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IBM Watson Explorer vs SAS Enterprise Miner 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 Watson Explorer
Ranking in Data Mining
11th
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAS Enterprise Miner
Ranking in Data Mining
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Data Science Platforms (18th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Data Mining category, the mindshare of IBM Watson Explorer is 1.0%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAS Enterprise Miner is 4.2%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Mining
 

Featured Reviews

it_user840897 - PeerSpot reviewer
Ingests, retrieves information from a range of sources; enables dissecting questions in context and answering them
WEX is more a platform, I believe, than it is the application. I could talk about what I'm looking for in the application. We've done visualizations and we can do basic analysis with the system as it stands. Where we're looking to take it is implementing it into workflows, so the workers on the line can actually understand the risks that they're exposing themselves to and then address them on the fly. So that's fantastic. And then the final one is, it's not prediction, but maybe anticipation. So when people are put at risk, we'll be implementing solutions shortly that will help people anticipate the risks and the dangers they're exposing themselves to so they can control them.
reviewer1352853 - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable product that is easy to deploy and can be used for structured and unstructured data mining
We use the solution for predictive analytics to do structured and unstructured data mining I like the way the product visually shows the data pipeline. The product must provide better integration with cloud-native technologies. I have been using the solution for 20 years. The product is very…

Quotes from Members

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

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."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"The solution is able to handle quite large amounts of data beautifully."
"I like the way the product visually shows the data pipeline."
"The most valuable feature is the decision tree creation."
"The solution is very good for data mining or any mining issues."
"The most valuable feature is that you can use multiple algorithms for creating models and then you can compare the results between them."
"Most of the features, especially on the data analysis tool pack, are really good. The way they do clustering and output is great. You can do fairly elaborate outputs. The results, the ensembles, all of these, are fantastic."
"The technical support is very good."
"The setup is straightforward. Deployment doesn't take more than 30 minutes."
 

Cons

"It needs better language support, to include some other languages. Also, they should improve the user interface."
"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."
"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."
"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"
"The solution is expensive."
"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."
"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"
"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."
"The initial setup is challenging if doing it for the first time."
"The solution is very stable, but we do have some problems with discrepancies involving SAS not matching with the latest Java versions. It's not stable in cases where SAS tries to run on a different version because SAS doesn't connect with the latest Java update. Once a month we need to restart systems from scratch."
"The ease of use can be improved. When you are new it seems a bit complex."
"The visualization of the models is not very attractive, so the graphics should be improved."
"The solution needs an easier interface for the user. The user experience isn't so easy for our clients."
"Technical support could be improved."
"The solution is much more complex than other options."
"While I don't personally need tutorials, I can't say that it wouldn't be helpful for others to have some to help them navigate and operate the system."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."
"The solution is expensive for an individual, but for an enterprise/institution (purchasing bulk licenses), it is not a high price for the use that will come from it."
"The solution must improve its licensing models."
"This solution is for large corporations because not everybody can afford it."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Educational Organization
15%
University
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Financial Services Firm
25%
University
12%
Educational Organization
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What do you like most about SAS Enterprise Miner?
I like the way the product visually shows the data pipeline.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAS Enterprise Miner?
The solution must improve its licensing models. It bundles all the products into smaller products. We can only have a subset of the functionality available according to our license. I rate the pric...
What needs improvement with SAS Enterprise Miner?
The product must provide better integration with cloud-native technologies.
 

Also Known As

IBM WEX
Enterprise Miner
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RIMAC, Westpac New Zealand, Toyota Financial Services, Swiss Re, Akershus University Hospital, Korean Air Lines, Mizuho Bank, Honda
Generali Hellas, Gitanjali Group, Gloucestershire Constabulary, GS Home Shopping, HealthPartners, IAG New Zealand, iJET, Invacare
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Watson Explorer vs. SAS Enterprise Miner and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,963 professionals have used our research since 2012.