few days of callbacks to get to the right technical support person. It's unnecessary and frustrating for the user."
"I think there is probably room to improve by offering free training."
"Rational DOORS' most valuable feature is that you can write any kind of requirement you want."
"The software and GUI is very outdated."
"The user interface for the Change Proposal System could be improved."
"The interface needs an area to be able to type your query and actually be able to find them."
"Enhancing security measures, particularly when handling multiple projects simultaneously, would be beneficial to prevent data loss within DOORS."
"I have had problems with performance and unresponsiveness. All of a sudden, the performance slowed down, and I had a number of users that could not use the tool."
"In JIRA, it's a bit complex in terms of what advanced search queries we use. Sharing them is also a problem. Because TFS is on the cloud, we can easily save that query and share it with our team members."
"There needs to be easier integration with third-parties — personally, this is the biggest issue for me."
"The history with Jira is that it is a bit complex for many users."
"To improve Jira, providing proper documentation, examples, or snippets for scripting workflows would be beneficial."
"I would like our clients' IT group to be able to have oversight without setting up agents. We're managing tickets, and I'd like their IT group to see everything we're doing without having to set them up as agents. There should be a better way of managing their users. I've got such requests, but Jira is expensive, and it is difficult to pay an agent fee for somebody else to view these tickets. Currently, the only way in which I can do that is by setting a user up as an agent, and it becomes cost-prohibitive. They need to do a better job on ticket viewers."
"Jira can improve by making methodologies better, such as scrum and agile. Additionally, improvements in Kanban boards are needed."
"In terms of improvement, I think Jira (Jira Agile, specifically) can be made more user-friendly. Most of the time, when people are somewhat used to the process, they find it easy to work with. But the thing is, if I want to create a sprint, I'd like the ability for it to come out like a kind of board or something like that. For example, they could offer something like a wizard for users who want to quickly create a sprint on the spot with a few clicks. I think that could be useful."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I think it's expensive because you have to pay for the licenses to IBM and all that and maintain them."
"It is expensive to onboard additional users."
"The licensing cost is too high."
"I don't personally know what the numbers are. I just know that one of the reasons we've limited it to three seats is a function of cost."
"IBM Rational DOORS is highly expensive."
"Licensing fees are billed annually and there is no support included with what I pay."
"We have to pay for a license. I think it's a one-time payment as my company hasn't notified me about more charges. I don't think it's expensive for large corporations, but it will be costly for an average person."
"It's expensive."
"It does not cost that much."
"One of my customers told me that they were receiving better pricing for a similar tool from Microsoft."
"Licensing is on a monthly basis, and it is based on what you use."
"The pricing for Jira is reasonable, although I think they can bring it down because the plugins cost extra."
"Almost everybody uses JIRA nowadays because it is the most cost-effective solution."
"It is not too expensive. It is just comparative to other tools like Microsoft Teams."
"I don't deal with licensing in my current consultant position."
"I rate the tool's pricing a five out of ten. It's paid yearly."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
26%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise36
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business103
Midsize Enterprise56
Large Enterprise149
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Rational DOORS?
The traceability matrix in DOORS improved our project outcomes. It helps ensure coverage of requirements at different levels, from user requirements to software requirements to test requirements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Rational DOORS?
Over the years, the first version cost something around 5800 euros.
What needs improvement with IBM Rational DOORS?
Compared to today, DOORS' competitors also excel in this discipline. Yet the price is too high. It's often not as generic as it used to be. IBM promised to find a way for a generic format that allo...
Is Jira better or would you go with Micro Focus ALM Octane?
Hi Netanya, Basically , it all depends on the use cases for your environment and the business needs. Hope the below data may be relevant to you for identifying your needs and deciding on the approp...
Which is better - Jira or Microsoft Azure DevOps?
Jira is a great centralized tool for just about everything, from local team management to keeping track of products and work logs. It is easy to implement and navigate, and it is stable and scalabl...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jira?
We operate under a nonlimited license with Jira, allowing a number of users to access it with a single enterprise license.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Rational DOORS
Jira Software
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Infosys, Chevrolet Volt
Square, Nasa, eBay, Cisco, SalesForce, Adobe, BNP Paribas, BMW and LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DOORS vs. Jira and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,785 professionals have used our research since 2012.