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Pentaho Business Analytics vs Windward Core comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 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
5.4
Pentaho Business Analytics mixed ROI perceptions highlight efficiency gains but unclear returns compared to competitors like QlikView and Tableau.
Sentiment score
7.0
Windward Core enhances template design efficiencies, reduces costs, and increases productivity up to 70%, freeing IT resources.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.5
Pentaho Business Analytics receives mixed reviews for customer support, with users relying heavily on forums and community assistance.
Sentiment score
8.4
Windward Core's service is praised for promptness, professionalism, effective communication, and proactive support, despite some troubleshooting concerns.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
Pentaho Business Analytics is scalable with good performance but occasionally needs professional help for complex data handling.
Sentiment score
7.4
Windward Core is generally scalable, effectively handling demand, though some infrastructure and cost limitations affect performance.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.5
Pentaho Business Analytics is stable but may face Java caching issues, impacting performance and requiring careful cache management.
Sentiment score
7.6
Windward Core is praised for stability, reliable performance, and strong support, despite occasional random errors and upgrade issues.
 

Room For Improvement

Pentaho Business Analytics lacks an intuitive interface, robust integration, self-service features, and requires technical expertise, limiting usability.
Windward Core needs improvements in compatibility, user interface, documentation, error handling, and feature enhancements like charts and interactivity.
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.
DBA at Federal University of Uberlândia
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise buyers find the free Pentaho Community Edition cost-effective, while the Enterprise Edition offers value with support and features.
Windward Core offers flexible and competitive pricing, ideal for enterprises with varied needs, supporting multiple deployment models.
Pentaho Business Analytics is priced similarly to other competitors such as QlikView and Tableau.
DBA at Federal University of Uberlândia
 

Valuable Features

Pentaho Business Analytics provides easy data integration, customizable dashboards, extensive connectivity, and supports efficient data transformation and delivery.
Windward Core integrates with Office tools, enabling non-technical users to generate complex reports with customizable templates effortlessly.
It is a stable product, and it can handle large datasets.
DBA at Federal University of Uberlândia
 

Categories and Ranking

Pentaho Business Analytics
Ranking in Reporting
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (20th), Cloud Operations Analytics (2nd)
Windward Core
Ranking in Reporting
21st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
Document Generation Tools (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of Pentaho Business Analytics is 1.8%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Windward Core is 1.1%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Reporting Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Pentaho Business Analytics1.8%
Windward Core1.1%
Other97.1%
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

JB
Founder at SJT Consult
Solution enables effective ETL processes and exhibits high satisfaction
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 is based on what I have heard about novelties in the market. I do not see the need to extend the coverage of Pentaho Business Analytics's domain. For things that it does not do, there are better solutions on the market, and it would be costly to implement them. Pentaho Business Analytics is a very great tool for very specific standardized scenarios. If you need more complex elastic solutions because the process is different, there are better tools available.
CH
Sr. Systems Analyst at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Strong layout and design capabilities; leverages every aspect available in Word-native formatting
The licensing key is a little bit twitchy. I'd like to see more HTML formatting support in templates. It has a basic stock of HTML formatting capability, but it doesn't have a rich vocabulary. I have to work around that sometimes. The help documentation and blog posts are extensive, but not always up to date. The error reports also need improvement. If you don't key it in right, it's a little hard to find the root cause. It gives you information as much as it can, but it doesn't really hone in and tell you explicitly what you should do to correct the problem.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Reporting solutions are best for your needs.
884,266 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user6978 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Marketing Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise15
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise8
 

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 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...
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...
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Also Known As

Pentaho, Kettle, Hitachi Pentaho Business Analytics
Windward, Windward Studios
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cargo 2000 Lufthansa, Marketo, ModCloth, Cardiac Science, Telefonica, ExactTarget, Active Broadband Networks, and Brussels Airport.
HAL, Inc., Axe Group, White Clark Group, Blueprint Software, Aspect Security, Nucleus Software, LeBlanc’s Food Stores, South Sound 911, Aegon, Barclays, Fidelity Investments, ArisGlobal LLC, USDA, RepLink, AON Hewitt
Find out what your peers are saying about Pentaho Business Analytics vs. Windward Core and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,266 professionals have used our research since 2012.