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Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer vs SAP Crystal Reports comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

Oracle Business Intelligenc...
Ranking in Reporting
29th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAP Crystal Reports
Ranking in Reporting
14th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
52
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer is 1.0%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP Crystal Reports is 2.4%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Reporting Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SAP Crystal Reports2.4%
Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer1.0%
Other96.6%
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

Useful for business reports and helps to drill down accounting information
The tool's most valuable feature is table creation. One of the most important capabilities is the supplier assessment reports. These reports provide a balance during transactions, which is crucial for auditing. This feature is not standard in other ERP systems, making it highly valuable. The solution helps to drill down details from sources like payables and inventory, which the accounting department requires.
Salman Mukhtar Baig - PeerSpot reviewer
SAP Technical Manager at VS Furniture Middle East
Unlock data insights with seamless integration and robust reporting features
I assess the impact of SAP Crystal Reports' dynamic parameters on the customization and flexibility of my reports as very good. Sometimes it creates a problem when it suddenly closes during work due to improper shutdowns, but most of the time it's beneficial since I can fetch the data in one report very efficiently, which is great for the company. The sub reports in SAP Crystal Reports help me enhance the depth and detail of my reports by allowing me to use multiple sets of records, especially when I have very large requirements, such as company dashboards that show what sales, purchases, productions, and HR are doing. Using sub reports as the main report is very beneficial because I can pull multiple department data into the main report. Over the years, SAP Crystal Reports has had a very positive impact and benefits. It's a powerful tool to design any kind of report if you have knowledge of the database, and it can attach to both HANA and SQL databases. I can also connect this data with Excel, which makes it a very powerful tool for me.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Discoverer has been very stable and we've had no real issues."
"The tool's most valuable feature is table creation. One of the most important capabilities is the supplier assessment reports. These reports provide a balance during transactions, which is crucial for auditing."
"The tool can be incredibly powerful and flexible for generating reports."
"In general, Crystal Reports 2008 is a very robust reporting tool."
"Our reports are no longer just a static product, as our users can actually interact with the reports and we can generate a single enterprise wide report where users simply navigate to see only what is pertinent to them."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to create reports easily."
"Creative formula construction is just one of the many tools in Crystal Reports that allows this tool to be so flexible and robust."
"Native connection, Subreports, pixel free formatting, free hand SQL, multiple sources, supports most databases"
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is a fantastic way of generating reports."
"Ease of extracting data from various sources and displaying in such a way that user can’t tell the difference."
 

Cons

"Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer needs to improve its performance and HTML reports."
"They need to try to develop reports to tie different tables together. Currently, to pull the data into one nice, neat report takes a more advanced technically minded person to develop."
"I would like to have horizontal paging like crosstabs."
"Crystal Reports makes too many assumptions, causing odd results, which can sometimes be corrected by altering the SQL or changing the links (providing you understand the link options)."
"I think the product is great and has so much now but I have noticed that it is not Excel 10 compatible and when the reports are extracted to XLS it defaults to MS Office version 95-97 which has dropped rows of data from sheet to sheet."
"I rate SAP Crystal Reports a seven out of ten because while reports sometimes lack clarity due to varying data scenarios affecting comprehension, the backend learning experience with data is ongoing and highlights existing challenges."
"Some features are difficult to use for beginning users, such as shared variables."
"Customer service is terrible, if it wasn’t for the Google community there would not be any support at all."
"Long, complex, crosstab reports are nearly impossible, and with Crystal it is nearly impossible to work with the raw, row-by-row data."
"It crashes the designer when the tool with no clear error messages."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer is more expensive than its alternatives. You need to pay additional costs for implementation."
"We pay fifteen hundred dollars as licensing fee."
"I feel that SAP Crystal Reports is a reasonably priced product."
"SAP Crystal Reports is a very expensive solution."
"The cost of licensing can be a significant factor to consider when upgrading or transitioning to a new version of SAP Crystal Reports. It's important to evaluate the benefits and features offered by the new version against the associated costs to ensure it aligns with your organization's needs and budget."
"This product costs a lot of money."
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915,287 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
20%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Media Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Construction Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise22
 

Questions from the Community

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What needs improvement with SAP Crystal Reports?
SAP Crystal Reports could be improved with more modern user-friendly interfaces and better integration with cloud platforms and AI tools. It would be beneficial to have easier integration with Azur...
What is your primary use case for SAP Crystal Reports?
I have been using SAP Crystal Reports for six months. I am using SAP Crystal Reports to develop data-driven reports and use customer data printing. When I use SAP Crystal Reports for customer data ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP Crystal Reports?
I am aware that the pricing of SAP Crystal Reports gradually changes. When I bought it last time, I don't remember the exact price, and I need to check the current price on the portal. SAP Crystal ...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Georg Fischer Central Plastics
City of Buenos Aires, ASR Group, Citrix, EarlySense, Usha International Limited, Automotive Resources International (ARI), LivePerson, Coelba (Grupo Neoenergia), RZD Russian Railways, National Basketball Association - NBA, TALLY WEiJL, El Machetazo, Young Heroes, Mozzart, Mitsui Knowledge Industry (MKI) , Surgutneftegas Open Joint Stock Company, The VELUX Group, AOK Bundesverband, AL-KO KOBER GROUP
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Business Intelligence Discoverer vs. SAP Crystal Reports and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,287 professionals have used our research since 2012.