S4HANA Cloud is reliable and accurate. Our existing team also has expertise in SAP, so it was simple to migrate to the cloud solution. S4HANA Cloud has advantages because we don't need to maintain the infrastructure, and there aren't any huge upfront costs.
Head of Professional Services at HCC - Technology & Advisory
It's reliable, accurate, and we save on infrastructure costs
Pros and Cons
- "S4HANA Cloud is reliable and accurate. Our existing team also has expertise in SAP, so it was simple to migrate to the cloud solution. S4HANA Cloud has advantages because we don't need to maintain the infrastructure, and there aren't any huge upfront costs."
- "Integrating SAP with other products like payroll solutions should be smoother. I wish there were some tools a consultant could build according to the client's requirements. For example, say I want to process debit and credits. In SAP, we have to follow SAP terminologies and patterns. I need a template to deploy my structure according to the client's requirements. There is no structure available in SAP that a consultant can mold."
What is most valuable?
What needs improvement?
We have to deploy add-ons integrated with the B1 when we are on the cloud option, and we face challenges with web integrations. Right now, when we attempt web integration, some of the ports are not open. There are infrastructure issues like IP conflicts and switches that need to be redefined.
Integrating SAP with other products like payroll solutions should be smoother. I wish there were some tools a consultant could build according to the client's requirements. For example, say I want to process debit and credits. In SAP, we have to follow SAP terminologies and patterns. I need a template to deploy my structure according to the client's requirements. There is no structure available in SAP that a consultant can mold.
This product is implemented in 35 domains across multiple organizations with different structures, so there is a bottleneck in multiple segments. The consultant needs different models to help with the financials.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have worked with S4HANA Cloud for two years, but I have eight years of experience with on-premise SAP solutions.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
S4HANA Cloud is stable.
Buyer's Guide
SAP S/4HANA Cloud
May 2025

Learn what your peers think about SAP S/4HANA Cloud. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2025.
857,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
S4HANA Cloud is scalable. Over the last six years, you can see how much it has improved. SAP has added multiple modules, new features, and patches. The usage depends on the company structure. Some companies need 20 to 30 licenses while others may require more than 100.
How are customer service and support?
We submitted multiple requests to SAP for technical support, and their response was quite good.
How was the initial setup?
S4HANA seems quite complicated when you first deploy it, but after you go through the setup procedure once, the next implementation is smooth. The maintenance depends on the complexity of the deployment and the company's structure. For example, plant maintenance requires three to four users. It all depends on the company structure, like the number of call centers involved, revenue, etc.
What about the implementation team?
One consultant can handle the deployment by themselves. It's not so complex.
What other advice do I have?
I rate SAP S4HANA Cloud seven out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner

Chief Digitalization Executive at a energy/utilities company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Robust data accessibility and reporting
Pros and Cons
- "The reporting that we are doing from SAP S/4HANA Cloud is a valuable feature."
- "SAP S/4HANA Cloud's customization can be improved."
What is our primary use case?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud is very powerful compared to previous versions regarding enterprise process management, data retrieval, and reporting. SAP S/4HANA Cloud is way better than the previous versions because of the data architecture and new technology adopted by SAP.
How has it helped my organization?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud's robustness in data accessibility and reporting, GUI change, end-user experience, and accessibility on mobile have improved our organization. The traditional layout change of SAP is improvised on SAP S/4HANA Cloud.
What is most valuable?
The reporting that we are doing from SAP S/4HANA Cloud is a valuable feature. Also, SAP S/4HANA Cloud has improved the data retrieval time, system speed, user accessibility, and user experience.
What needs improvement?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud's customization can be improved.
SAP S/4HANA Cloud can incorporate basic procurement, material management, and HR-related functionality like in other cloud-related services, such as SAP Ariba. The incorporation of these additional features could be a very good offer.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using SAP S/4HANA Cloud for the last five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I would give SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten rating for stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I would give SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten rating for scalability.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is a bit complex.
What was our ROI?
We do see a ROI with the use of SAP S/4HANA Cloud.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is on the higher side. Traditionally, SAP is always a heavy product for any organization.
What other advice do I have?
We currently use a free version. We started with a very basic version around five years back and then did two upgrades. Around 2,0000 people are using SAP S/4HANA Cloud in my organization, and we have plans to increase the usage in the coming years.
My advice would be to evaluate whether your organization needs this kind of product because it is a high-end product and may not be relevant for a small-scale or medium-scale organization. Your business processes should be standardized instead of adapting the tool because we normally believe adopting the tool is the solution to our business processes or business problems. First, fix the business process-related issues, streamline and standardize them, and then go for this implementation of SAP S/4HANA Cloud. When I compare SAP S/4HANA Cloud on-premises with SAP RISE, I feel there must be some more control available on SAP RISE.
Overall, I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Buyer's Guide
SAP S/4HANA Cloud
May 2025

Learn what your peers think about SAP S/4HANA Cloud. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2025.
857,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.
CEO at a manufacturing company with 11-50 employees
The readymade processes make it a good option if you're adopting a greenfield approach
Pros and Cons
- "I like S/4HANA's automated features, readymade processes, and user interface. It supports various processes required by large international companies, like logistics, procurement, payments, sales, etc. All of these features were available in previous SAP solutions, but HANA has an updated user interface and improved integration with other systems. The readymade processes make HANA a good option if you're adopting a greenfield approach."
- "S/4HANA isn't ideal for managing contracts and subscriptions. There isn't a feature to notify us when a contract for a service we need is approaching its end or a product is no longer supported. You need a separate solution for that."
What is our primary use case?
We're a manufacturing company that uses S/4HANA for managing finances and other business processes.
What is most valuable?
I like S/4HANA's automated features, readymade processes, and user interface. It supports various processes required by large international companies, like logistics, procurement, payments, sales, etc. All of these features were available in previous SAP solutions, but HANA has an updated user interface and improved integration with other systems. The readymade processes make HANA a good option if you're adopting a greenfield approach.
What needs improvement?
S/4HANA isn't ideal for managing contracts and subscriptions. There isn't a feature to notify us when a contract for a service we need is approaching its end or a product is no longer supported. You need a separate solution for that.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used S/4HANA for the last eighteen months.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
S/4HANA is stable, but it needs resources.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
S/4HANA is scalable.
How are customer service and support?
I have contacted SAP support in Germany and Spain many times and also SAP partners. SAP support is excellent, but the support from partners varies depending on who you get. Some are more experienced than others.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have used other SAP ERP solutions that were more appropriate for small and medium-sized companies, like logistics warehouses. They didn't have good enough support. S/4HANA is easier to use and suitable for large, complex organizations.
How was the initial setup?
You need to prepare before deploying S/4HANA. You need to do a feasibility study and have a team analyze the current processes. It involves several groups of employees, like testing, configuration, and interface teams. Before implementing, you need to know what resources are needed. It's easier if you are adopting a greenfield approach. It can take two years or more for a large company to deploy S/4HANA company fully. It's at least one year.
The system requires ongoing maintenance. You need people who can code and understand SAP logic. It's hard to maintain if you have to change something.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The license for S/4HANA is expensive, and the licensing structure is hard to understand. The admin license is something like 500 euros per user. Other ERP solutions allowed you to pick only the modules you need. The SAP ECC version requires you to take all the modules even if you are not using them.
You take the whole system and pay your monthly fees. S/4HANA can define licenses based on roles, series, etc., but there are so many kinds of licenses and fees. It's more complicated than the licensing for Microsoft Dynamics or other SaaS ERP tools.
What other advice do I have?
I rate SAP S/4HANA eight out of 10. Before implementing an ERP tool, you should understand your needs, processes, and business requirements.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
Lead SAP Cloud Services at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
Detailed costing structure, useful built-in analytics, and scales well
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable features of SAP S/4HANA Cloud are the detailed solution costing, integration, and built-in analytics."
- "The integration with third-party vendors could improve."
What is our primary use case?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud has been used in manufacturing, for niche industries, such as automotive utilities, higher education, and oil and gas.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features of SAP S/4HANA Cloud are the detailed solution costing, integration, and built-in analytics.
What needs improvement?
The integration with third-party vendors could improve.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used SAP S/4HANA Cloud within the last 12 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud is a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is great.
How are customer service and support?
It is difficult to receive the correct answer from the support.
I rate the support from SAP S/4HANA Cloud a four out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Neutral
How was the initial setup?
Other ERP solutions are significantly easier to implement, but SAP S/4HANA Cloud has its merit.
The length of time it takes to implement the solution depends on the environment. I have done 15 implementations.
I rate the initial setup of SAP S/4HANA Cloud a six out of ten.
What other advice do I have?
The maintenance of the solution can be outsourced, done in-house by a selected team, or a hybrid of the two. Most companies have hybrid maintenance programs.
SAP S/4HANA Cloud is not one of the top solutions when evaluating other solutions on the market. This solution is a bit rigid.
I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
Senior Technical Specialist at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
High availability, good support, but scalability could improve
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is the uptime it provides from being on the cloud. We do not have to manage the solution. All the infrastructure management is done from their side."
- "The scalability of the solution could improve."
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is the uptime it provides from being on the cloud. We do not have to manage the solution. All the infrastructure management is done from their side.
What needs improvement?
The scalability of the solution could improve.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using SAP S/4HANA Cloud for approximately two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution has high availability.
I rate the stability of SAP S/4HANA Cloud a seven out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I rate the scalability of SAP S/4HANA Cloud a seven out of ten.
How are customer service and support?
The support I have received from SAP S/4HANA Cloud has been good.
I rate the support from SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
What other advice do I have?
Those who want to implement this solution need to determine the purpose for which they want to use it. It makes the most sense if they have their entire system based on SAP, they can opt for SAP S/4HANA Cloud. It is a highly advanced application. I would recommend that the team make their decision based on their specific needs and use cases.
I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud a seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Industrial engineer at W-DFS
A scalable solution that has a good UX design, but its reporting could be improved
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is the new UX design."
- "The solution’s reporting could be improved."
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of SAP S/4HANA Cloud is the new UX design.
What needs improvement?
The solution’s reporting could be improved.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using SAP S/4HANA Cloud for more than 20 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Sometimes, we have performance issues with the solution.
I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud a five out of ten for stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Our clients for SAP S/4HANA Cloud are mostly enterprise businesses.
I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud an eight out of ten for scalability.
How was the initial setup?
The solution’s initial setup is difficult.
What about the implementation team?
The solution's deployment takes up to 24 months. The solution was deployed on Google and Microsoft Azure cloud.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven out of ten.
What other advice do I have?
SAP S/4HANA Cloud is suitable for small and medium-sized businesses, but it's not preferable for enterprise customers.
Overall, I rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud a seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Microsoft Azure
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
A unified platform that helps with real-time analysis, but it's very expensive and hard to integrate
Pros and Cons
- "Finance aspects of it and transportation management, asset management, and inventory management are valuable."
- "The pricing is way over any of the other ERPs, and the bank integrations are not perfect. There are a lot of costs for other implementations and integrations with Salesforce and other systems. Rather than being a fully-fledged system on its own like most of the other ERPs, it relies too much on developed integrations by the implementation partner."
What is our primary use case?
Its use cases are related to financial management, asset management, ERP, logistics, and sales.
How has it helped my organization?
It's a unified platform for finance and all the other fields, so it allows the finance team to control the other operations a lot better. It helps with real-time analysis of all the information of the company in one location.
What is most valuable?
Finance aspects of it and transportation management, asset management, and inventory management are valuable.
What needs improvement?
The pricing is way over any of the other ERPs, and the bank integrations are not perfect. There are a lot of costs for other implementations and integrations with Salesforce and other systems. Rather than being a fully-fledged system on its own like most of the other ERPs, it relies too much on developed integrations by the implementation partner.
In terms of additional features, the parent portal is a major miss out. There are no HR systems. I don't think any ERP is complete without an HRMS offering, but that's a separate system in SAP. It's missing in the public edition, and only in the private edition, it's available as an optional add-on. It's a huge limitation in the ERP system, and it was almost a deal-breaker for us.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been looking at the evaluation of it for about six months, and we just finished implementing it.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The platform itself is quite decent. It's relatively stable, but because it relies a lot on customizations, a lot of the customizations are sometimes not very stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's very scalable. We have around 40 users working with this solution.
How are customer service and support?
We haven't contacted them yet. We were working with an implementation partner, and they also had an implementation team from SAP directly, so many of our queries would be answered by them directly. We've just now entered the post-handover phase where we would have to reach out to technical support.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We had Tally and Zoho. We switched because Tally was just not a full ERP. It was just a basic ledger similar to an Excel sheet. Zoho was suitable for the manufacturing or trading industry. It was not suitable for a large organization or any complex organizational structure. It definitely was not suitable for all the things that we needed or anything beyond what a very small shop would have.
How was the initial setup?
It was extremely complex and painful. We had to work with partners who had consultants in each of the modules being implemented, such as asset management, finance, and operations. There were over eight different consultants, even on the smallest project, and it was extremely painful compared to any other ERP system and platform.
It took us around three months. We initially contacted a partner who helped us with our requirements. We spent a couple of weeks just looking at our requirements before we signed the contract. After we signed the contract, we had two to three weeks for document review and evaluation of the current solution for the migration. It took us another month or so just to implement these modules. After that, it probably took us two weeks to migrate all our data over to the system, and then the changes required took another week or so. We had to make changes or do customizations where it just wasn't working for us, and then it took us another month just for the go-live of the final solution with full features.
In terms of maintenance, there is no real maintenance to be done because it's a SaaS product, but we have to maintain our integrations with banks and other things, which, in general, are quite difficult to maintain. Because a lot of the product relies on customizations, it's very difficult to maintain those integrations and customizations across platforms. In general, it's no different than Office 365, where they do updates themselves and maintain the software updates, but it's still a pain for us to maintain the customizations.
What about the implementation team?
There were eight consultants. We had one consultant for each of the modules, and they were all on the payroll of the implementation partner. There were also resources involved from our company side. It took up way too much of our finance and executive team's time. IT was involved, but way too much of the finance and executive team was used. It was to an extent that it almost didn't let them complete their own job well, and they were spending way too much time with just the ERP consultant.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Its pricing is way over any of the other ERPs. I'd rate it one out of ten in terms of pricing.
What other advice do I have?
Get a very good implementation partner because the prices of the subscription itself vary depending on the partner, and the price of the implementation, which is more than the price of the subscription for the first two years, would also vary significantly. The implementation partner does a lot of the work of implementing the system and making a lot of customizations, which are implemented automatically in a general ERP but need to be done in SAP. So, if you have a bad partner, it will be painful for you.
I'd rate SAP S/4HANA Cloud a six out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
SAP PP Consultant at Spectrum
Stable solution with improved computational power and speed
Pros and Cons
- "SAP S4HANA Cloud is stable, and its computational power and speed have improved in later versions."
- "SAP S4HANA Cloud's production planning screens could be improved."
What is our primary use case?
I primarily use SAP S4HANA Cloud for production planning.
What needs improvement?
SAP S4HANA Cloud's production planning screens could be improved. In the next release, I would like SAP S4HANA Cloud to include a project team management tool.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using SAP S4HANA Cloud for six months.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
SAP S4HANA Cloud is stable, and its computational power and speed have improved in later versions.
How are customer service and support?
SAP's documentation is really good.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward.
What other advice do I have?
I strongly recommend using SAP S4HANA Cloud as it's much better than competing ERP products. Also, if you have in-detail production processes, I would strongly suggest using the PP/DS module. I would give SAP S4HANA Cloud a rating of nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner

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