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TFS vs Zephyr Enterprise comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 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

TFS
Ranking in Test Management Tools
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
99
Ranking in other categories
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites (9th)
Zephyr Enterprise
Ranking in Test Management Tools
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.6
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Test Management Tools category, the mindshare of TFS is 5.4%, down from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zephyr Enterprise is 5.1%, down from 7.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Test Management Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
TFS5.4%
Zephyr Enterprise5.1%
Other89.5%
Test Management Tools
 

Featured Reviews

PS
Service delivery manager at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Ensures team collaboration with strong version control but could improve testing capabilities
Version control is the most basic feature in TFS. It has been there since the beginning. We use it primarily for that purpose. Basically ensuring that the code is not overwritten by other team members and maintaining the sanctity of the code. Bringing order to a disparate team which is virtual at different locations is very important, and TFS provides that control. Once you update a code, nobody can modify it until you are done working on it and check in. It is a great product that revolutionized the way teams work together on Microsoft pieces of code. The versioning part has unique features and capabilities which are unmatched with other products out there.
JM
Director - Quality Engineering at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Integration with tool streamlines test management but needs better exporting options
I use it for test management within Jira This tool boasts an incredibly user-friendly interface that integrates seamlessly with other Jira tools. I particularly appreciate its intuitive features for designing test plans, creating test cases, and executing test cycles. Some areas for improvement,…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is having everything in a single interface, allowing quick and efficient browsing."
"The most valuable features are test case writing and bug tracking."
"The scrum template to manage our development process, as well as the continuous build and release functionality."
"It is very user-friendly."
"The solution helps with pretty much all aspects of the development cycle, including using it for QA, testing, development, and the release, and it's useful for every aspect of the development cycle."
"The most valuable features are related to source code management. Using TFS for source code management and being able to branch and have multiple developers work on the same projects is valuable. We can also branch and merge code back together."
"This product brings a lot of discipline and consistency in the way that our developers use their tools."
"For what I need TFS for, I have never run into any limitation."
"It's very simple to use, which is beneficial, and it has 90% of the basic features you need without having to pay a lot of extra money."
"We use the solution for test case management."
"Now, we are getting consolidated reports in one place, we have all our metrics and repository together, and this is helpful."
"If anyone is looking for a good, lightweight, flexible and agile test management product, I think they would do very well with Zephyr Enterprise."
"Zephyr really improves the testing of the product on many levels - planning, test case creation, automation goals, test reporting, and verification of the testing."
"It has many features, but the main things that we need are the test cycles and integration with automation because we have automation for the web and mobile applications. We use it for test case management to run the test cases and get the results. At this moment, it is fulfilling our requirements. We are able to get the test execution report and the test pass and fail report. This summary is delivered to our management."
"It has integration with test automation tools."
"At this moment, it is fulfilling our requirements."
 

Cons

"Merging branches is definitely one of the more challenging aspects for people new to TFS."
"If you plan on using on-premise, we would recommend you resource your hardware or VM requirements appropriately to host Team Foundation Server."
"TFS administration tools need to be more controlled and easier to use."
"One of the areas that could be improved is to have an effective full life-cycle management."
"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 user interface could improve and test management was not useful in TFS."
"For large organizations with more than 200+ concurrent users, there can be some scalability issues."
"For VSTS, more flexibility around the customisation of test reports."
"Security needs improvement to protect customer information better."
"The only thing I have missed is an easy way to configure showing the latest execution results of all test cases linked in JIRA (story/epic), thus, receiving the state of a feature."
"For JIRA, in comparison to other solutions, such as TestRail, Zephyr is good, but it is not as good as DFS."
"Additionally, they could improve the daily reporting. It does generate reports, but they are screen based reports."
"Zephyr Enterprise needs to redesign the reporting."
"The reporting, and the ability to reorganize the test repository, which are a little stifling. There is definitely room for improvement there."
"We have a lot of automation for our products, and we require a utility for its integration with automation. Currently, we have to write this utility ourselves. It would be great if they can provide such a utility."
"The solution is not really stable. Sometimes in the past, some pages wouldn't load due to issues."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We are using the open-source version."
"The pricing is reasonable at this time."
"On a scale where ten is the highest and one is the cheapest, I rate the solution's licensing cost at one on a scale of one to ten."
"If running TFS on-premise is expensive, maybe you could consider moving to the Cloud and use the Visual Studio Team Services."
"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."
"We pay subscription fees on a yearly basis and the price is reasonable."
"TFS is expensive, and the licensing costs are yearly. I rate the tool's pricing an eight out of ten."
"It's just as expensive as HPE ALM, without many of the features, best used for development tool only to avoid higher costs."
"It costs a couple of thousand dollars for a little more than 125 users, per month."
"DFS is more expensive than Zephyr. DFS is around $32 per person, whereas Zephyr is $10 per person. There is a major difference in the price, which is the main reason why we are trying to shift to Zephyr."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Construction Company
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise64
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

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 is your experience regarding pricing and costs for TFS?
While I do not know the exact pricing, TFS is likely more expensive than GitLab.
What needs improvement with TFS?
From a testing perspective, while the build and deploy automation capability and pipeline integration are already present to a great extent, these are areas where TFS can improve further.
What needs improvement with Zephyr Enterprise?
Some areas for improvement, include its export capabilities. Exporting test cases, especially those with screenshots or attachments, can be cumbersome, hindering easy sharing and scalability.
What advice do you have for others considering Zephyr Enterprise?
I would recommend it mainly for manual testing and test management. Within Zephyrscale, they also have automated testing, however, I would recommend it only for test management. The overall rating ...
 

Also Known As

Team Foundation Server
SmartBear Zephyr
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Vendex KBB IT Services, Info Support, Fujitsu Consulting, TCSC, Airways New Zealand, HP
Hyundai, Fujitsu, Google, David Jones, Burger King, Ingenico, Websense, Dow Jones, Harris, Saab
Find out what your peers are saying about TFS vs. Zephyr Enterprise and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,456 professionals have used our research since 2012.