Pentaho Business Analytics vs QBO comparison

Hitachi Vantara and Unscrambl, Inc are both solutions in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category. Hitachi Vantara is ranked #19 with an average rating of 8.5, while Unscrambl, Inc is ranked #62. Hitachi Vantara holds a 0.5% mindshare in BIT, compared to Unscrambl, Inc’s 0.1% mindshare. Additionally, 87% of Hitachi Vantara users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Unscrambl, Inc users who would recommend it.

Pentaho Business Analytics

Read 45 Pentaho Business Analytics reviews

1,443 Views
534 Comparison Views

87% willing to recommend

QBO

Read 6 QBO reviews

148 Views
148 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

Pentaho Business Analytics

QBO

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

Pentaho Business Analytics and QBO compete in the field of business intelligence and financial management. Pentaho holds an advantage with its extensive data integration capabilities and flexible dashboards, while QBO excels in financial reporting and collaboration.

Features: Pentaho Business Analytics offers advanced ETL capabilities, ad-hoc reporting, integration with Google Maps for geo-referencing, and supports tools like JasperReport and BIRT. It provides both Community and Enterprise editions, with the open-source Community edition catering to budget-conscious businesses. QBO focuses on finance and accounting, offering robust support for invoicing, order processing, and integrations with major platforms like SAP and Oracle.

Room for Improvement: Pentaho could enhance its user interface, improve dashboard creation, and offer more intuitive reporting features. The need for better version control and comprehensive online resources is noted. QBO could focus on enhancing its inventory management functionalities and improve integration processes with different payment gateways.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Pentaho is available as on-premises and hybrid cloud, relying on its active user community for support, providing a robust layer of assistance. Some mixed reviews exist for technical support. QBO, as a public cloud solution, offers easy access, with mixed reviews on customer service; some praise its responsiveness, while others note limitations in technical support.

Pricing and ROI: Pentaho offers a flexible pricing structure with an open-source Community Edition and a costlier Enterprise Edition. Low entry costs appeal to businesses with tight budgets, though the Enterprise edition requires significant investment. ROI perceptions vary among users. QBO's pricing is relatively high but justified by its extensive financial management features leading to favorable ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO

July 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 865,384 peers since 2012

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

Pentaho Business Analytics

Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

19th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Operations Analytics (5th), Reporting (12th)

QBO

Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

62nd

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of Pentaho Business Analytics is 0.5%, down from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of QBO is 0.1%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

Featured Reviews

Mir Gulzar Ahmed

IT Manager at Synergy Computers

Excels in handling unstructured data, helping organizations navigate through different storage systems

Pentaho can help organizations by providing them an insight of their unstructured data using one platform(Pentaho Business Analytics). The features are almost identical to other BIS platforms but to me, customers can benefit as it has a community version with most of its Enterprise features. It also has a free limited-period trial version. The other feature that I would like to share here is, that users have access to a complete spectrum of data from different sources with the system’s adaptive big data layer, which takes the source of the data into account. The software is built on an open architecture and can be integrated with multiple systems. However, Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics has been acquired by HDS which offers an Enterprise edition for organizations that also need to meet product compliance.

Read full review

Mimi Evans

Owner/Operator at Fearless Bookkeeping Services LLC

Offer great partnership models and relatively simple to use

My only issue with QuickBooks Online is their inventory capabilities. My understanding is that they're rolling out improvements in 2023, but anytime a person asks me about using QuickBooks Online and inventory, then I always recommend the desktop version because otherwise the functionality isn't great. They're trying to become the all-in source that we use for everything. However, the product lakcs a client portal, a feature that would make a huge difference. I'm an accountant and if I can't use it well, I can't train my customers to use it well. There are so many professional service companies that would love to be able to offer a client portal of some sort but they're so industry-specific or they're outrageously expensive because they're meant for enterprise level. I don't like the UI or the functionality of their cash flow planner. I would rather pay for another software than use theirs.

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

"We were able to install it without any assistance from tech support."

"The most valuable feature of Pentaho is the Tableau report."

"Pentaho is an analytics platform that can be used when an organization has a lot of big data storage systems already installed and needs to manage and analyze that data. It has a specific use case for unstructured data, such as documents, and needs to be able to search and analyze it."

"The interface of Pentaho Business Analytics is easy to use and does not require high-level skills to operate the tool."

"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."

"It is robust, offers market intelligence, and utilizes modules effectively."

"I use the BI Server, CDE Dashboards, Saiku, and Kettle, because these tools are very good and highly experienced."

"Pentaho Business Analytics' best features include the ease of developing data flows and the wide range of options to connect to databases, including those on the cloud."

More Pentaho Business Analytics pros

"The most valuable feature of QBO is that it can be reconnected at any time and anywhere. It is not like other software where you have to back up and restore the data."

"The most valuable features of QBO are its order processing and sales capabilities, as well as its invoice and batch processing capabilities. It allows for multiple batch processing and integration with other platforms, such as SAP V1, Oracle, and Dynamics BC. This makes the solution versatile and effective for customers, and they are satisfied with its integration with different platforms. The integration of this solution is not fixed, it can be based on the user's requirements."

"The scheduling feature for salaries and taxes is one of the best features of QBO. It's also very user-friendly."

"It's intuitive, electronic, and, as in the old days, eliminates the need for pen and paper. It is the only option. It's the best software."

"QBO has a very good reconciliation tool."

"The most valuable feature is the collaboration around allowing many people to ask questions and see the dashboards together."

Cons

"Deployment is not simple. It is not simple because we are dealing with a lot of data; we are dealing with a lot of storage. So, it's not a simple process."

"Pentaho, at the general level, should greatly improve the easy construction of its dashboards and easy integration of information from different sources without technical user intervention."

"The repository should be improved."

"The tool is very good, and yet it has some problems as it relies heavily on Java."

"Another concern is that Pentaho is not customizable or interactive."

"Pentaho Business Analytics is hard to learn and not suited for initial users as it requires knowledge of operating systems, Java, and other technical skills."

"Logging capability is needed."

"Version control would be a good addition."

More Pentaho Business Analytics cons

"The dashboards can be improved by making them customizable in a more granular manner."

"Compared to offline accounting software with many shortcuts and allows you to operate the software using the keyboard, QBO doesn't have the keyboard feature."

"QBO could be improved by adding more flexibility in its invoice and sales order processing capabilities. Customers have requested the ability to integrate with different retail services and the ability to easily integrate with different payment gateways, such as PayPal, by providing API and credentials, with the system automatically processing the integration."

"Inventory capabilities are lacking in the cloud version."

"The Linux Operating System feature is not available. When we access it from the accounting features, it does not transit to installation."

"The internet version is less user-friendly than the desktop version. The desktop version is their flagship, whereas the online version is considerably different, requiring all new learning and having several glitches."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pentaho is expensive ."

"We were lucky enough to find a Pentaho OEM partner who offered a data warehouse model and the ETL software for about 60K SGD per year."

"Free and commercial versions are available."

"I give the pricing a nine out of ten."

"In my opinion, QBO is a bit on the pricey side, but you have no choice. It is still better, in the long run, to go with their pricing or their software than the alternatives."

"The solution is expensive."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which BI (Business Intelligence) Tools solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Comparison Review

it_user6978

Co-Founder at Helical IT Solution (Jaspersoft, Pentaho, Talend, Kettle, DWBI, ETL, Ctools, iReport, Jasper Report)

Jun 10, 2013

Jaspersoft vs. Pentaho – Which one to use & is there any need to purchase the commercial edition

Any company (be it technology, manfucaturing, human resource, ecommerce, SME etc) always has the need for Business Intelligence to some or the other extent. If cost is one of the consideration factor, then the 2 BI tools which are at the forefront are Pentaho and Jaspersoft. But, often the same…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

Educational Organization

Manufacturing Company

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

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

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pentaho Business Analytics?

Pentaho Business Analytics offers the best value for money. While improvements can be made in some areas, particularly with more cloud-based solutions, it is not in their domain because they do not...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pentaho Business Analytics?

From an integration perspective, Pentaho Business Analytics is not the best tool on the market. There are things done by Apache that are better, though I am not the one implementing them, so this i...

See all answers

Ask a question

Earn 20 points

Comparisons

KNIME Business Hub vs Pentaho Business Analytics

Compared 41% of the time

Databricks vs Pentaho Business Analytics

Compared 15% of the time

Tableau Enterprise vs Pentaho Business Analytics

Compared 12% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Pentaho Business Analytics

Compared 11% of the time

Apache Spark vs Pentaho Business Analytics

Compared 8% of the time

More Pentaho Business Analytics Competitors

No data available

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pentaho Business Analytics

August 2025

Download Pentaho Business Analytics product report

Buyer's Guide

QBO

August 2025

Download QBO product report

Also Known As

Pentaho, Kettle, Hitachi Pentaho Business Analytics

No data available

Overview

Pentaho is an open source business intelligence company that provides a wide range of tools to help their customers better manage their businesses. These tools include data integration software, mining tools, dashboard applications, online analytical processing options, and more.

Pentaho has two product categories: There is the standard enterprise version. This is the product that comes directly from Pentaho itself with all of the benefits, features, and programs that come along with a paid application such us analysis services, dashboard design, and interactive reporting.

The alternative is an open source version, which the public is permitted to add to and tweak the product. This solution has its advantages, aside from the fact that it is free, in that there are many more people working on the project to improve its quality and breadth of functionality.

Hitachi Vantara

QBO combines the power of natural language and spontaneous collaboration to deliver on-demand insights to the decision-makers. Winning features of QBO: 1. Easily connect to multiple internal and external datasets 2. Slice-and-diced data in infinite ways using natural language (English) and interactive visualizations 3. Responds easily to descriptive, diagnostic, predictive and prescriptive questions 4. Native integration with Microsoft Teams 5. Save and share your findings easily on interactive boards URL of the product : https://www.unscrambl.com/qbo-insights/ Powered by Unscrambl, we believe that our increasingly complex world of data can be simplified and transformed into actionable insights, saving valuable time and resources for every business. Unscrambl develops next-generation conversational analytics software that gives business users the power to access and consume data instantly and collaboratively. Unscrambl is headquartered in the United States and has offices in Singapore, Turkey, India, and the Philippines. For more information, please visit www.unscrambl.com

Unscrambl, Inc

Sample Customers

Cargo 2000 Lufthansa, Marketo, ModCloth, Cardiac Science, Telefonica, ExactTarget, Active Broadband Networks, and Brussels Airport.

SATS, Celcom, EastWest, DBS, Metrobank, XL-Axiata, Etisalat, UnionBank of the Philippines

Buyer's Guide

Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO

July 2025

Free Report: Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO

Find out what your peers are saying about Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Pentaho Business Analytics vs. QBO report.

See our list of best BI (Business Intelligence) Tools vendors.

We monitor all BI (Business Intelligence) Tools reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.