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Pentaho Business Analytics vs TIBCO Spotfire 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
5.9
Pentaho Business Analytics enhanced efficiency and output but faced ROI calculation challenges compared to alternatives like QlikView and Tableau.
Sentiment score
6.6
TIBCO Spotfire boosts productivity through reduced maintenance and enhanced analysis, justifying its cost with aligned organizational adoption.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.8
Pentaho receives mixed feedback on support, with strong community engagement but varying customer service and documentation quality.
Sentiment score
7.1
TIBCO Spotfire customer service is praised for responsiveness and knowledge, with ratings ranging from 7 to 9 out of 10.
TIBCO's support, especially for integration products, is swift.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.2
Pentaho scales well and fits organizational needs but may require admin expertise for complex environments and large data.
Sentiment score
7.3
TIBCO Spotfire offers strong scalability, supporting large datasets and real-time processing, though setup and updates may pose challenges.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.6
Pentaho Business Analytics is generally stable but has occasional Java caching, RAM, and subprocess issues with large databases.
Sentiment score
6.6
TIBCO Spotfire is reliable but may face stability issues with complex tasks, dataset size, and improper real-time data integration.
It can handle large datasets.
There are no significant stability issues as long as the product's capabilities are understood and not overly pushed.
 

Room For Improvement

Pentaho needs user interface, reporting, and visualization enhancements, along with better debugging, metadata management, and cost-effective licensing.
TIBCO Spotfire struggles with customization, user-friendliness, data integration, and requires enhancements in training, support, and mobile functionality.
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.
TIBCO Spotfire and ClickView need improvement in scheduling, which is critical yet lacking in quality.
 

Setup Cost

Pentaho's Community Edition is cost-free, while the Enterprise Edition, offering enhanced features, can cost up to $250,000 annually.
TIBCO Spotfire's pricing is high yet competitive, offering value with comprehensive features despite challenges in transparency and negotiation.
Pentaho Business Analytics is priced similarly to other competitors such as QlikView and Tableau.
TIBCO Spotfire's pricing is high, particularly in traditional markets like Turkey, impacting market penetration.
 

Valuable Features

Pentaho Business Analytics offers powerful ETL, user-friendly interface, customizable dashboards, and cost-saving, open-source analytics and reporting features.
TIBCO Spotfire excels in interactive visualizations, real-time analytics, and seamless integration, praised for handling large datasets efficiently.
It is a stable product, and it can handle large datasets.
TIBCO Spotfire integrates with R and Python, offering a differentiator from the competition.
 

Categories and Ranking

Pentaho Business Analytics
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
20th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Operations Analytics (5th), Reporting (13th)
TIBCO Spotfire
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
70
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 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 TIBCO Spotfire is 1.1%, down from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Mir Gulzar Ahmed - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Fuad Mammadli - PeerSpot reviewer
A scalable tool to create dashboards for financial reporting
I have experience with Qlik. Our company moved from Qlik to TIBCO, as the latter provided us with easier options to make dashboards. We consider TIBCO to be better for our company in some of the areas related to automation and analytics. The data monitoring team in our company prefers TIBCO.
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857,162 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user6978 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
14%
Educational Organization
7%
Real Estate/Law Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
10%
Energy/Utilities Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pentaho Business Analytics?
Pentaho Business Analytics is priced similarly to other competitors such as QlikView ( /products/qlikview-reviews ) and Tableau ( /products/tableau-reviews ). I usually use the community edition.
What needs improvement with Pentaho Business Analytics?
Pentaho Business Analytics ( /categories/bi-business-intelligence-tools ) is hard to learn and not suited for initial users as it requires knowledge of operating systems, Java, and other technical ...
What do you like most about TIBCO Spotfire?
TIBCO Spotfire is easy to use. We initiated Spotfire as POC, with support from a tech team based in South Africa. While they assisted with the setup, we conducted the POC ourselves.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TIBCO Spotfire?
TIBCO Spotfire's pricing is high, particularly in traditional markets like Turkey, impacting market penetration. There is a lack of local support and distributors, making it challenging to sell.
What needs improvement with TIBCO Spotfire?
ClickView ( /products/clickview-reviews ) offered more visually appealing visualizations. TIBCO Spotfire and ClickView ( /products/clickview-reviews ) need improvement in scheduling, which is criti...
 

Also Known As

Pentaho, Kettle, Hitachi Pentaho Business Analytics
Spotfire
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cargo 2000 Lufthansa, Marketo, ModCloth, Cardiac Science, Telefonica, ExactTarget, Active Broadband Networks, and Brussels Airport.
Allergan, ASSS de Montreal, Avantium, Blue River, Bank of Montreal, Citibank, FrieslandCampina, Hellmann Logistics, Merck, Novartis
Find out what your peers are saying about Pentaho Business Analytics vs. TIBCO Spotfire and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
857,162 professionals have used our research since 2012.