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SAP BW4HANA pros and cons

Vendor: SAP

3.8 out of 5

44 reviews
86% willing to recommend

Pros & Cons summary

SAP BW4HANA offers fast reporting and robust HANA database capabilities, enabling seamless real-time analytics and data integration. Users value its powerful toolset, stability, and customization. Effective SAP ERP integration enhances connectivity and data management. However, challenges include integration with third-party tools and AI/ML limitations. High costs and migration complexities persist, impacting competitive edge. Real-time processing and scalability require improvements for heightened business growth and ROI.

Buyer's Guide

Get pricing advice, tips, use cases and valuable features from real users of this product.

Prominent pros & cons

PROS

SAP BW4HANA provides robust infrastructure and reliable stability, ensuring enhanced data management efficiency and reduced data footprint.

The integration with HANA allows seamless real-time analytics, offering advanced performance and scalability.

SAP BW4HANA facilitates sophisticated data processing capabilities with powerful analytics engines, offering detailed and customized calculations.

SAP BW4HANA simplifies the connection with SAP ERP systems, fostering enhanced business growth and understanding through effective data management.

SAP BW4HANA supports both no-code and ABAP coding for complex transformations, making it versatile and efficient for a variety of data processing needs.

CONS

SAP BW4HANA is challenging to integrate with other tools and lacks mobile reporting capabilities.

Connecting multiple sources in SAP BW4HANA involves complex setups and is challenging due to the absence of certain functionalities from previous BW versions.

SAP BW4HANA is expensive, with high pricing for licenses and support, affecting its accessibility for customers.

Initial setup and migration from BW to SAP BW4HANA are complex, requiring considerable expertise and effort.

Real-time processing and integration with AI/ML are limited in SAP BW4HANA, hindering its performance and modernization potential.

SAP BW4HANA Pros review quotes

Srivatsav Andra

SAP BW/4HANA Specialist at a government with 10,001+ employees

Apr 9, 2023

You can do hierarchical alert slicing and dicing out-of-box, which is not available in other solutions. I haven't come across that in Oracle or any other software provider.

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Co-founder & Partner at idiligence Solution

Feb 14, 2024

It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution.

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reviewer1426734

Head of Enterprise Reporting & Analytics at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

Jan 7, 2021

Its direct approach is the most valuable. You get more real time and capabilities than BW.

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Director Sales at Rialtes

Apr 2, 2024

It is a very stable solution.

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PN

BI Manager at a manufacturing company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Jul 31, 2019

The most valuable feature is that it's robust.

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Manager, Business Analytics, BI Lead at Capgemini

Jul 4, 2024

It provides the functions in a way that even a less technical person can do the modeling.

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FranciscoSantos

Director at Pixel Studio PTY

Aug 5, 2019

The processes are the most valuable aspect of this solution.

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Anandha Krishna

Senior Architect at iQM

Apr 17, 2024

One significant advantage of SAP BW/4HANA is the direct integration with the SAP HANA database, providing seamless access to real-time analytics. Additionally, it enables real-time data integration. We don't need to rely on historical data alone; we can provide reporting and features based on real-time information.

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Csaba Grünblatt

Senior Data, Data warehouse and BI/Analytics Architect at Techwave.

Mar 25, 2024

I like how it blends no-code and ABAP code for complex transformations during data loading.

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SA

Lead Consultant at Infosys Technologies Ltd

Feb 2, 2020

Out of the box, this solution has a lot of standard features.

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SAP BW4HANA Cons review quotes

Srivatsav Andra

SAP BW/4HANA Specialist at a government with 10,001+ employees

Apr 9, 2023

There's one area where the other vendors have an upper edge, which is the data lake. I think SAP is trying to figure out whether to stick with IQ, their own data lake solution, or push customers toward customer-preferred vendors, like Azure Data Lake, AWS, or any other provider.

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Co-founder & Partner at idiligence Solution

Feb 14, 2024

The cost of the product might be an area that might introduce some restrictions or limitations to customers, making it one of the aspects where improvements are required.

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reviewer1426734

Head of Enterprise Reporting & Analytics at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

Jan 7, 2021

They have taken out a few BW functionalities when they redesigned this. The way of multi-dimensional thinking and star schema got a little bit lost. It may be because of the cost, but certain functionalities that were previously implemented from the BW side should come back again in the whole product. It is a young product. It is version 2.0. In time, I'm pretty sure they will come back again because otherwise, it limits the potential of the product, and I have to do a lot of modeling towards that direction. For me, the analytics focus is too much. It is not cube-oriented in that way, so its functionality is limited. It is not really technically limited in the back end; it is more limited in the front end. It has a data-mining mindset for SQL developers. The navigational attributes should be easy. It needs to be built in models. I see the data mark cube or understanding that the composite provider needs to be models in a cube coming back. The multi-dimensional star schema approach and the reporting need to be done as well as possible to leverage the star scheme below. This is definitely not understood by many consultants and even composite providers for star schema. They always think in terms of flat tables, which is limiting. You need to build the right dimensions, objects, and so on. If you can build this in BW4HANA, then you have this understanding that BW4HANA is not forcing you in this direction, but it should force you a bit better in this direction. Maybe a few elements which were in use in BW should come back again. It would help the community to determine the direction to build on the cube. You can have maybe 50 elements, and then you can expand it to what you need by leveraging navigation. So far, this functionality is a little bit limited in the tool, and it is not thought through, but I think it will come. They should also be adding more capabilities for the transformation between different objects. In BW, this is currently limited, especially towards composite providers. It is a bit complex basically in the building. You have to have a lot of knowledge as well as know how to do it better because it is a bit different from BW. There is not too much expertise currently in the consulting markets. Many are trying to build something, but it may be based on their knowledge of what they have from the BW and HANA side. You have to find the right mix from both of them at this time. We also have HANA Native. These are our two different sync sources basically, and we have approaches to connect nicely, but it is hard to manage your team because a lot of coaching is required.

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Free Report: SAP BW4HANA Reviews and More

Learn what your peers think about SAP BW4HANA. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: October 2025.

872,655 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Director Sales at Rialtes

Apr 2, 2024

I don't see SAP actively supporting the solution now...a better support from SAP would be appreciated.

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PN

BI Manager at a manufacturing company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Jul 31, 2019

I cannot integrate it with my other tools. It's not possible to do something in the predictive analysis. Mobile reporting is also not available.

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Manager, Business Analytics, BI Lead at Capgemini

Jul 4, 2024

Real-time processing isn't BW/4HANA's strongest point.

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Anandha Krishna

Senior Architect at iQM

Apr 17, 2024

There's the complexity in migration from BW to BW/4HANA, especially with data migration.

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Csaba Grünblatt

Senior Data, Data warehouse and BI/Analytics Architect at Techwave.

Mar 25, 2024

One thing that could be enhanced in SAP BW4HANA is the user interface for process chains.

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SA

Lead Consultant at Infosys Technologies Ltd

Feb 2, 2020

Connecting multiple sources is a challenge because you have to go through a lot of different setups.

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Shaik Abdul Khadar

Chief Executive Officer at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Aug 20, 2024

The problem is the expensive pricing of technical support, making it an area where improvements are required.

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Show 10 more reviews (out of 42)

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