--- title: "IBM Cognos Analytics Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice" description: "Reviews of IBM Cognos Analytics. Learn how real users rate this software's ease-of-use, functionality, overall quality and customer support. Talk to our advisors to see if IBM Cognos Analytics is a good fit for you!" source_url: "https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/ibm-cognos-analytics-profile/reviews/" page_type: "reviews" language: "en" --- 1 million+ businesses helped. Get advice Get Free Advice [Home](https://www.softwareadvice.com/) / [Data Preparation Software](https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/data-preparation-comparison/) / [IBM Cognos Analytics](https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/ibm-cognos-analytics-profile/) / IBM Cognos Analytics Reviews Software Advice offers objective insights based on verified user reviews and independent product and market research. When our advisors match you to a software provider, we may earn a referral fee. [Overview](https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/ibm-cognos-analytics-profile/) Reviews [Alternatives](https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/ibm-cognos-analytics-profile/alternatives/) # IBM Cognos Analytics User Reviews ## Reviews summary - Overall rating: 4.2/5 - Total reviews: 139 ### Secondary ratings - Ease of use: 3.8/5 - Customer support: 3.8/5 - Value for money: 3.9/5 - Functionality: 4.2/5 ### Rating distribution - 5 stars: 54 reviews (39%) - 4 stars: 63 reviews (45%) - 3 stars: 17 reviews (12%) - 2 stars: 2 reviews (1%) - 1 star: 3 reviews (2%) ### Most mentioned pros - IBM Cognos Analytics is an accurate data management and analytics platform. - IBM Cognos Analytics has been powerful, secure and accurate to use. - Additionally, the software offered robust collaboration and sharing features, enabling me to collaborate with team members and stakeholders efficiently. ### Most mentioned cons - Drill down in reports seems to take much time which make this software slow sometime. - You obviously require proper training, and anyone who aren't familiar with SQL will struggle to put it up. - Cognos, like most, hasn’t been able to put together the full package. ## IBM Cognos Analytics customer reviews Showing reviews 1-25 of 139 (page 1). ### Robust BI tool - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Nicolas P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Financial Services - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used daily for less than 12 months - Reviewed: June 2022 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. It provides a set of highly flexible and customizable features that help improve our analytics and positively impact our decision-making. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros It allows you to connect the data thrown by different sources and create personalized reports that you can share in real time. It allows planning operations based on pre-established rules to model the entire business process and obtain the best results on the implemented strategies. #### Cons Its license has a high cost compared to similar platforms. It has a steep learning curve and its user interface has a lot of room for improvement. --- ### Powerful, Reliable, Expensive - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Vlad D. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. I've been working with IBM Cognos since version 8.4 I like this product and see how IBM is improving it. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros It's been a long on the market. It's offered by IBM It has a great integration with many databases #### Cons New version (CA 11) has some inconvenient UI changes (new side panel which does not allow to easily navigate and see all properties) Many things need to be done manually instead of integrating as best practices (security, deployments, testing, version control, etc.) New studios are not that intuitive / transparent --- ### Great Analytics Tool - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Higher Education - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Overall, I would recommend using Cognos Analytics for data analysis. My whole company uses it from daily reporting to more advanced analyses. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros IBM Cognos Analytics is a great data analytics tool. It can handle a lot of data and makes it easy for users to create reports to view their data. I like that it allows for a variety of output formats. #### Cons Cognos Analytics can be hard to learn how to use. You have to really understand your data first so that you can figure out how to make the tool do what you need it to do. --- ### A great solution for your financial planning - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Gerson M. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Product usage: Used other for more than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Take your time and implement it right and the rewards will be very good. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It has integration with with other IBM products like business intelligence. The excel functionality is great for finances. The product to meet our needs perfectly for all our needs. #### Cons Creating reports is overwhelming at the beginning but if you dedicate time and resources there will be the face of your deployment. --- ### Cognos is sophisticated BI application for large enterprises - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Leon P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used unspecified for less than 2 years - Reviewed: December 2015 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Cognos is one of 2 major Business Intelligence tools on the market. If it is implemented correctly, it could provide complete web-based business solution based on the data analysis. It is a platform which allowing to deliver mission critical analytics to the business including but not limited to Enterprise reporting, Planning & Forecast, OLAP cubes technology, etc. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Customer support: 3/5 #### Pros - The application designed to enable business users with limited technical knowledge to extract data, analyze it and make business decision based on the analysis; - It could be used within relational or multidimensional data sources; - It is included a mobile version allowing users to access a complete version of Cognos from mobile devices; #### Cons - very sensitive in implementation; - requiring significant resources in order to maintain and support; - too expensive for mid-size companies; --- ### IBM Cognos Analytics Review - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: VIKAS S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Services - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used other for less than 12 months - Reviewed: April 2021 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered It is AI driven, improves the business outcomes.It enhances decision making.Overall it improves business agility. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros The best thing is "Quality reports can be run at any time and by any representative with a substantial log-in " at IBM Cognos Analytics.The AI enabled exploration and dashboard capabilities are easy to use and exceed expectations #### Cons It is not simple to use. User has to get the formal training to utilise it to maximum extent. Report pulling is not that much fast. It take quite some time to load and display. --- ### Cognos Developer - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Hilary S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Banking - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: July 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros Cognos is a great tool for reporting. The visuals are not awesome but there is a lot of customization you can do for reporting. #### Cons It can be difficult to learn at first. It is not as easy to pick up as Tabeau. Googling for solutions can be tough. --- ### Cognos BI is best for large projects.. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Chinna C. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used unspecified for less than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2016 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Using Cognos ,We can develop diff types of reports.It is suitable for big projects and it have so many new features and products like Cognos BI,Cognos Express,Cognos Tm1 aand etc.. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 4/5 #### Pros It is suitable for Huge data projects. #### Cons Expensive and difficult to understand --- ### Cognos Controller - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Aniket W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Management Consulting - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros The user access review is easily performed in cognos application #### Cons The technical details are not very clear --- ### Cognos Analytics in the Cloud - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Jeremias E. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Higher Education - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 6 months - Reviewed: May 2020 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. IBM Cognos Analytics offers the up-to-date version of the application that you can use immediately to your reports. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Cognos Analytics on Cloud removes the expensive and tedious process of installation Cognos Analytics on-premise server. #### Cons You must cope with the latest version of the software. The lesson materials that you are using in the past may be different in terms of interface offered by the application. --- ### Enterprise Reporting and Analytics Tool - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2020 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. It has been a solid tool for our company for last so many years. IT meets out current needs in terms of performance and capabilities. However, as we start exploring more cutting edge technologies like cloud, SAAS and Advanced Analytics, we see the tool is not in the top 3. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Well established took with huge user base and support. Being IBMs main BI tool, it comes with a lot of Support and Knowledge Base. There are tons of supporting products for Advanced Analytics, Visualization and AI/ML which makes the tool both powerful and versatile. It fits into both departmental BI as well as for Enterprise wide reporting. #### Cons IBM should increase the support the provide for their products. It is difficult to get quick help from IBM.Self service features of the tool and not as easy as other contemporary tools like Tableau and Qlikview. IBM has catching up to do in this area. Also cloud based SAAS is not yet advanced for COGNOS. #### Reasons for choosing IBM Cognos Analytics IBM support. We have been an IBM shop since early 200s and continued with that --- ### Great capabilities, but really difficult to use practically. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Elaine E. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Cognos Analytics has really great capabilities. There is so much that you can do with the framework if you know what you're doing. Good security features. Good for enterprise level reporting. #### Cons If you're hoping this will replace a dedicated reporting team or IT team, it will not. The ease of use depends on several factors and be SURE that you have an experienced team built the framework. No support whatsoever from Cognos themselves for end users, and they take a long time to get back to us on issues. The new visualizations can be clunky, especially maps. They are unusable for detailed maps. Scheduling features slow down the system considerably. --- ### Cognos Review - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Nabeel C. - Industry: Government Administration - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Overall, if there is a company that wishes to automate it's reports and improve efficiency across their organization, Cognos is a must-have tool. There is a bit of upfront cost involved to get the reports created in Cognos but the efficiency achieved is almost unparalleled. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Cognos is an incredibly powerful reporting tool offered by IBM and it has a wonderful ability to be customized across different industries and companies. It can transform work efficiency but automating virtually any data that exists in a company's primary accounting and finance system. #### Cons Cognos is not very user-friendly and often times it can take a while for an individual working with Congos to get familiar with the functionality and the power this tool possesses. Furthermore, report writing and query studio functionality require some database knowledge so the true power of the tool is sometimes limited by these factors. --- ### IBM Cognos Review - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Michael B. - Industry: Primary/ Secondary Education - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. My company has been using IBM Cognos for the past 4 years. When we purchased IBM Cognos it was the best fit for our situation. It has been a valued piece of software in our business. It has given us the ability to tie data from multiple data sources. It has given the ability for our departments to run reports that we haven't been able to in the past. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros The software is very intuitive. If you have knowledge of SQL, it is a very easy software to pick up. The Help portion of the Cognos interface is very helpful also. #### Cons Customer Support for this product isn't the best. We have been on Cognos 10.1.1 for a while and when it came up for licensing renewal, we were charged for a newer version of Data Manger. When we inquired about this through our support contract we were going to be charged for the new software. --- ### valuable yet expensive - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: natasha s. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: August 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. overall its good and it is one of the initiators in the reporting market. We are still using it and find it quite useful to fulfill our client requirements. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros you can combine multiple queries in one report to create your desired report, which can be formatted in multiple ways to meet your desired structure. #### Cons its little bit tricky to handle. You need to understand it thoroughly which actually takes time to began working with it from scratch. Also lacks the graphics and user interface. --- ### IBM Cognos is a top business analytics software keeping internal reporting easy - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Medical Devices - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 6 months - Reviewed: August 2022 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered It has been good, but I am still looking for the best to match my business practices #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It allows the user to create reports and customize based on user needs #### Cons It is expensive compared to a lot of the other software out there #### Reasons for switching to IBM Cognos Analytics Reporting --- ### Intuitive BI and Reporting Software - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Financial Services - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Good enterprise product for business intelligence and trend analysis #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros We have used IBM Cognos to create customer insights and patterns to help in our marketing and targeting campaigns. The dashboards and graphs have multiple styles and formats and can be scheduled to be generated at specific times #### Cons Larger reports tend to be slow to generate from the report studio. Installation can also be challenging and may require purchase of vendor support --- ### Almost unworkable product - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Kim C. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: June 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. A reporting framework that can be used to access back end data. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Functionality: 2/5 #### Pros Unfortunately, there is not much to write in this section. The only possible "pro" in all cases would be the flexibility offered in the product as far as setting up the framework. Other than that, not much to like. #### Cons User interface was slow and clumsy. The user experience was not smooth at all. There was no ease of use whatsoever. The retrieval times from the back end were even worse. We had to retrofit an existing n-tier system to use the reporting side of this software and it was a disaster. There is no way I would recommend to anyone to purchase this system. --- ### Before leaving their Web version, they had a very good desktop application - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. with it we can visualize in a more comfortable way our information of DW and cubes #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 2/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros Before leaving their Web version, they had a very good desktop application, but they discontinued it. is a powerful tool, with ease for the reporter #### Cons it is traumatic for its administration, it depends on the active directory, which can be an advantage, but in other cases it makes it cumbersome --- ### Great Reporting tool for your datawarehousing need - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Sagar K. - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: July 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Cognos tool suite is perfect for your enterprise needs, with different tool available for different user level. The tool can handle all the reporting needs (charts, table, list, crosstab). With the addition of active reports and Cognos mobile it makes a complete solution #### Cons Enhancement of geographical reporting, current available option for Maps are very limited and should be extended. --- ### IBM Cognos Analytics allows me to access our data warehouse - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: George H. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Higher Education - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 12 months - Reviewed: December 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. I mainly use it to get data from the customer information system. Cognos allows me access to customer information without getting access to the other system. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros We use Cognos to access our customer info. The IT team set ups the report and we are able to export it for viewing and analysis. If built correctly, the reports can be easily run by the users. The users do need to know how to enter the parameters and known the data structure to fully utilitzed Cognos. We run Cognos through the browser. No need to install software. #### Cons Users need to understand the data structure in order to enter parameters. If the parameters are not entered correct, there will be no data, exports, or graphs. You also need to make sure the back-end servers are fast if you have a lot of data. --- ### IBM Cognos Analytics - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Christopher M. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Health, Wellness and Fitness - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used monthly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2022 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Value for money: 2/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Extensive features, vast ability to access, mine and report on data. #### Cons Steep learning curve, this software requires intensive training, is not intuitive and requires a dedicated analyst. --- ### Good product for BI Tools. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: worapot r. - Industry: Utilities - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: May 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros I like the ability to create reports its has many functions ( Explore, Analysis, Report Studio, Event Studio). #### Cons I dislikes its. Because of so hard of setting page or design report page when it set wide and height. --- ### Not easy to Use - Overall rating: 2/5 - Reviewer: Kathy J. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Mining & Metals - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: August 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. This is the reporting system our payroll company provides us with for weekly reports, its not easy to use and is frustrating. They do have a lot of options for running the report but its difficult to get the report to run. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 1/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros If you can figure out how to make the reports run you can create nice reports with lots of information. #### Cons Not easy to create a report, some reports will stop working for no reason, they just will spin and not generate. Difficult to change the layout and information. --- ### Cognos Review - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Dawn R. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Machinery - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: December 2016 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. I utilize Cognos for dashboard and custom reports and the ease of creating and storing reports is fairly simple. The organization of files is a bit confusing and the ability of seeing other employee folders tends to be complication for sharing. The availability to send out reports is much easier though. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros The ability to create custom reports makes it user friendly for anyone to figure out #### Cons the cubes tend to be confusing for file storage ## More reviews [Next reviews](https://www.softwareadvice.com/bi/ibm-cognos-analytics-profile/reviews/?page=2) --- IBM Cognos Analytics Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice