QuickSight vs Cognos Analytics

Last Updated:

Our analysts compared QuickSight vs Cognos Analytics based on data from our 400+ point analysis of Business Intelligence Tools, user reviews and our own crowdsourced data from our free software selection platform.

QuickSight Software Tool
Cognos Analytics Software Tool

Product Basics

Amazon QuickSight is a business intelligence tool that enables organizations to visualize and analyze data, derive insights, and make informed decisions. It empowers users with interactive dashboards, data exploration capabilities, and machine learning-driven insights, making it an ideal solution for businesses seeking to leverage data for better outcomes.

The benefits of Amazon QuickSight include its ease of use, fast performance, and scalability to handle large datasets. Its popular features include natural language querying, automated insights generation, and integration with other AWS services. Compared to similar products, Amazon QuickSight stands out for its affordability, ease of deployment, and robust feature set.

Pricing for Amazon QuickSight is based on a per-user, per-month subscription model. It offers flexible pricing options to accommodate varying business needs, ensuring cost-effectiveness and scalability as organizations grow.

read more...
IBM Cognos Analytics is a self-service, web-based analytics platform which empowers users of all skill levels to explore data through reporting, data analytics, KPI monitoring, events and metrics. Reports give users the ability to not just visualize their insights, but also share them with colleagues.

It integrates with Watson Analytics, which leverages IBM’s artificial intelligence and natural language processing to make insights more accessible to non-technical users. It has various components which give additional functionality, flexibility and agility when processing large sets of data.
read more...
$5/User, Monthly
Get a free price quote
Tailored to your specific needs
$50/User, Monthly
Get a free price quote
Tailored to your specific needs
Small 
i
Medium 
i
Large 
i
Small 
i
Medium 
i
Large 
i
Windows
Mac
Linux
Android
Chromebook
Windows
Mac
Linux
Android
Chromebook
Cloud
On-Premise
Mobile
Cloud
On-Premise
Mobile

Product Assistance

Documentation
In Person
Live Online
Videos
Webinars
Documentation
In Person
Live Online
Videos
Webinars
Email
Phone
Chat
FAQ
Forum
Knowledge Base
24/7 Live Support
Email
Phone
Chat
FAQ
Forum
Knowledge Base
24/7 Live Support

Product Insights

  • Self-Service BI: Get answers to questions and share insights independently through self-service analysis of business data. Connect to data sources, manipulate values to create visualizations, invite others to collaborate and share dashboards and reports — all without the need to install any application. 
  • Multi-Tenancy: Its multi-tenant architecture with namespaces allows vendors to provide data exploration and dashboarding capabilities for multiple applications at the same time. Host multiple clients and add templates created and shared by dashboard authors to the proprietary visualizations library. 
  • Embedded Analytics: Embed dashboard sessions into proprietary software to enhance business with console analytics. Personalize the appearance of visualizations and reports by adding custom fonts, colors and styles. Set defaults and error handling to match the host application for a cohesive feel. 
  • Report Sharing: Stay informed as to how key metrics are performing by scheduling automatic email updates. Ensure secure access to dashboards and email reports by showing only relevant data through targeted reports. 
  • Flexible Pricing: Save on upfront costs and capacity planning through its p    ay-as-you-go pricing model for report consumers — people who view dashboards, but don’t create them. 
  • Mobility: Get data insight and forecasting summaries on-the-go through its mobile version, available on both iOS and Android. Drill down into mobile-optimized dashboards and reports for in-depth analysis and filter to view specific metrics, even when away from the office. Share results with others and get email alerts for changes in business data as they happen. 
  • Automate Deployments: Deploy applications at scale, keeping them online for continued access while minimizing downtime. AWS CodeDeploy provides automated app deployments to multiple cloud compute services, such as Amazon EC2, AWS Fargate, AWS Lambda, and on-premise servers. Seamlessly integrates with continuous delivery process pipelines, such as AWS CodePipeline, GitHub and Jenkins. 
  • Promote Data Literacy: Identify key metrics, perform what-if analysis through simple point-and-click actions, discover hidden trends and generate forecasts — without needing any technical skills. Generates dashboard summaries in easy-to-understand language to enable shared understanding of data insights. 
  • Scalable: Its serverless architecture makes it easily scalable, ensuring fast loading of dashboards even during peak traffic. Scales as the organization grows to take on larger loads — no need to set up dedicated servers. 
  • Data Security: Its Enterprise version provides additional security features through permissions-based access to AWS data, row level security, SSO and data encryption. It is FedRamp, HIPAA, PCI PSS, ISO and SOC compliant, keeping with industry best practices. 
read more...
  • Enhanced Decision Making: Cognos Analytics synthesizes data from various sources, providing comprehensive insights that empower users to make informed, data-driven decisions.
  • Time Efficiency: Automates the process of data collection and report generation, significantly reducing the time spent on these tasks and allowing teams to focus on analysis and strategy.
  • Customizable Dashboards: Offers the flexibility to create personalized dashboards that highlight key metrics, making it easier for users to access the information most relevant to their roles and objectives.
  • Scalability: Adapts to the growing data needs of a business, ensuring that as your company expands, Cognos Analytics can handle the increasing volume and complexity of data.
  • Data Accuracy: Minimizes human error by automating data collection and analysis, leading to more accurate insights and reducing the risk of costly mistakes.
  • Collaboration Enhancement: Facilitates better teamwork by providing a shared platform where team members can access, analyze, and discuss data insights in real-time.
  • Advanced Analytics: Utilizes AI and machine learning to uncover deep insights, predict trends, and identify patterns that might not be apparent through traditional analysis methods.
  • Comprehensive Reporting: Generates detailed reports that can be customized to suit different audiences, ensuring stakeholders receive the information they need in an understandable format.
  • Mobile Accessibility: Offers mobile support that allows users to access data and insights on the go, ensuring decision-makers are always informed, regardless of their location.
  • Regulatory Compliance: Helps ensure that data management practices comply with relevant regulations and standards, reducing the risk of legal issues and fines.
  • Cost Reduction: By streamlining data analysis processes and reducing the need for manual intervention, Cognos Analytics can lead to significant cost savings over time.
  • Improved Customer Insights: Analyzes customer data to provide a deeper understanding of customer behavior and preferences, enabling more targeted and effective marketing strategies.
  • Operational Efficiency: Identifies bottlenecks and inefficiencies in operations, allowing organizations to optimize processes for better performance and productivity.
  • Future-Proofing: Continuously updates to incorporate the latest technologies and analytics trends, ensuring that businesses remain competitive in a rapidly evolving digital landscape.
read more...
  • Data Connectivity: Connect to a multitude of cloud-based and on-premise data sources such as Salesforce, JIRA, Github, Teradata, MySQL, SQL Server, Postgres and many more, or upload data from Excel, JSON, CSV and Presto files. 
  • Integrations: Perform predictive data analysis by integrating Amazon Sagemaker ML-based data models with its supported data sources, such as S3, Athena, Redshift, as well as third party sources that include Salesforce and JIRA, among others. Easily integrates with BI tools such as Domo and Tableau for data querying through an intuitively similar SQL interface. 
  • Data Visualization: Create interactive visualizations and reports by choosing from a rich library of graphs, charts and tables. Build dynamic dashboards by interacting with data in real time through drag-and-drop, drill-down and filtering options. 
  • Reporting: Its Enterprise edition provides ad-hoc as well as scheduled reporting to share targeted reports on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Subscribe to receive reports via email. Creates a custom snapshot of the report based on individual data permissions. 
  • In-Memory Engine: Perform calculations and analyses at the speed of thought by querying through its super-fast parallel in-memory calculation engine, SPICE. Built from the ground up, it prepares data faster by replicating it in memory and updates in real-time as the underlying data changes. 
  • Dashboards: Create data dashboards with 28 supported charts, such as filled maps, histograms, funnel charts, stacked area charts, waterfall charts and boxplots, as well as tables and pivot tables. View information based on business context by sorting on fields not shown in the visualization. Provide report readers with on-sheet controls to slice and dice data by filtering on fields. Offers multiple report layout customization options that include adding drop-downs with single-select or multi-select sorting. 
  • ML-Based Insight: Get in-depth data insights through its out-of-the-box ML and NLP capabilities. Perform queries on data in seconds in simple language through its natural language attribute, Q. It learns from data patterns to provide accurate predictions based on historical trends. Detect anomalies and variations in data aggregates through scheduled anomaly detection. 
  • Localization: Available as a global solution with support for 10 major languages: English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese. 
read more...
  • Components: Boost the feature set of the core platform with components that enhance data modeling, visualization and analytics capabilities. 
  • Powerful Reporting: Create detailed charts, graphs, maps, voiceovers and repeat functions with the robust, professional reporting suite. Simplify reporting for non-technical users with express mode. 
  • Web-based Interface: Access the platform on any hardware via the web.
  • Natural Language-powered AI: Interrogate data and receive natural, consistent responses with a built-in AI, powered by NLP. 
  • Automated Modeling: Verify and combine data via automated modeling, and assess relationships between separate data points. 
read more...

Product Ranking

#80

among all
Business Intelligence Tools

#12

among all
Business Intelligence Tools

Find out who the leaders are

Analyst Rating Summary

81
82
75
87
54
59
100
96
Show More Show More
Availability and Scalability
Data Management
Platform Compliance
Platform Security
Data Visualization
Availability and Scalability
Data Visualization
Platform Compliance
Platform Security
Reporting

Analyst Ratings for Functional Requirements Customize This Data Customize This Data

QuickSight
Cognos Analytics
+ Add Product + Add Product
Advanced Analytics Augmented Analytics Data Management Data Pre-processing Data Transformation Data Visualization Embedded Analytics Capabilities Geospatial Visualizations And Analysis Mobile Capabilities Platform Capabilities Reporting 75 54 100 95 90 99 86 73 79 83 88 87 59 96 85 90 100 84 58 77 91 100 0 25 50 75 100
46%
46%
8%
69%
31%
0%
46%
8%
46%
62%
0%
38%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
88%
13%
-1%
63%
38%
-1%
90%
0%
10%
90%
0%
10%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
86%
0%
14%
86%
0%
14%
75%
0%
25%
50%
13%
37%
71%
0%
29%
71%
0%
29%
78%
0%
22%
78%
0%
22%
88%
0%
12%
100%
0%
0%

Analyst Ratings for Technical Requirements Customize This Data Customize This Data

100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
68%
0%
32%
72%
4%
24%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%

User Sentiment Summary

we're gathering data
Great User Sentiment 1251 reviews
we're gathering data
81%
of users recommend this product

Cognos Analytics has a 'great' User Satisfaction Rating of 81% when considering 1251 user reviews from 4 recognized software review sites.

n/a
3.9 (306)
n/a
4.1 (120)
n/a
4.3 (358)
n/a
4.0 (467)

Synopsis of User Ratings and Reviews

Self-Service Analytics: QuickSight empowers business users to create and customize visualizations, dashboards, and reports without relying on IT or data scientists.
Cloud-Based Platform: QuickSight's cloud-based architecture eliminates the need for costly on-premise infrastructure and provides seamless access from anywhere with an internet connection.
Scalability and Performance: QuickSight handles large datasets efficiently, allowing users to analyze vast amounts of data in real-time.
Easy Integration: QuickSight seamlessly integrates with popular data sources, including Amazon Redshift, Amazon Aurora, and Salesforce, enabling users to access and analyze data from various systems.
Machine Learning Capabilities: QuickSight leverages machine learning algorithms to provide predictive analytics, anomaly detection, and automated insights, empowering users to uncover hidden patterns and make data-driven decisions.
Collaboration and Sharing: QuickSight facilitates collaboration among teams by allowing users to share dashboards, reports, and insights securely.
Show more
Data Analysis and Visualization: All users who mention data analysis and presentation unanimously agree that this solution covers the full spectrum of BI analytics capabilities.
Data management: All users who mention data preparation praise its data integrations and effective metadata management, which ensure data consistency and accuracy across multiple reporting systems.
Functionality: Of users who mentioned this platform’s features, around 90% were satisfied with regular updates and enhancements which allow them to create faster, more responsive dashboards.
Reporting: Around 89% of users who mention reporting are satisfied, appreciating its ad-hoc reporting and report-sharing capabilities.
Setup: Excellent vendor support coupled with the ease of establishing data connectivity with data sources make installation of this solution a breeze, as approximately 87% of users have mentioned.
Show more
Pricing Structure: Complicated pricing model that can lead to unexpected costs for advanced features and usage.
Limited Customization: Pre-built dashboards and visualizations may not fully meet specific business requirements, limiting customization options.
Data Connectivity: May not seamlessly integrate with all data sources, requiring additional effort for data preparation and ingestion.
Limited Advanced Analytics: Lacks certain advanced analytical capabilities, such as predictive modeling and machine learning algorithms, which may be essential for deeper insights.
User Interface: Some users find the user interface to be cluttered and not as intuitive as other BI tools, impacting the ease of use.
Show more
Cost: Around 87% of users who mention cost feel that its licensing model is expensive when compared to other BI solutions.
Training: Approximately 45% of users who reviewed training say that the learning curve can be quite steep and though self-service training is available, they would prefer a formal learning program.
Show more

Amazon QuickSight has received positive user reviews for its ease of use, intuitive interface, and quick data visualization capabilities. Users find it simple to connect to data sources, create dashboards, and generate insights. The drag-and-drop functionality and pre-built templates make it accessible to users of all technical skill levels. QuickSight's strengths include its integration with other Amazon Web Services (AWS) products, such as Amazon Redshift and Amazon S3, allowing for seamless data analysis. It also offers advanced features like machine learning-powered insights and natural language querying, providing users with deeper analytical capabilities. Compared to similar products, QuickSight is praised for its cost-effectiveness and scalability. Users appreciate its pay-as-you-go pricing model and the ability to handle large datasets without performance issues. However, some users have expressed concerns about the limited customization options and the lack of certain advanced features found in competing products. Overall, Amazon QuickSight is well-suited for businesses and organizations looking for an easy-to-use and affordable business intelligence solution. Its intuitive interface, integration with AWS products, and scalability make it a valuable tool for data visualization, analysis, and decision-making.

Show more

IBM Cognos Analytics is an excellent BI tool and rates very highly with users on all major counts. Users are unanimous in their praise of its data management and data analysis capabilities to provide a single source of truth. Having ventured into AI-powered tools with the 11.1.3 version in 2018, IBM is making bold strides to incorporate augmented intelligence into the platform. IBM has astutely combined this solution with the capabilities of one of its other offerings, Watson Analytics, for natural language processing - a game-changer for empowering non-technical users to create a vast range of dashboards. With AI-enabled exploration, users can review key drivers of metrics and identify gaps in data, though some users feel that more tools are needed for content store exploration through its relational database. It also rates excellently with users for its data integration and ad-hoc reporting capabilities, efficient metadata management and extensive data modeling features. Several strong features of this platform, as noted by reviewers, include Jupyter notebooks, regular updates to the platform and enhancements to data modules, though when it comes to integrating with Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) data sources and IBM Planning Analytics in particular, it comes up short. Version 11 of the platform comes with over-the-top installs for upgrades, which reduces time to set up; though some users feel that integrations built with the current SDK solution can be tedious to implement and maintain. Being part of the IBM software suite, it connects seamlessly to other IBM products under the same umbrella. However, integration with MS-Sharepoint is not supported; this can be managed with workarounds, but only for on-premise setups, not cloud-based deployments. The platform has a rich reporting repertoire with report burst capabilities, pivots and Cognos Event Studio for event-driven reports. However, many users feel that Report Studio should provide the write back capability, which is crucial for business. As for the cost, a majority of users feel that its licensing models are restrictive, especially when compared to other BI solutions; though the vendor seems to address pricing and ease of use with version 11.1.3. In summary, Cognos Analytics is among the best BI solutions in the market today and IBM, with its ear to the ground, is delivering enhanced data analysis and reporting capabilities at scale.

Show more

Screenshots

Top Alternatives in Business Intelligence Tools


Cognos Analytics

Domo

GoodData

Grow

Logi Symphony

Looker Studio

MicroStrategy

Oracle Analytics Cloud

Power BI

Qlik Sense

SAP Analytics Cloud

SAS Visual Analytics

Sisense

Spotfire

Tableau

Related Categories

WE DISTILL IT INTO REAL REQUIREMENTS, COMPARISON REPORTS, PRICE GUIDES and more...

Compare products
Comparison Report
Just drag this link to the bookmark bar.
?
Table settings