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Informatica PowerCenter vs ThoughtSpot comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
8.1
Informatica PowerCenter is valued for its flexibility, stability, and effectiveness in handling diverse and complex data for reports.
Sentiment score
7.2
ThoughtSpot enhances value with time savings, ease of use, and reduced costs, but user adoption affects ROI.
Using ThoughtSpot has resulted in significant time savings and improved business sales by allowing us to identify sellers and buyers across regions, facilitating targeted marketing.
ThoughtSpot saves a significant amount of time compared to other tools and is very user-friendly.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.9
Customer service and technical support receive mixed reviews, highlighting varying levels of responsiveness, resource availability, and user experiences.
Sentiment score
6.8
ThoughtSpot's customer support is praised for responsiveness but critiqued for depth, with mixed ratings on problem resolution.
I like the technical support provided by Informatica.
I stopped opening tickets due to insufficient and untimely responses.
ThoughtSpot provides a dedicated customer success person and the ability to submit tickets online, with a response time of no more than a day.
The knowledge base for ThoughtSpot is less robust compared to others.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.8
Informatica PowerCenter excels in scalability and versatility for data management, though costs and setup complexity are concerns.
Sentiment score
7.2
ThoughtSpot offers effective scalability and growth, but may require improvements in role management and advanced preparation tools.
For scalability, I would rate Informatica PowerCenter between eight to nine.
Tableau, Power BI, or Looker have separate tools for preparation, customization, and storytelling.
The platform does not have technical problems with scaling data or connections.
As our data has grown, I have validated huge datasets and complex models without significant issues.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
Informatica PowerCenter is highly rated for stability, with few issues, mostly resolved by hotfixes, ensuring reliable performance.
Sentiment score
7.1
ThoughtSpot is stable and fast for large datasets but faces occasional downtime, feature gaps, and integration challenges.
Informatica PowerCenter is stable and can scale well.
I use it primarily for large datasets, and it performs faster than regular data visualization tools such as Power BI, which has limits on dataset size.
The upgrades are smooth with no downtime, which is super important.
The responsiveness of accessing live data is exceptional and faster than most other BI tools.
 

Room For Improvement

Informatica PowerCenter users seek improved affordability, a modern interface, better integration, and scalability for enhanced efficiency and user-friendliness.
ThoughtSpot lacks visualization flexibility, geospatial options, customization, integration tools, and better organization, lagging behind Power BI and Tableau.
With Informatica PowerCenter, I am looking for an AI interface that looks at the underlying data model of the databases and the metadata of the tables, allowing the developer to provide instructions on what data sources to connect to and how to apply or create Transformations.
Utilizing more stored procedures from Oracle databases in an easy way would significantly boost performance.
Currently, it is not as customizable as the options available on Power BI or Tableau.
Handling governance when there are many models and dashboards is complex.
Enhancing integration capabilities with other tools like DBT would also be beneficial as it would make our lives easier.
 

Setup Cost

Informatica PowerCenter, although costly, is valued by large enterprises for its comprehensive features and effective complex data handling.
ThoughtSpot offers competitive, flexible pricing between Tableau and Power BI, with options suited to various organizational needs.
I find that the pricing and licensing for Informatica PowerCenter align with its quality.
The price of Informatica PowerCenter is high, especially for small and medium-sized businesses.
HubSpot is expensive.
ThoughtSpot's pricing is reasonable and in line with other BI tools.
 

Valuable Features

Informatica PowerCenter provides robust, scalable ETL solutions with user-friendly design, supporting extensive databases and seamless data integration.
ThoughtSpot's search-based functionality enables intuitive data exploration, empowering non-technical users to create reports and improve business efficiency.
The system supports real-time integration, which is essential for many of my tasks.
The functions in Informatica PowerCenter that I have found most valuable are the way it manages the volume of data, the push down optimization, and the performance aspects of it, mostly related to parallelism techniques.
Its compatibility with most databases, including the latest from FlexMovely and Redshift, allows users to create joins and worksheets easily.
This alerting feature is very beneficial for our company at the moment, and we use it extensively.
When I upload a data dump, AI analytics suggest possible data visualizations and insights, which I can pin to dashboards or live boards for modification.
 

Categories and Ranking

Informatica PowerCenter
Ranking in Data Visualization
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
82
Ranking in other categories
Data Integration (4th)
ThoughtSpot
Ranking in Data Visualization
8th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (13th), Embedded BI (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Data Visualization category, the mindshare of Informatica PowerCenter is 1.3%, down from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ThoughtSpot is 2.0%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Visualization
 

Featured Reviews

Deepak Shiv - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides multiple transformations in one toolset and helpful when extracting data from multiple sources
Error handling capability is quite good in Informatica PowerCenter because it provides a very detailed session log, which is really helpful to identify errors. In addition, there are KB articles published by Informatica that are really helpful. So, error handling and the KB articles provided by Informatica are very helpful. Even if you face any issues or errors, we can usually resolve them. If the error cannot be solved with Informatica PowerCenter, we can raise a case with Informatica, and their support team will help us address that issue. If it cannot be solved with that particular version, they will consider it and try to solve it with the next patch or hotfix. AI Initiatives: Our company also has organizational AI or machine learning initiatives. However, Informatica PowerCenter doesn't fit into AI-related things because it's an on-premise tool. It doesn't have a significant role in the field. It is just a small ETL on-premises tool. So basically, in the AI field, Informatica PowerCenter is not going to be that impactful. Informatica has launched IICS and IDMC (Informatica Data Management Cloud and Informatica Cloud), where their AI comes into the picture. But for Informatica PowerCenter, AI does not come into the picture at all.
Sushma Polavarapu - PeerSpot reviewer
Creates user-friendly analysis environments for large datasets
The tool is user-friendly for the end users. It is primarily a search-based tool. Users do not need a technical background to work directly on the dataset. Its compatibility with most databases, including the latest from FlexMovely and Redshift, allows users to create joins and worksheets easily. ThoughtSpot is fast, even with one to ten terabytes of data.
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Comparison Review

it_user90069 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 20, 2014
Informatica PowerCenter vs. Microsoft SSIS - each technology has its advantages but also have similarities
Technology has made it easier for businesses to organize and manipulate data to get a clearer picture of what’s going on with their business. Notably, ETL tools have made managing huge amounts of data significantly easier and faster, boosting many organizations’ business intelligence operations…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
21%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica PowerCenter?
Azure Data Factory is flexible, modular, and works well. In terms of cost, it is not too pricey. It offers the stability and reliability I am looking for, good scalability, and is easy to set up an...
Which is better - SSIS or Informatica PowerCenter?
SSIS PowerPack is a group of drag and drop connectors for Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services, commonly called SSIS. The collection helps organizations boost productivity with code-free compo...
Which Informatica product would you choose - PowerCenter or Cloud Data Integration?
Complex transformations can easily be achieved using PowerCenter, which has all the features and tools to establish a real data governance strategy. Additionally, PowerCenter is able to manage huge...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ThoughtSpot?
The pricing is on the higher end but reasonable for what ThoughtSpot offers.
What needs improvement with ThoughtSpot?
ThoughtSpot lacks an intermediate layer for data loading, unlike Qlik, which affects dashboard stability when the database has issues. The platform also has fewer formulas and functions compared to...
What is your primary use case for ThoughtSpot?
I am working for a telecommunication company where we use ThoughtSpot ( /products/thoughtspot-reviews ) to create monthly, weekly, and daily ad hoc reports for business needs. We work for both B2B ...
 

Also Known As

PowerCenter
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, LexisNexis, Rabobank
Primary Capital Mortgage, Sterling Backcheck, RichRelevance, Rambus, Batteries Plus Bulbs
Find out what your peers are saying about Informatica PowerCenter vs. ThoughtSpot and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.