IBM SPSS Statistics vs IBM Watson Explorer comparison

IBM SPSS Statistics and IBM Watson Explorer are both solutions in the Data Mining category. IBM SPSS Statistics is ranked #3 with an average rating of 9.2, while IBM Watson Explorer is ranked #12. IBM SPSS Statistics holds a 15.9% mindshare in DM, compared to IBM Watson Explorer’s 1.4% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of IBM SPSS Statistics users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of IBM Watson Explorer users who would recommend it.

IBM SPSS Statistics

Read 39 IBM SPSS Statistics reviews

2,682 Views
992 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

IBM Watson Explorer

Read 10 IBM Watson Explorer reviews

520 Views
62 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM SPSS Statistics

IBM Watson Explorer

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Executive SummaryUpdated on May 21, 2025

IBM SPSS Statistics and IBM Watson Explorer occupy the analytics tool category. SPSS Statistics appears to have an advantage in statistical analysis, whereas Watson Explorer provides deeper insights through advanced features, albeit at a higher cost.

Features: IBM SPSS Statistics includes robust statistical capabilities with a user-friendly point-and-click interface, facilitating comprehensive data manipulation. It allows for quick custom tables and macros. In comparison, IBM Watson Explorer's strengths lie in intelligent data exploration and cognitive search, offering natural language processing and the aggregation of data entities, which enable hidden insights within unstructured data.

Room for Improvement: IBM SPSS Statistics could enhance its data capacity and expand beyond straightforward statistical functions to include more sophisticated data modeling techniques. Additionally, expanding custom visualization options would be beneficial. IBM Watson Explorer could improve by streamlining its deployment processes, increasing affordability, and strengthening its ability to manage structured data more effectively.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM SPSS Statistics is known for a fast and straightforward deployment process, making it ideal for immediate implementation needs. It provides a streamlined user experience with accessible support options. IBM Watson Explorer, while requiring a more detailed setup, compensates with extensive customer support and comprehensive documentation to support user queries.

Pricing and ROI: IBM SPSS Statistics is generally viewed as more cost-effective, balancing performance with cost, offering a quicker ROI. On the other hand, IBM Watson Explorer, despite its higher initial cost, provides significant potential for a substantial ROI due to its ability to deliver deep insights and more comprehensive data exploration capabilities over time.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM SPSS Statistics vs. IBM Watson Explorer Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM SPSS Statistics vs. IBM Watson Explorer

July 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

IBM SPSS Statistics

Ranking in Data Mining

3rd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Science Platforms (8th)

IBM Watson Explorer

Ranking in Data Mining

12th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Data Mining category, the mindshare of IBM SPSS Statistics is 15.9%, up from 13.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Watson Explorer is 1.4%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Data Mining

Featured Reviews

Laurence Moseley

Emeritus Professor of Health Services Research at University of South Wales

Delivers reliable results for academic research and keeps you close to your data.

SPSS is perfectly adequate if all you want are some results. If you only need the results, you do not require the trail of evidence on how you obtained those results. I mainly used it for cross tabs, correlation, regression, chi-squared tests, and similar analyses often seen in published papers; I used it for my papers as well. For wider uses I find Knime keeps me in touch with my data, however much I transform them.

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it_user1319820

Lead Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

A data analysis tool that is scalable and includes keyword search functionality

The solution is used for a government company for data collection and analysis I have found the auto-generated document very useful as well as the main keywords that are highlighted, which are used for the search functionality within IBM Watson Explorer. I have been using the solution for five…

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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

"You can quickly build models because it does the work for you."

"SPSS can handle whatever you throw at it, whether your data set contains 10,000, 100,000, or a million objects. It's like the heavy artillery of analytical tools."

"It is a modeling tool with helpful automation."

"Custom tables and macros: They allow us to create useful reports quickly for a broad audience."

"SPSS is perfectly adequate if all you want are some results."

"The most valuable feature is the user interface because you don't need to write code."

"The most valuable feature of IBM SPSS Statistics is all the functionality it provides. Additionally, it is simple to do the five-way analysis that you can into multidimensional setup space. It's the multidimensional space facility that is most useful."

"The most valuable feature is its robust statistical analysis capabilities."

More IBM SPSS Statistics pros

"The ability to easily pull together lots of different pieces of information and drill down in a smarter way than has been possible with other analytics tools is key. Watson is all based on a set of AI and deep learning, machine-learning capabilities, and it is looking behind the scenes at some relationships that you likely would not have spotted on your own. It's pulling things together, categorizing some things, that are not something that you might have seen on your own."

"I have found the auto-generated document very useful as well as the main keywords that are highlighted, which are used for the search functionality within IBM Watson Explorer."

"We take natural language that was happening in our repositories and our application and then feed it to the Watson APIs. We receive JSON payloads as an API response to get cognitive feedback from the repository data."

"For me, as a user, the most valuable feature is the ability to ingest and then retrieve information from a range of separate sources; the ability to dissect questions in context and actually answer them."

"Ease of use is pretty good as is the standardization of not actually having to have my own natural learning algorithms, just to use the Watson APIs."

"The valuable feature of Watson Explorer for us is data entities, and to see the hidden insights from within unstructured data."

Cons

"It could allow adding color to data models to make them easier to interpret."

"The design of the experience can be improved."

"Each algorithm could be more adaptable to some industry-specific areas, or, in some cases, adapted for maintenance."

"The reports could be better."

"There is a learning curve; it's not very steep, but there is one."

"If there is any self-generation data collection plan (DCP), it would be helpful in gathering data. It would also be useful if there is a function to scale it up to, let's say, UiPath and have it consolidate and integrate into a UiPath solution."

"SPSS slows down the computer or the laptop if the data is huge; then you need a faster computer."

"I feel that when it comes to conducting multiple analyses, there could be more detailed information provided. Currently, the software gives a summary and an overview, but it would be beneficial to have specific details for each product or variable."

More IBM SPSS Statistics cons

"Small businesses will probably have a little harder time getting into it, just because of the amount of resources that they have available, both financial and time, but it really is a solution that should work for them."

"Stability is actually one of the areas that could use improvement. Setting it up is always tough. Setting Explorer requires experts, but also the underlying platform is not that stable. So it really needs a good expert to keep it running."

"The solution is expensive."

"I would say, give some kind of a community edition, a free edition. A lot of companies do, even Amazon gives you some kind of trial and error opportunities. If they could provide something like that, it would be good."

"It is a little bit tricky to get used to the workflow of knowing how to train Watson, what can be provided, what can't be, how to provide it, how to import, export, and what it means every time you have to add a new dictionary"

"More cognitive feedback would be good. The natural language analysis is great, the sentiment analyzers are great. But I would just like to see more... innovation done with the Watson platform."

"It needs better language support, to include some other languages. Also, they should improve the user interface."

"Much of IBM operates this way, where they have sets of tools that are in the middleware space, and it becomes the customer's responsibility or the business partner's responsibility to develop full solutions that take advantage of that middleware. I think IBM's finding itself in that spot with Watson-related technologies as well, where the capabilities to do really interesting and useful things for customers is there, but somebody still has to build it. Is that going to be the customer? Are they going to be willing to take on that responsibility themselves"

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of this solution is a little bit high, which was a problem for my company."

"It's quite expensive, but they do a special deal for universities."

"SPSS is an expensive piece of software because it's incredibly complex and has been refined over decades, but I would say it's fairly priced."

"The price of IBM SPSS Statistics could improve."

"More affordable training for new staff members."

"While the pricing of the product may be higher, the accompanying service and features justify the investment."

"The pricing of the modeler is high and can reduce the utility of the product for those who can not afford to adopt it."

"Our licence is on a yearly renewal basis. While pricing is not the primary concern in our evaluation, as products are assessed by whether they can meet our user needs and expertise, the cost can be a limiting factor in the number of licences we procure."

More IBM SPSS Statistics pricing and cost advice

"The solution is expensive."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

University

Educational Organization

14%

Performing Arts

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM SPSS Statistics?

The software offers consistency across multiple research projects helping us with predictive analytics capabilities.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM SPSS Statistics?

SPSS is horrendously expensiver. On a laptop Knime is free of charge (Windows, Mac, Linux)

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM SPSS Statistics?

Better guidance both in producing programs and interpreting their output.

See all answers

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Comparisons

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Compared 26% of the time

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Compared 10% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

Alteryx vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 7% of the time

Amazon SageMaker vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 35% of the time

Tableau vs IBM Watson Explorer

Compared 29% of the time

Salesforce Einstein Analytics vs IBM Watson Explorer

Compared 25% of the time

Izenda vs IBM Watson Explorer

Compared 11% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM SPSS Statistics

April 2025

Download IBM SPSS Statistics product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Watson Explorer

July 2025

Download IBM Watson Explorer product report

Also Known As

SPSS Statistics

IBM WEX

Overview

IBM SPSS Statistics is a powerful data mining solution that is designed to aid business leaders in making important business decisions. It is designed so that it can be effectively utilized by organizations across a wide range of fields. SPSS Statistics allows users to leverage machine learning algorithms so that they can mine and analyze data in the most effective way possible.

IBM SPSS Statistics Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy IBM SPSS Statistics include:

Ease of use. SPSS Statistics enables users to simply and intuitively take control of their statistical needs. The solution is designed so that analysts who do not know how to code can easily make full use of the various tools and capabilities that SPSS Statistics has to offer. Its command language is so straightforward that it does not require users to undergo special training before they use it.

Comprehensive and flexible build. SPSS Statistics is designed to be both a comprehensive and highly flexible analytics solution. It enables users to utilize a variety of integrations that make it easy for users to add features that they might feel they are missing.

Automation. SPSS Statistics makes it simple for users to automate basic tasks that they might otherwise devote too much time worrying about. Tasks like calculation or data gathering can be delegated to the system while more conceptual tasks like data analysis are given to an organization’s analysts to handle.

IBM SPSS Statistics Features

Intuitive user interface. SPSS Statistics enables users to deploy an intuitive interface that makes the process of system management simple. Among the other components of this interface is a drag-and-drop feature that makes analysis and management possible for anyone who wants to use it.

Advanced data visualizations. Analysts that employ SPSS Statistics gain access to tools that empower them to create and export data visualizations. These visualizations can be formatted in many different ways depending on what the user needs.

Local data storage. SPSS Statistics has the ability to securely store data on a user’s computer. This enables them to add layers of security that would not necessarily be present if the data was stored in the cloud.

Reviews from Real Users

IBM SPSS Statistics is a highly effective solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are the wealth of functionalities that it provides and its high level of accessibility.

An Emeritus Professor of Health Services Research at a university writes, "The most valuable feature of IBM SPSS Statistics is all the functionality it provides. Additionally, it is simple to do the five-way analysis that you can in a multidimensional setup space. It's the multidimensional space facility that is most useful."

A Director of Systems Management & MIS Operations at a university, says, “The SPSS interface is very accessible and user-friendly. It's really easy to get information from it. I've shared it with experts and beginners, and everyone can navigate it.”

IBM

IBM Watson Explorer is a cognitive exploration and content analysis platform that lets you listen to your data for advice. Explore and analyze structured, unstructured, internal, external and public content to uncover trends and patterns that improve decision-making, customer service and ROI. Leverage built-in cognitive capabilities powered by machine learning models, natural language processing and next-generation APIs to unlock hidden value in all your data. Gain a secure 360-degree view of customers, in context, to deliver better experiences for your clients.

IBM

Sample Customers

LDB Group, RightShip, Tennessee Highway Patrol, Capgemini Consulting, TEAC Corporation, Ironside, nViso SA, Razorsight, Si.mobil, University Hospitals of Leicester, CROOZ Inc., GFS Fundraising Solutions, Nedbank Ltd., IDS-TILDA

RIMAC, Westpac New Zealand, Toyota Financial Services, Swiss Re, Akershus University Hospital, Korean Air Lines, Mizuho Bank, Honda

Buyer's Guide

IBM SPSS Statistics vs. IBM Watson Explorer

July 2025

Free Report: IBM SPSS Statistics vs. IBM Watson Explorer

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM SPSS Statistics vs. IBM Watson Explorer and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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