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Oracle Exadata vs SAP BW4HANA comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

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 Exadata
Ranking in Data Warehouse
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
128
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAP BW4HANA
Ranking in Data Warehouse
8th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of Oracle Exadata is 17.4%, down from 19.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP BW4HANA is 4.6%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Warehouse
 

Featured Reviews

Anand_Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
A solid data warehouse for transactional data that needs to be priced more competitively
Since the product is an appliance, it is very costly. And in the current age, people are cautious about spending this amount of money on any of these types of backend products. Some use cases are in real-time, where all other databases are much faster, but if you talk about the data warehouse, business intelligence, and all other perspectives in the transactional world, Oracle has to reduce the cost. Otherwise, a customer wouldn't want to continue this. If the same thing can be done at half or one-third of the cost, why would people stay with Oracle? Oracle Exadata would not have great value in front of a CFO. Other solutions can guard your data and address security concerns. Security, volumetrics, and so on are also provided by other databases, which are not that costly. Apart from Exadata, Oracle has other tools for business intelligence and other things, which they add on top of Exadata when they're selling a general license. For example, the Vertica database, an HP data warehouse. They have come up with their own analytic engine within the database, which gives an edge for the client to use the data analytics engine as a part of their database. Exadata does not have an analytic engine. Even MySQL has some statistical tools within it. If Exadata integrates analytical tools, it will be good for them.
Csaba Grünblatt - PeerSpot reviewer
Performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities
SAP BW4HANA improved data reporting processes significantly. Performance on HANA database is good. Well-built data models ensure consistent and fast reporting. Reusable models enhance efficiency, even for SaaS services. In-memory computing, especially since HANA, has greatly improved performance in data analysis tasks. It eliminates the need for complex optimizations like creating indexes or aggregates. Queries that once took minutes now run in seconds, enabling real-time reporting, especially for SAP ECC on HANA. SAP BW4HANA's integration capabilities are streamlined with a simplified architecture and more virtual layers. You can directly load data into optimized layers, reducing the need for extra storage. The introduction of Open ODS Views allows for additional logic and master data inclusion, making integration faster and simpler. The learning curve for SAP BW4HANA is much faster now compared to ten years ago, thanks to abundant free resources like documentation, videos, blogs, and learning journeys provided by SAP. It is simpler to learn with these resources available compared to the past when you had to attend courses and rely on books. I would recommend SAP BW4HANA to users looking to implement it, especially if they want to keep their systems on-premise and already have SAP systems. Those with BW on HANA have two choices: BW4HANA or DataSphere, depending on their cloud strategy. If they are advanced in their cloud strategy and want to migrate off-premise, DataSphere is a good choice. However, for a robust solution on-premise or in a private cloud, BW4HANA is an excellent option. Overall, I would rate BW4HANA as a nine out of ten. It performs all necessary data warehouse tasks and offers additional functionalities. We use it traditionally, with complex transformations and models but with less emphasis on real-time processing and third-party sources.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has improved the performance, now we run with more performance cores with less CPU to attend all the database demands. Reducing Time to Market, increase our ability to face the competition with speed and low cost."
"Oracle is easy to use for peripheral things, such as the data vault and the data firewall, data sync, and partitions. These are the features that give an edge to other databases."
"We like the tool’s features like Smart Scan, Hybrid Columnar Compression, and the TFA."
"The ease of setup is an eight out of ten."
"A very stable solution, which we have hardly any problems with."
"Backup/Restore performance: Fast backups, fast restores (especially useful for creating clone environments)."
"I am satisfied with its functionalities and performance."
"The performance of the data is the most important part."
"I like the reporting features of the solution."
"The processes are the most valuable aspect of this solution."
"The solution's most valuable feature is that it is a very powerful tool. The solution also has the best stability, robustness, and customizability features."
"The solution is easier to maintain than traditional SAP products."
"The most valuable aspect of this solution is that the infrastructure is easy to understand."
"We like that it is an SAP product, so we can easily connect with the SAP ERP system."
"The most valuable feature is the dashboard."
"SAP BW4HANA aids in managing data from ER to front-end analysis, contributes to ROI, and fosters business growth understanding. I like that the solution breaks down components to a very granular level, allowing for customization and implementation based on specific requirements. The solution is stable. The solution is scalable."
 

Cons

"The improvement could be made on the hardware level as the habit in the industry is to go better and faster and larger with every iteration."
"It's too expensive per terabyte. It's complex."
"There is room for improvement with the handling of the Temp IO, which is often used for JOIN statements."
"Oracle Exadata could improve the platform performance tuning should be easier, automated, and user-friendly."
"Patching must be simplified."
"The price is also higher than I would prefer."
"The scalability can be improved as it is not a parallel execution."
"There is a feature for security, but it is not included in the first purchase of this solution. That means if you need to increase the security, you need to buy the security feature which doesn't come by default on these solutions."
"From a technical perspective, it could be even more related to legacy systems. The connectivity requirement is quite high and requires systems that are up-to-date."
"There should be a direct pipeline from Azure to SAP."
"The problem is the expensive pricing of technical support, making it an area where improvements are required."
"The solution does occasionally get a few bugs, but this is typical for any product."
"The tool is not easy to use for an end user."
"I don't see SAP actively supporting the solution now...a better support from SAP would be appreciated."
"We cannot integrate with third-party tools like Python or advanced integration options. You can't fine-tune tables within BW or generate specific views or reports."
"The cost of the product might be an area that might introduce some restrictions or limitations to customers, making it one of the aspects where improvements are required."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of the solution is high."
"Oracle Exadata is not a cheap solution. Pricing is a problem for Oracle, and every client, not just my company, would like the vendor to improve on the price, or lower the price. My company paid for several years' worth of Oracle Exadata licenses. You need to pay for the technical support and other features separately, on different contracts. In terms of affordability, my rating for Oracle Exadata is two out of five."
"Our customers are always looking to reduce the license's cost."
"The solution takes a lot of time to clone the environment. I would like to see some improvement in the cloning support or the time it takes on the storage side."
"The licensing can be a bit expensive because you need to have certain tools enabled that require them."
"The solution’s cost is a little bit more than the traditional databases."
"The price of the solution has been expensive to implement."
"I did note that Oracle does tend to internally oversize things especially if they want to fill up a budget, and hence third-party oversight is essential."
"For some, the rates offered by SAP can be costly while for others it may seem cheap. The price ultimately depends on how you have negotiated your contract with SAP."
"The tool is affordable."
"Price wise, this solution is on the higher side."
"For the on-premises version of the product, the solution offers a perpetual-based licensing model to its users. In general, SAP offers a monthly subscription-based licensing model to its users."
"We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses."
"The product is free if we have the ECC license."
"This is an expensive solution and there are costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"It's a little expensive compared to Microsoft Azure."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
32%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Retailer
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Oracle Exadata?
It is the best solution for OLTP and data warehousing.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Exadata?
The price is a major consideration. I would rate the price an eight on a scale from one to ten, indicating it is fairly expensive.
What needs improvement with Oracle Exadata?
We recently completed an extension of our storage space. There are minor areas where improvement is needed, such as making the user interface more user-friendly and enhancing configuration and cust...
What do you like most about SAP BW4HANA?
One significant advantage of SAP BW/4HANA is the direct integration with the SAP HANA database, providing seamless access to real-time analytics. Additionally, it enables real-time data integrati...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP BW4HANA?
We have a broad licensing arrangement, which is expensive but worth it for sizeable businesses.
What needs improvement with SAP BW4HANA?
The interface could be more user-friendly, as we often need to do low-level coding to get things done.
 

Also Known As

No data available
SAP BW/4HANA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PayPal, EBS, Organic Food Retailer, Garmin, University of Minnesota, Major Semiconductor Company, Deutsche Bank, Starwood, Ziraat Bank, SK Telecom, and P&G.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Exadata vs. SAP BW4HANA and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.