QlikView vs SQL Server comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between QlikView and SQL Server based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Tableau, Oracle and others in Reporting.
To learn more, read our detailed Reporting Report (Updated: March 2024).
765,386 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"It excels in supporting database connections and various database types.""This solution has simplified getting to and understanding our data, no matter where it is housed.""Easy to analyze data by click-through.""Data transforming with scripting, and the associative model that lets users browse data in an easy way, are the most valuable features.""The language support is very good.""We can scale it if we need to.""On the positive side, QlikView's scripting is a great asset as it functions as an ETL.""The initial setup is not very complex."

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"Tuning Advisor suggests where to add indexes and from where to remove them. It works like an adviser.""SQL Server's performance is fine.""I like that the new version has a memory-optimized table to improve the performance.""The solution is very common. It's easy to use.""It's a good option for those that have a lot of Microsoft solutions in use.""The pricing of the solution is okay. It's less expensive than Oracle, for example.""I like that it's very easy to use, and Veeam is excellent. There are tons of experts and writers in the area now, and we don't find the same for other databases.""The most valuable features of SQL Server are the speed, great support, and it is from a known vendor."

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Cons
"There could be a feature to analyze the sales and accounting data of the client.""If a user wanted to see something not included in the application the new object had to be created by a power user or developer because Qlik view's scripting has somewhat of a learning curve.""This solution would be improved with the inclusion of a feature that would allow us to add a common library of (our) commands used in load scripts and expressions, so with a keyword, we would get a drop down to select the command we are looking for, as opposed to the generic help.""The tool is expensive in Turkey.""They could provide a user-friendly analysis process rather than specialized IT resource code.""It is really old. We are moving towards converting everything into a Power BI environment. We want to have a self-service type of BI environment where different levels of users in organizations can log onto a portal and retrieve the data they need or get the necessary insights for decision-making that's important for them or their business unit. They have built a new version of QlikView called QlikSense, which probably competes with newer BI tools, such as Power BI, but they are far behind. That's why we are moving towards a newer tool that's easier to use and has more visualizations to represent the data.""There is a challenge on the frontend when it comes to browsing data through QlikView, as it isn't entirely compatible with other platforms we use.""There's room for improvement in the area of management's handling of concerns."

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"SQL Server doesn't have proper bitmap indexing, proper columnar databases, or proper implementation of materialized views.""The pricing in general could be better.""It needs to be improved to handle big data for large volumes of transactions for big industries. As compared to Oracle Database, SQL Server is not suitable for big data or large organizations where the database size could be more than 100 GB or more. In our country, for a large database and a large volume of transactions, we normally use Oracle Database. Most of the large banks are shifting from SQL Server to Oracle Database because of its slowness.""We have no vision. We don't know when or how we have been hacked.""When we are talking about event space architecture, scalability generally comes into play. For example, I might have a hundred thousand transactions a second, and then all of a sudden, I build something that everybody in the world wants. The next thing I know is that I have a million transactions a second. So, to be able to process the throughput, I'd have to scale up, and then when the holidays are over, I'm again down to a hundred thousand transactions, and I want to scale back down. SQL Server is not going to do that. In this way, it is not very scalable. One of the reasons why they want us to use Kafka is so that if we need to, we can do that, but our base program is on SQL Server. So, this is where we would use a Kafka event stack so that if I need more servers, I can just write a command, and I can have more consumers, more brokers, and more producers, and when the holiday season is over, it scales right back down again. SQL Server is not going to do that.""There are a lot of improvements in the cloud space about which we open a case with Microsoft every now and then. These improvements are not in terms of features or functionality. They are more related to their own compatibility or connectivity on which they keep on working to improve the product.""The licensing is pretty expensive.""Its security can be improved. When you look at the Windows environment, it isn't the most secure environment. It is exposed to so many attacks. They continuously need to improve the security of the platform on which it sits."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Pricing is a bit too high and I think licenses should be unlimited."
  • "QlikView pricing and licensing is on the high side for a small sized company, but it's competitive among its peers."
  • "Qlik is fairly high in terms of pricing."
  • "The pricing is too high compared to the other solutions on the market."
  • "It is not very expensive. I think it it is on par with other similar products on the market."
  • "The setup costs for QlikView are fair as are the yearly maintenance fees. The licensing becomes a bit more expensive and requires some planning for onboarding."
  • "It has an annual license. It is expensive as compared to other competitive tools that do more for less. In South African rands, we pay about 100,000 to 200,000 a year."
  • "On a scale of one to ten, where one being low price and ten being high price, I rate pricing a four."
  • More QlikView Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "The free version is cumbersome to use and maintain. But $5000 for a licence is more expense than the benefit I would get from a licensed version. A licence might be worth the price to simplify management and speed up searches."
  • "​We are a Microsoft shop, so we use Active Directory. That integrates well with this product, but we did look at Oracle. We also looked at IBM. This was the best price point for us for what we were getting.​"
  • "​It has the easiest licensing."
  • "This is a downside of enterprise Microsoft products."
  • "Currently, almost all of my machines are in Azure and I think it is the best way of licensing now (VM+software)."
  • "The price has been going higher and higher. The market is quite price sensitive."
  • "My advice is quite straightforward. If you know the number of users who really and truly need access to the Server then it is a no-brainer. If you do not know, then get the basic package and minimum licenses and start from there. Needless to say, users can develop/use data structures outside and then deploy onto the Server."
  • "The setup cost is high, but it will return every penny."
  • More SQL Server Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Comparison Review
    Anonymous User
    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:It has user-friendly data visualization features, supporting our decision-making process with its business intelligence capabilities
    Top Answer:QlikView is more expensive than SAP Crystal Reports. It could be improved. I rate the pricing a five out of ten.
    Top Answer:QlikView's UI could be more user-friendly. At present, I encounter difficulties while writing complex queries on the UI. It doesn't support the query button as well.
    Top Answer:SQL Server is fairly priced because it has various editions, depending on the number of users, servers, or core packs you are using. If you compare the product to others in this category, the prices… more »
    Top Answer:SQL Server has helped my organization through partitioning to distribute the workload, as it splits them up into smaller pieces so the machines can easily deal with it. However, this comes with a high… more »
    Top Answer:My company connects through SQL Server authentication. We have company Windows accounts, but we do not want to connect the two, out of security concerns and to keep things separated for our own… more »
    Ranking
    5th
    out of 50 in Reporting
    Views
    2,815
    Comparisons
    2,476
    Reviews
    19
    Average Words per Review
    454
    Rating
    8.1
    Views
    33,485
    Comparisons
    25,100
    Reviews
    26
    Average Words per Review
    361
    Rating
    8.6
    Comparisons
    Tableau logo
    Compared 21% of the time.
    Microsoft  Power BI logo
    Compared 11% of the time.
    Amazon QuickSight logo
    Compared 7% of the time.
    TIBCO Spotfire logo
    Compared 6% of the time.
    IBM Cognos logo
    Compared 6% of the time.
    Also Known As
    Microsoft SQL Server, MSSQL, MS SQL
    Learn More
    Overview

    QlikView is a Business Intelligence tool that allows you to keep tabs on all of your business-related information in a clean, clear, and easy to access database that is intuitive to build and simple to navigate. It is ideal for business owners who wish to improve overall output by creating the most productive system possible.

    SQL Server is a relational database management system (RDBMS) by Microsoft. The product's main purposes are to store data and retrieve it as requested by other software applications - on the same computer or on another computer across a shared network. The solution is built on top of Structured Query Language (SQL), which is a standardized programming language used for relational database management.

    The product is tied to Transact-SQL (T-SQL), which is an implementation of SQL from Microsoft that adds several proprietary programming extensions to the standard language. SQL Server is built similarly to other RDBMS products, as its structure is a row-based table that connects related data elements in different tables to one another. One of its most important components is the SQL Server Database Engine, as it controls data processing, storage, and security. Beneath the Database Engine is the SQL Server Operating System, which is used for memory and I/O management, locking data to avoid unneeded upgrades, and job scheduling.

    The solution has four editions with different sets of services and tools. They include:

    • SQL Server Developer
    • SQL Server Expression
    • SQL Server Standard 
    • SQL Server Enterprise

    The first two are available for free and are typically utilized by smaller companies, as they work with fewer functions and storage. The second two editions are generally used by bigger organizations and enterprises and offer more features.

    The solution has several functions through which users can facilitate different data-related processes. These include:

    • Aggregate functions: These functions are used to calculate one or more values and return a single value.

    • Window functions: Window functions calculate an aggregate value based on a group of rows and return multiple rows for each involved group.

    • Date functions: These functions allow clients to handle data and time data efficiently.

    • String functions: Through the string functions, SQL Server processes an input string and returns a string or numeric value.

    • System functions: The system functions of the product return objects, values, and settings.

    SQL Server Services

    SQL Server has a wide range of add-on services that provide additional benefits beyond database management. These services include:

    • Machine learning: SQL Server machine learning services allow users to do machine learning and data analytics within the product.
       
    • Service broker: This feature is a part of the database engine and offers messaging and message queuing for applications on the platform.

    • Replication: This feature consists of transaction replication, merge replication, and snapshot replication. 

    • Analysis: SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) adds online analytical processing (OLAP) and data mining capabilities to SQL Server databases.

    • Reporting: This feature supports the development of custom reporting applications.

    • Notifications: This feature generates data-driven notifications which are sent to subscribers of Notification Services.

    • Integration: This SQL Server feature provides capabilities for data integration, data import, and data warehousing.

    • Full-text search: Through this feature, users can utilize specialized indexing and query for unstructured text stored in the solution.

    • Visual studio: This feature supports data programming with SQL Server.

    • Azure Data Studio: This is a cross-platform query editor that can be downloaded and used alongside SQL Server.

    SQL Server Benefits

    The solution has many benefits for users. These include the following:

    • The platform ensures a consistent experience across other platforms while being fast and agile.

    • Through the built-in intelligence features, users can understand their data better.

    • The solution has enterprise-level security, which ensures the smooth and safe performance of users' data.

    • SQL Server offers the ability to retrieve large amounts of data quickly and efficiently.

    • The product installation process is fairly easy, and it offers a user-friendly interface.

    • SQL Server offers improved data storage and retrieval functions through frequent upgrades.

    • The solution reduces the risk of database server attacks, since it is not an open-source database.

    Reviews from Real Users

    A president at a consultancy evaluates SQL Server as a veteran solution with critical log shipping feature

    Harkamal S., a user at a manufacturing company, rates SQL Server with a high mark because it is a stable, scalable, and easy-to-deploy solution that pretty much covers everything.

    Sample Customers
    Canon, Gatorade, Amcor, Panasonic, Fila, Cambridge University Hospitals, Global Retail Bank, North Yorkshire Police department, Lanoo Group Publishers, and AonGroep Nederland.
    Microsoft SQL Server is used by businesses in every industry, including Great Western Bank, Aviva, the Volvo Car Corporation, BMW, Samsung, Principality Building Society, Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and the Catholic District School Board of Eastern Ontario.
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company16%
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Consumer Goods Company6%
    Retailer6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Computer Software Company12%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    Government6%
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm18%
    Computer Software Company12%
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Comms Service Provider5%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization42%
    Financial Services Firm9%
    Computer Software Company8%
    Manufacturing Company5%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business39%
    Midsize Enterprise20%
    Large Enterprise41%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise10%
    Large Enterprise71%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business41%
    Midsize Enterprise21%
    Large Enterprise39%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business13%
    Midsize Enterprise48%
    Large Enterprise39%
    Buyer's Guide
    Reporting
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Tableau, Oracle and others in Reporting. Updated: March 2024.
    765,386 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    QlikView is ranked 5th in Reporting with 158 reviews while SQL Server is ranked 1st in Relational Databases Tools with 245 reviews. QlikView is rated 8.2, while SQL Server is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of QlikView writes "Useful for data visualization and business intelligence". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SQL Server writes "A stable, scalable, and easy-to-deploy solution that pretty much covers everything". QlikView is most compared with Tableau, Microsoft Power BI, Amazon QuickSight, TIBCO Spotfire and IBM Cognos, whereas SQL Server is most compared with MariaDB, SAP HANA, Oracle Database, IBM Db2 Database and SAP Adaptive Server Enterprise.

    We monitor all Reporting 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.