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Polarion ALM vs TFS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 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

Polarion ALM
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
6th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (6th)
TFS
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
98
Ranking in other categories
Test Management Tools (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of Polarion ALM is 8.2%, up from 5.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of TFS is 4.1%, down from 7.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
 

Featured Reviews

Dina Bindi - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides traceability and compliance with high flexibility
It's extremely flexible. Configuring items is straightforward and doesn't require involving the supplier each time. We find the requirement management, test management, documentation, and dashboards very effective. However, we don't use DevOps-related features, such as integration with tools like SVN or Git, because we use Azure DevOps. The aspects related to requirements, testing, changes, tasks, and agile methodology are excellent, which is why we've been using it for a long time.
Pmurki@Micron.Com Praveen - PeerSpot reviewer
Version control is excellent and good for code review, branching, merging strategies and more
I've worked with TFS for source control and Agile project management. We also used TFS for seamless team collaboration and tracking.  I used TFS for a couple of years. Now, we use Azure DevOps. It's a wonderful tool for source control and CI/CD pipelines It's a really valuable tool for…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The features I find the most valuable are requirement tracking and schematics."
"The tool's most valuable feature is its browser experience. I rate its traceability feature a ten out of ten. From the initial stage to the release, you can manage everything through a single point."
"Polarion ALM delivers both document views and table views simultaneously and organizes configurations according to norms and standards."
"Polarion ALM has some valuable tools for managing our targets and requirements. I think that's its best feature."
"We had a nice experience with technical support."
"You can see the work ticket and you can circulate that within the teams. You can define your flows, customize according to your needs, and you can create dashboards and create the reports according to your needs."
"Polarion ALM helps us better structure our customer requirements, and we can also validate the specs of our products against those. If anything changes on our side, we see the impact, and we can see the effect If a customer changes requirements."
"It's extremely flexible. Configuring items is straightforward and doesn't require involving the supplier each time. We find the requirement management, test management, documentation, and dashboards very effective."
"It is a stable solution."
"TFS is very user-friendly."
"Build definitions and releases within the product. allow us to put our latest applications in the field."
"The most valuable feature of TFS is the central repository, and you can see what changes other developers did from which branch."
"Version Control: TFS offers both the centralized “TFVC” version control technology as well as the distributed “Git” version control technology."
"A notable feature of TFS is its ease of creating user stories and tasks, which simplifies the process of adding and editing them."
"The most valuable feature of TFS is its compatibility with Microsoft Windows systems. We have predominantly Microsoft solutions and TFS work well."
"TFS' most valuable feature is the triage process. It is a robust solution that is easy to use."
 

Cons

"Test management lacks an automated process."
"The configuration aspect of the solution is not easy. A person needs a lot of programming knowledge in order to successfully handle the job."
"The system’s technology is not the most current, leading to missing features that are common in web-based applications."
"The solution can be improved by making it more user-friendly, and a server-based application rather than client based."
"As Polarion ALM is a development-oriented tool, easy support or easy access is provided by default, but if I want to use detailed features, I need to write the script, particularly the VM script, and this is its area for improvement. I want Polarion ALM to have a graphical user interface that doesn't need scripting. In the next release of the tool, I'd like for it to not require scripting and programming because needing to run script language is time-consuming."
"The interface for this solution needs to be made more user-friendly to provide a better user experience."
"The solution's editing capabilities need improvement."
"We use PTC Windchill, and Polarion ALM doesn't have native integration, so we had to purchase the connector to integrate it with Polarion ALM. We still haven't implemented it."
"This solution is quite old and it is already being bundled as Azure DevOps Server."
"I'm looking for specific options that aren't currently available, such as active status, new status, or what's currently in progress."
"Not all of the functionality, which is exposed by the command line interface (tf.exe) is available in the Visual Studio GUI."
"I would like to see the reporting features expanded so that I can see details on the users connected to all of the projects."
"The solution is stable but could improve."
"Its pricing could be improved."
"The price could be cheaper."
"The project management side should be addressed and the project and release planning should be somewhat extended."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Software for medical devices is always expensive."
"The license model is okay for large companies but would be quite expensive for smaller enterprises."
"Our license for Polarion ALM is yearly. And it's not the cheapest tool that we've looked at. So if we had made our decision purely based on the licensing cost, we wouldn't have selected Polarion."
"If the pricing would come down and it was more affordable then we wouldn't have to switch."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is an expensive product."
"You have to pay around 50-60 euros per user."
"TFS is on the higher side, but if you intend to use the tool as a complete ALM tool, it will reduce your costs in the long run."
"I wouldn't say that this tool is cheap or expensive but in the middle."
"The solution is expensive."
"I was working with the engineering team, and that was not under my umbrella. From what I can remember, its license was yearly. They had the licenses on a per-user basis, and they included MTM."
"It's just as expensive as HPE ALM, without many of the features, best used for development tool only to avoid higher costs."
"It is an expensive solution."
"Microsoft products are always expensive. Obviously, they are quality products, but it would be helpful if there was a reduction in price. But compared to other vendors, I think the cost is high."
"We pay for the license yearly."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
26%
Computer Software Company
14%
Healthcare Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Educational Organization
68%
Computer Software Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Manufacturing Company
3%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Polarion ALM?
Polarion ALM ( /categories/application-lifecycle-management-alm-suites ) could see improvements in performance and scalability. The system’s technology is not the most current, leading to missing f...
What is your primary use case for Polarion ALM?
Polarion ALM ( /products/polarion-alm-reviews ) is a tool that delivers both document views and table views simultaneously. It organizes configurations according to norms and standards, making it s...
Which is better - TFS or Azure DevOps?
TFS and Azure DevOps are different in many ways. TFS was designed for admins, and only offers incremental improvements. In addition, TFS seems complicated to use and I don’t think it has a very fri...
What do you like most about TFS?
Microsoft's technical team is supportive.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TFS?
While I do not know the exact pricing, TFS is likely more expensive than GitLab.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Team Foundation Server
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Engineering Ingegneria Informatica, IBS AG, Zumtobel Group
Vendex KBB IT Services, Info Support, Fujitsu Consulting, TCSC, Airways New Zealand, HP
Find out what your peers are saying about Polarion ALM vs. TFS and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.