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SAP Data Hub vs SAP PowerDesigner comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 3, 2025

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

SAP Data Hub
Ranking in Metadata Management
12th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Data Governance (30th)
SAP PowerDesigner
Ranking in Metadata Management
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Metadata Management category, the mindshare of SAP Data Hub is 3.4%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP PowerDesigner is 4.5%, up from 3.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Metadata Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SAP PowerDesigner4.5%
SAP Data Hub3.4%
Other92.1%
Metadata Management
 

Featured Reviews

VM
The solution is seamless, but the database sometimes leads to confusion
We used to have multiple different kinds of databases, which internally, had different compliance levels. Retention management is very different now. If the policy is live and the claim has been completed, I couldn't archive the claim. I needed to keep a reference integrity of that claim and understand which policy paid out the claim. With this solution, the policy came in six months ago and qualified for archiving. The claim had been paid and in every environment, the claim had been closed, including the reporting system, the claims system, etc. With the payment set gateway, I can just go and archive. But, we had a hard time during this process. I rate the overall solution a seven out of ten.
Kopparapu Venkatesh Prasad - PeerSpot reviewer
Data modeling tool improves data management and decision-making efficiency
The lineage analysis helps my organization understand data dependencies at an enterprise level. As a SAP PowerDesigner developer, I monitor data across the organization, creating data models that reflect not just one data warehouse but comprehensive organizational information. If you have a small company, lineage helps track employee data across different areas such as finance and HR. Data governance prevents duplicate records, so when tracking employee details, SAP PowerDesigner highlights where data exists in various areas, helping ensure we only use the appropriate sources. This functionality allows us to assess the impact of data deletions effectively. I utilize the reverse engineering capabilities in SAP PowerDesigner. Reverse engineering is helpful, especially since I have colleagues new to SAP PowerDesigner. They often do not know which columns are available where. In SAP PowerDesigner, we can reverse engineer existing data from its source and identify errors in production. For instance, by using Ali's example, if an error arises, I can trace it back to the table and environment it originated from using the reverse engineering feature. The best features of SAP PowerDesigner, from my perspective, are its ability to keep the connectivity between the source database and the new system, data redundancy and availability, and impact analysis. The first feature acts as a bridge between systems. The second allows us to see what data is already available and what new data can be brought in. The third, impact analysis, helps determine how many tables will be affected if a specific table is deleted. This critical point allows us to capture how much data will be lost if any table is removed. Currently, these features shape my daily work. SAP PowerDesigner primarily benefits business management units by offering three types of data modeling structures: conceptual, logical, and physical models. The conceptual model communicates high-level insights to top executives, while logical and physical models address complex queries faced by developers in analytics. SAP PowerDesigner enhances the clarity of our data management significantly, as around 80% of data can be searched quickly and maintained in our SAP systems. The tool enables mapping from end to end, making my work faster and more efficient than using other ER data modeling solutions. The interface allows easy creation of data models and searching for existing data, ensuring I can complete my tasks significantly quicker. The importance of SAP PowerDesigner's collaboration capabilities lies in fostering a unified data management approach. It acts as a unified tool, preventing the duplication of existing data in analytical processes, thus saving both effort and storage costs, which is essential for effective data management. We utilize collaboration capabilities in SAP PowerDesigner with various source systems such as PG admin, Postgres, Oracle, and Snowflake. Recently, we have added Snowflake for cloud data modeling and POC work, streamlining the collaboration process across different systems.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its connection to on-premise products is the most valuable. We mostly use the on-premise connection, which is seamless. This is what we prefer in this solution over other solutions. We are using it the most for the orchestration where the data is coming from different categories. Its other features are very much similar to what they are giving us in open source. Their push-down approach is the most advantageous, where they push most of the processing on to the same data source. This means that they have a serverless kind of thing, and they don't process the data inside a product such as Data Hub. They process the data from where the data is coming out. If it is coming from HANA, to capture the data or process it for analytics, orchestration, or management, they go to the HANA database and give it out. They don't process it on Data Hub. This push-down approach increases the processing speed a little bit because the data is processed where it is sitting. That's the best part and an advantage. I have used another product where they used to capture the data first and then they used to process it and give it. In Data Hub, it is in reverse. They process it first and give it, and then they put their own manipulations. They lead in terms of business functions. No other solution has business functions already implemented to perform business analysis. They have a lot of prebuilt business functions for machine learning and orchestration, which we can use directly to get an analysis out from the existing data. Most of the data is sitting as enterprise data there. That's a major advantage that they have."
"SAP is one of the most seamless ERPs that have integrated SAP archiving within Excel. I have not seen this with any other database."
"The most valuable feature is the S/4HANA 1909 On-Premise"
"SAP PowerDesigner is fairly stable."
"By using SAP PowerDesigner, we are able to create a product that is always up to date, so the model always represents the implementation."
"I mostly work on the conceptual and logical side of things, and I enjoy how easy it is to use."
"SAP PowerDesigner is an excellent tool that does what I need it to do. What I like most about it is that it's stable, fast, and easy to understand."
"Provides the flexibility to create logical and conceptual data models."
"In terms of operational efficiency and cause savings or return on investment, I can say that with SAP PowerDesigner, our company saves a lot of time."
"I do a data-centric design, so for me, the data analysis and design tools are the most valuable features."
"I like the property sheet capability and the user-defined attributes that you can set up."
 

Cons

"The company has everything offshore."
"Nowadays there are some inconsistencies in data bases, however, they upgrade and release the versions to market."
"In 2018, connecting it to outside sources, such as IoT products or IoT-enabled big data Hadoop, was a little complex. It was not smooth at the beginning. It was unstable. It took a lot of time for the initial data load. Sometimes, the connection broke, and we had to restart the process, which was a major issue, but they might have improved it now. It is very smooth with SAP HANA on-premise system, SAP Cloud Platform, and SAP Analytics Cloud. It could be because these are their own products, and they know how to integrate them. With Hadoop, they might have used open-source technologies, and that's why it was breaking at that time. They are providing less embedded integration because they want us to use their other products. For example, they don't want to go and remove SAP Analytics Cloud and put everything in Data Hub. They want us to use SAP Analytics Cloud somewhere else and not inside the Data Hub. On the integration part, it lacks real-time analytics, and it is slow. They should embed the SAP Analytics Cloud inside Data Hub or support some kind of analysis. They do provide some analysis, but it is not extensive. They are moreover open source. So, we need a lot of developers or data scientists to go in and implement Python algorithms. It would be better if they can provide their own existing algorithms and give some connections and drop-down menus to go and just configure those. It will make things really quick by increasing the embedded integrations. It will also improve the process efficiency and processing power. Its performance needs improvement. It is a little slow. It is not the best in the market, and there are other products that are much better than this. In terms of technology and performance, it is a little slow as compared to Microsoft and other data orchestration products. I haven't used other products, but I have read about those products, their settings, and the milliseconds that they do. In Azure Purview, they say that they can copy, manage, or transform the data within milliseconds. They say that they can transform 100 gigabytes of data within three to five seconds, which is something SAP cannot do. It generally takes a lot of time to process that much amount of data. However, I have never tested out Azure."
"SAP PowerDesigner could improve by making the repository easier to understand. It is difficult to understand how the repository works because when I used logical models as part of the team, we wanted to use them together and update the older versions of the data model version but it was confusing. The repository needs to be explained."
"One issue is the cost, as it is a high-priced tool coming from SAP."
"There should be a better usage of current hardware including multicore CPUs, higher resolutions, and multiple displays."
"SAP PowerDesigner is not a product that's really actively developed anymore in the sense that the user interface is outdated."
"Not very intuitive or user-friendly."
"One disadvantage of SAP PowerDesigner is that you cannot reverse engineer the ALTER statements, so that's an enhancement or area for improvement I'm looking forward to seeing from the SAP team in the future. That should directly reflect on the physical data models my company builds."
"SAP PowerDesigner can improve the ease of use. It is not the best tool on the market because it is tough to navigate and use. A beginner would not be able to use it well, it requires some experience. If the solution was more user-friendly it would be able to be used by more audiences. I do not think many people are aware of this solution and they should use it."
"The solution is very, very expensive. It would be ideal if it was a more affordable product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The Cloud is very expensive, but SAP HANA previous service is okay."
"Regarding costs, SAP PowerDesigner is pricey, as I've heard from my team manager, which is why the company has been thinking of bringing another solution on board."
"The pricing varies based on functionality and users."
"SAP PowerDesigner is cheaper than eriwin."
"PowerDesigner is not the cheapest solution on the market, so make sure that you are using it to its full potential."
"When you purchase the license for SAP PowerDesigner, you have to buy one year of support. The tool is worth the money."
"I would like SAP to prove free licenses to professionals that are using the solution. The free version is limited."
"I bought the software outright and do not pay a licensing fee."
"The price of the solution is low."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Government
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise17
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SAP Data Hub?
SAP is one of the most seamless ERPs that have integrated SAP archiving within Excel. I have not seen this with any other database.
What needs improvement with SAP Data Hub?
We moved from Oracle. If you're aware of your monitoring system, the RPU market, and the managed system, you should move to HANA, which is an innovative database built by SAP itself. However, this ...
What is your primary use case for SAP Data Hub?
I technically handle the database, like cycle management projects. When transaction data comes in, we see it based on the retention periods. We have to move the data to some secure storage rather t...
What do you like most about SAP PowerDesigner?
It allows us to have proper documentation in terms of the databases.
What needs improvement with SAP PowerDesigner?
For collaboration, it's a two-sided coin. SAP PowerDesigner does pretty good at allowing you to compare models. If you have two or more people who work on the same data models, it has a capability ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Sybase PowerDesigner
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Kaeser Kompressoren, HARTMANN
Medtronic, Cirque du Soleil, Antarc, B&G Manufacturing, EarlySense, eBay, Ferrero, James Austin Company, Lenovo, Sagem, RAK Ceramics, Vodafone
Find out what your peers are saying about SAP Data Hub vs. SAP PowerDesigner and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
868,759 professionals have used our research since 2012.