Top Sigma Computing Alternatives & Competitors For 2024

While Sigma Computing receives praise for its user-friendly interface and affordability, some users feel it lacks compared to similar BI tools like Tableau and Power BI. One user noted, "Sigma is great for beginners, but I quickly outgrew its capabilities. It just doesn't offer the depth of analysis I need." Another echoed this sentiment, stating, "The lack of advanced features was a dealbreaker for me. While Sigma is easy to use, it's not powerful enough for complex data analysis." However, others find Sigma's strengths outweigh its weaknesses. One user commented, "For the price, Sigma is a fantastic tool. It's simple to use and allows me to create insightful reports quickly and easily. I don't need all the bells and whistles offered by other platforms." Another user praised its scalability, saying, "Sigma has grown with my business. As my data volume increased, Sigma seamlessly scaled to accommodate my needs." One differentiating factor is Sigma's focus on real-time data and collaboration. One user highlighted this, saying, "Sigma's ability to work with real-time data is a game-changer. It allows me to make decisions based on the latest information, not outdated data." Another user noted the benefits of collaboration, stating, "Sigma's collaborative features make it easy to work with my team on data analysis. We can share insights and brainstorm ideas in real-time." Ultimately, the suitability of Sigma Computing depends on individual needs and priorities. If you're a small business or individual user who needs a basic, affordable BI tool, Sigma is a great option. However, if you require advanced data analysis capabilities or extensive customization options, you may be better served by a more powerful BI platform.

With Cognos Analytics and its self-service functionalities, IBM is trying to move away from the too-technical tag of its predecessor, Cognos BI. Did it succeed? I would say yes.In terms of user experience, I would give it full marks, as it took me only three days to learn the basics with the help of vendor documentation, which is up-to-date and easy to follow. Creating and accessing content is straightforward once you get the hang of what’s where.Sample data and templates were lifesavers and neatly organized in a content folder. I also liked it for data management – it validates incoming data automatically. Our analysts agree, giving it a 96 score. It also ranked excellently with users for efficient metadata management and extensive data modeling.The platform has a rich reporting repertoire with report burst capabilities, pivots and Cognos Event Studio for triggering reports.Cognos helped Nukissiorfiit, a Greenlandic utility company, enhance its efficiency and create accurate budgets and forecasts. They saved thousands of hours annually by reducing the people needed for budgeting from 70 to nine.By using AI and machine learning in Cognos, Nukissiorfiit improved financial planning and decision-making by generating more precise forecasts.On the flip side, users were divided over deployment and integrations with some saying they’re difficult to set up. I found the platform to be a bit slow, but I would still encourage you to try it out before forming an opinion about its performance.I also didn’t find the natural language insights very useful, even with the sample data. IBM needs to step up its NLP game to compete with market leaders like MicroStrategy, Qlik, Tableau and Power BI. I expected better, considering that the legendary Watson technology is at work here.As for the cost, all users who mentioned pricing felt it was expensive when compared to other BI tools that offer similar or better features at lower price points.In summary, Cognos Analytics is a BI solution to watch out for in the analytics and visualization space, though it’s got a lot of catching up to do before it can pose stiff competition to the market leaders.

MicroStrategy is a patchwork quilt of products on the web, desktop and mobile. There’s MicroStrategy Library where you can access published content and Auto Express for dashboarding and bot creation. Anyone with basic data skills can feed information to a bot and gain insights in seconds.You don’t need a credit card to sign up for the free trial, but you won’t be able to publish content to the server without a paid upgrade. As for choosing which edition to use, there’s the web and the desktop instance. Which one will suit you? Maybe both?MicroStrategy Workstation is for developers and data analysts and is more robust for manipulating data. It provides administrative control, even when offline, and helps prototype content before it goes live. Combining multiple visualizations on a single page provided me with more context for the same data.On the other hand, the Workstation version lacks the same level of natural language processing as the web version.MicroStrategy Web is for delivering content to your clients. Being online, it’s open to seamless upgrades and customization, and identity management and collaboration are built in. If you have a small organization, the web version might suffice, but you might want to consider going for both if you deal with large data volumes.Metadata mapping was immensely useful to me when designing a bot using MicroStrategy Auto Express. All I needed to do was feed it the data, and it generated a slew of questions I might want to ask.With a semantic layer, Microstrategy is among the BI tools that work best with large data warehouses. If you’ve just started in business or haven’t got large data volumes yet, you might want to consider a simpler tool.An oft-repeated sentiment in user reviews was that this motley crew of products — web, desktop and mobile — didn’t always sync. The vendor positions MicroStrategy One as a unified solution that’ll, hopefully, eliminate these annoyances.On the flip side, quite a few users said it could be clunky for inexperienced users. Also, some reviewers said it slowed on occasion. Most people said the solution was expensive and found its learning curve quite steep.In summary, MicroStrategy is worth considering, especially if you’re a medium or large-sized company looking for a web reporting tool with a user-friendly interface.

InsightSquared is a powerful sales analytics platform that helps users drive sales pipelines and access self-service data analytics through robust features and interactive data visualizations. According to many users who discussed data integration, the tool interacts seamlessly with other applications and data sources to enable predictive analytics that help forecast future trends. Most of the users who mentioned support said that they are responsive and knowledgeable. A majority of the users who reviewed the interface said that it’s user-friendly and easily navigable, though some users said that the versatility of the platform makes it complex to learn. Many users who discussed the platform’s visualization capabilities said that it provides a wide range of interactive and intuitive out-of-the-box dashboards. A majority of the users who discussed data analytics said that the platform excels in analyzing historical data to better forecast future trends, though some users said that the scope of predictive analytics should be wider to provide better insights. According to many users who mentioned functionality, the solution provides many ways to explore data-based insights through deep-dive and pivoting on key metrics, though some users said that the platform is not easily customizable. Many users who mentioned reporting said that the solution provides a plethora of out-of-the-box reports that can be customized and exported easily, though some users said that there is limited flexibility in report customization. On the flip side, a majority of the users who reviewed speed said that the platform is slow when moving between templates and can become CPU-intensive with large dashboards, though some users said that it can slice and dice data to present relevant information in seconds. Many users who mentioned pricing said that necessary customization modules add to the cost of the software, which makes adoption difficult for small businesses. Many users said that though training is needed to maximize the tool’s potential, lack of adequate documentation makes the learning curve steep. In summary, InsightSquared is a self-service revenue intelligence tool that provides a single source of truth for sales analytics and forecasting pipeline management. It boosts productivity across the organization, though its pricing can be cost-prohibitive for small businesses.

Qlik Sense focuses on independent data analysis for enterprises with advanced tools that include AI, natural language processing and automation. User reviews praise it for its associative engine, interactive visualizations and sophisticated analytics.Its dataset-linking functionality gets my vote as the most significant differentiator since it makes data modeling seamless and saves time. In comparison, manually linking tables in Tableau and Power BI feels like a huge task.It supports fewer features out of the box (69%) compared to Tableau (72%) and Power BI (74%), but this could be intentional. Qlik has ready-to-go modules for analytics, automation and printing, so keeping it lean is a smart vendor move. Users should be aware that additional modules will cost extra, though.Qlik Sense SaaS is multi-cloud, so unless the admin assigns separate workspaces, your users won’t be able to create personal dashboards — everything is shared otherwise. Some users said the platform slowed when processing large workloads, which is a common issue with many other platforms. Assess your need for speed before committing to a purchase.If upgrading from QlikView, you’ll need to create new objects initially, as both platforms have different architectures. However, the vendor assists in seamless migration with the Qlik Analytics Modernization program.Overall, Qlik Sense is an efficient platform that offers many analysis capabilities worth considering. We recommend checking it out if you’re looking for an alternative to Power BI, entrenched in Microsoft technology, or Tableau, with its emphasis on visualization.