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Microsoft Power BI vs Oracle Essbase comparison

The compared Microsoft and Oracle solutions aren't in the same category. Microsoft is ranked #1 in BIT , with an average rating of 8.0, and holds a 12.7% mindshare in the category. Oracle is ranked #12 in DDM , with an average rating of 7.9, and holds a 0.9% mindshare. Additionally, 93% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Oracle users who would recommend it.
Microsoft Power BI
Read 327 Microsoft Power BI reviews
  • 22,072 Views
  • 13,685 Comparison Views
93% willing to recommend
Oracle Essbase
Read 18 Oracle Essbase reviews
  • 1,682 Views
  • 185 Comparison Views
100% willing to recommend
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary
We performed a comparison between Microsoft Power BI and Oracle Essbase based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Domo and others in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools.

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To learn more, read our detailed BI (Business Intelligence) Tools Report (Updated: October 2025).
Buyer's Guide
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
October 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

Microsoft Power BI
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
327
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (1st), Reporting (1st)
Oracle Essbase
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
4.6
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Database Development and Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Microsoft Power BI and Oracle Essbase aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Microsoft Power BI is designed for BI (Business Intelligence) Tools and holds a mindshare of 12.7%, down 22.1% compared to last year.
Oracle Essbase, on the other hand, focuses on Database Development and Management, holds 0.9% mindshare, down 1.2% since last year.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Power BI12.7%
Tableau Enterprise9.2%
Amazon QuickSight4.5%
Other73.6%
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
Database Development and Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Oracle Essbase0.9%
SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer5.7%
Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials5.6%
Other87.8%
Database Development and Management
 

Featured Reviews

Shoury Priyanshu - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates seamless data aggregation with some outdated visual elements hindering user appeal
Real-time data integration is an area for improvement. Although I've worked on several solutions involving real-time integration, it's not very user-friendly and often lags, especially with over a million data rows. This makes Power BI difficult to manage as loading times can reach one or two minutes, which is problematic today. There are challenges with scalability, requiring multiple pages in dashboards to manage these issues. Visualization could be improved as it appears outdated. Users, especially newcomers, find it unappealing and not user-friendly.
Read full review
Bhavya N - PeerSpot reviewer
Ensuring efficient data analysis and reporting while identifying areas for calculation and export improvements
The features of Oracle Essbase are valuable, such as its multi-dimensional database used for dynamic calculations and reporting purposes. These features are valuable because they support multi-dimensional data views, allowing users to analyze relationships across various data categories and establish a comprehensive perspective on business operations. Moreover, dynamic calculations allow real-time data analysis, significantly improving the accuracy and depth of financial insights. I have utilized Essbase's data aggregation capabilities. The Oracle Essbase interface provides a good user experience, allowing users to easily navigate and analyze data with fast query performance, effective data visualization tools such as charts, graphs, and tables, and flexibility for customizable analysis and reporting, including the ability to create ad hoc reports. The benefits of the interface include improving productivity and enhancing decision-making.
Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is very well integrated with other Microsoft products, including PowerApps and Excel, as well as Access, so it fits well into our workflow."
"It is more user-friendly compared to SSRS."
"Microsoft BI is very easy to set up and use."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"If you are not very technical this tool could be very useful."
"It is a good platform for data analysis, organization, and all of the other interim performances that are necessary."
"The solution makes it easy for me to develop reports and publish them."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft BI is its visualization and its ease of use."
More Microsoft Power BI pros
"The Oracle Essbase interface provides a good user experience, allowing users to easily navigate and analyze data with fast query performance, effective data visualization tools such as charts, graphs, and tables, and flexibility for customizable analysis and reporting, including the ability to create ad hoc reports."
"It is very fast compared to other normal databases, like SQL and MySQL."
"Oracle's capability to define custom hierarchies and dimensions has helped my organization in performing nuanced data exploration and advanced modeling because we use Oracle Essbase for dimension definition and also to define the properties of these members, such as dynamic members, stored members, shared members."
"The solution can handle a large volume of data."
"Essbase is extremely stable and low-maintenance."
"Unlike relational, where you're linking together multiple tables, with Essbase, you basically define what the dimensions are beforehand, and you define the hierarchy, and then load the data. This allows you to do a pretty sophisticated analysis so that you can drill into it and slice and dice the data."
"Oracle Essbase is a web integration system that integrates with other data systems."
"It is highly efficient and easily scalable, particularly for handling large databases."
More Oracle Essbase pros
 

Cons

"It has limited performance capabilities in terms of connecting to large transactional databases, but it is fine for simple and quick queries from Excel spreadsheets or one table. The premium level is going to be more applicable for the higher transaction-level databases."
"Right now, their premium pricing is keeping us out of the premium market. The premium price per user just doesn't make sense for us, but we haven't reached the limit of 500 users to justify the premium."
"Technical support could be a bit better."
"If I have to update data automatically, where I have to pin the gateway, it doesn't update. There is a scheduled refresh functionality so that it refreshes automatically, but I find it very hard to make it work."
"It needs a wizard that covers all its options."
"I would like for there to be some type of user manual that shows steps on how to navigate the solution."
"It's not really complicated, but I didn't find the things I was looking for. The ones I used to work with within Dash are more open, and there are more choices. But with Power BI, there are only limited types of plots that I can use. For example, when I wanted to put the plots in Power BI, there was no extendable space. You have a limited page where you can place a maximum of three plots in that, and you can't do more than that on a single page. You have to create a new page, a different page for that. That made it a bit annoying, and the filtering part is limited, with basic functions. If you want to make custom filtering or custom functions, you can't do that."
"I face performance issues with Microsoft Power BI, which are unsolvable. There is a lack of features between the on-premises and cloud version, which poses a challenge for me."
More Microsoft Power BI cons
"They should improve the solution's performance."
"The initial setup is pretty complex."
"The solution could enhance business analytics. I delved into the data using Oracle Essbase to create a new support tool."
"The main concern is that Oracle is ending on-premises server support, so it would be better if there was a cloud platform available for Oracle Essbase."
"The initial setup could be simplified."
"Essbase has a programming language, and it has a couple of functions to do forecasting, however, their feature set for that is not that good."
"The reporting tool of Essbase needs improvement."
"A significant area for improvement in Oracle Essbase is that financial statement analysis, CAPEX and OPEX analysis, and financial consolidation must be done manually, as Oracle Essbase doesn't include the financial consolidation module that is available in EPM."
More Oracle Essbase cons
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I think it's a good price, from what I've heard. I know it's competitive with other Power BI tools."
"I believe that the price is reasonable, at least for an enterprise solution."
"I would advise that Microsoft BI products are rightly priced and the licensing is easy to follow and to fulfill."
"Microsoft BI is considered to be competitively priced when compared to other similar solutions in the market."
"I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten, with one being cheap and ten being expensive."
"Microsoft BI requires licenses."
"Compared to what's available on the market, I think we pay a fair price."
"Remove the cost of a licence to show a dashboard within SharePoint. Why should readers of a dashboard have to pay to view? ​"
More Microsoft Power BI pricing and cost advice
"The solution is expensive."
"Essbase is competitively priced."
"It is a costly solution."
"I believe the licensing is on a monthly base."
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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…
Read full review
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
21%
Computer Software Company
9%
Insurance Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business135
Midsize Enterprise57
Large Enterprise165
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

Seeking lightweight open source BI software
There are many...It would rather depend what System BI architecture or Enterprise legacy you have at your end...I would recommend as follows: 1) If you have legacies of SAP, Oracle - look for SAP...
See all answers
Is Power BI a complete platform or only a visualization tool?
Power BI is an advanced visualization tool oriented to big data with a very complete set of widgets to visualize information, control users accessing information, the configuration of governance po...
See all answers
How does Oracle OBIEE compare with Microsoft BI?
Oracle OBIEE is great in allowing design and creativity per the individual needs of the organization. Dashboards are fully customizable and very user-friendly. This solution is very stable. Oracle ...
See all answers
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Essbase?
It's not that expensive, but also not cheap. I'm not sure because it's a private license.
See all answers
What needs improvement with Oracle Essbase?
A significant area for improvement in Oracle Essbase is that financial statement analysis, CAPEX and OPEX analysis, and financial consolidation must be done manually, as Oracle Essbase doesn't incl...
See all answers
What is your primary use case for Oracle Essbase?
The initial setup of Oracle Essbase is dependent on whether you select BSO or ASO cubes. First, you need to set up the type of information and once the type of cubes is defined, you need to define ...
See all answers
 

Comparisons

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Amazon QuickSight vs Microsoft Power BI
Compared 12% of the time
Domo vs Microsoft Power BI Logo
Domo vs Microsoft Power BI
Compared 7% of the time
Databricks vs Microsoft Power BI Logo
Databricks vs Microsoft Power BI
Compared 6% of the time
KNIME Business Hub vs Microsoft Power BI Logo
KNIME Business Hub vs Microsoft Power BI
Compared 4% of the time
More Microsoft Power BI Competitors
SAP Analytics Cloud vs Oracle Essbase Logo
SAP Analytics Cloud vs Oracle Essbase
Compared 11% of the time
IBM Cognos vs Oracle Essbase Logo
IBM Cognos vs Oracle Essbase
Compared 10% of the time
IBM Planning Analytics vs Oracle Essbase Logo
IBM Planning Analytics vs Oracle Essbase
Compared 9% of the time
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform vs Oracle Essbase Logo
SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform vs Oracle Essbase
Compared 7% of the time
Tableau Enterprise vs Oracle Essbase Logo
Tableau Enterprise vs Oracle Essbase
Compared 6% of the time
More Oracle Essbase Competitors
 

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide
Microsoft Power BI
October 2025
Microsoft Power BI reportDownload Microsoft Power BI product report
Buyer's Guide
Oracle Essbase
October 2025
Oracle Essbase reportDownload Oracle Essbase product report
 

Also Known As

SSRS, SSAS, MSBI, MS Reporting Services, Microsoft BI Tools, Microsoft Big Data, Power BI Pro, MS BI
Essbase
 

Overview

Microsoft Power BI is a powerful tool for data analysis and visualization. This tool stands out for its ability to merge and analyze data from various sources. Widely adopted across different industries and departments, Power BI is instrumental in creating visually appealing dashboards and generating insightful business intelligence reports. Its intuitive interface, robust visualization capabilities, and seamless integration with other Microsoft applications empower users to easily create interactive reports and gain valuable insights.

Microsoft

Oracle Essbase is an OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) Server that provides an environment for deploying pre-packaged applications or developing custom analytic and enterprise performance management applications.

Oracle
 

Sample Customers

Accenture Adidas Aetna AIG Airbus Alibaba Allstate Amazon American Express Aon AT&T Audi Bank of America BASF Bayer Berkshire Hathaway Boeing Coca-Cola Comcast Cisco Coca-Cola Dell Disney Emirates Equinix FedEx Ford GE Google H&M Home Depot Honda IBM Intel JPMorgan Chase Kellogg's Kroger L'Oréal McDonald's Merck MetLife Microsoft Nike Oracle P&G PepsiCo Procter & Gamble Prudential Financial SAP Siemens Snapchat Spotify Starbucks Target Toyota T-Mobile Unilever Visa Walmart WeWork World Bank Xerox
CHU de Rennes, Bellco Credit Union, Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd, Deutsche Telekom AG, Samarco MineraÊo S.A., PCCW Ltd., QDQ media S.A.U., Boiron Italia, Specialized Bicycle Components Inc., Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd., Air Canada, Daelim Industrial Co. Ltd.
Buyer's Guide
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
October 2025
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