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IBM DOORS vs Jira comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 20, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM DOORS
Ranking in Application Requirements Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Jira
Ranking in Application Requirements Management
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
274
Ranking in other categories
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites (1st), Project Management Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Application Requirements Management category, the mindshare of IBM DOORS is 32.5%, down from 35.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jira is 15.4%, up from 15.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Requirements Management
 

Featured Reviews

UweSeufert - PeerSpot reviewer
Old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements
I use IBM DOORS because my customer wants it for managing their requirements IBM DOORS is a tool from the 20th century. It is very old but capable of storing, organizing, and exchanging requirements. It helps to manage requirements efficiently, which significantly improves the way requirements…
AmitUbale - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient project management that's comprehensive and and helps with time efficiency
We use Jira primarily for project management within the organization. It helps us manage tasks, bug management, and tracking tickets effectively. We assign tickets to individual team members and track them easily For project management, Jira has helped facilitate efficient task segregation and…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We have different generations of all products. It lets us select and see unique attributes for each release or generation. You can use attributes to define a selection area to see which equipments are for the old versions and which ones are for the new versions. This inbuilt view is what I like in IBM Rational DOORS. So, for a database and a set of requirements, it will select and show unique attributes for a release or a generation."
"The most valuable feature is the management verification and login."
"The program is very stable."
"It is very customizable and easy to scale."
"I would say that the best feature of the solution is that since everything is in one place, and if you make any changes, then they are recorded or tracked."
"The data logs are ver conveneint."
"The most valuable feature of IBM Rational DOORS is the full requirements development and testing."
"Very customizable and can be as powerful as you want it to be."
"Jira has a useful user interface and overall is easy to understand and learn."
"The most valuable feature of Jira for sprint planning is the timeline feature, which allows for better visualization and planning of releases."
"It is easy to integrate Jira within our current IT environment. Jira has connectors and supports various integration."
"The ordinary user has an interface that is very clear."
"In Jira, the integrations I have used so far are the repository integration, like when it gets added, or the integration with Confluence, which is good."
"The agile framework works well, and I pretty much live by that. Everything, such as sprint management, is laid out."
"It is very configurable, and we can do whatever we want. Jira dashboards are also good, and we use them extensively. We also use the tracking mechanism extensively."
"I like that all of the team members on an agile team can use it. No one is in a separate application."
 

Cons

"There are problems with communicating between DOORS and Microsoft Office."
"One thing that I would like to see is a lower-cost version of it that we could use for smaller projects. Sometimes, we do projects for commercial customers who would benefit from something like DOORS, but it's just so expensive. It's just a monster, so a lower-cost version would be the thing that we'd like to see."
"The user interface for the Change Proposal System could be improved."
"Rational DOORS' most valuable feature is that you can write any kind of requirement you want."
"It would be helpful if Microsoft provided a more user-friendly interface for updating and querying updates. Additionally, if there was a way for users to notify developers of any changes in requirements, it would allow for faster and more efficient updates to the solution's architecture. This could be in the form of a notification system that alerts developers of any changes that need to be made. Additionally, the solution is document-driven and it should be more digital."
"Both the performance and the price could be improved."
"There needs to be quicker access to tech support. When I have a two minute question that takes two minutes to answer, it shouldn't take me 45 minutes and/or a few days of callbacks to get to the right technical support person. It's unnecessary and frustrating for the user."
"Not all Rational Team Concert operations are available from the web client. Certain operations, like creating streams or components, still require using the desktop application. They're not accessible through the web interface. And in my opinion, this limitation should be removed."
"ClickUp is a good alternative to Jira, so they have a better interface [GUI]. I don't like Jira's graphical interface - it could be more user-friendly. Jira looks old school."
"In the way it is deployed, I think Jira is too dependent on the third-party applications that are available in its marketplace. If we could get some of the basic functionalities which are offered by these third-party applications, that would be ideal because each time we need a new functionality, we have to purchase a new plugin as an add-on."
"We would like to see the integration of a lite-version of Confluence, just to manage some of the templates and documents."
"The reporting tool and the approval tool need work."
"Adding applications is very expensive."
"Nowadays, many organizations are moving toward the Objectives and Key Results (OKR) framework, and this is something that Jira should be able to accommodate."
"If I'm comparing it to ALM Octane, the documentation is not as robust as ALM Octane's documentation. So, they can improve on the documentation side."
"The thing I don't like is that it is hard to decide which dropdown options should be selected. When we try and submit it, it will state that there are certain mandates in place. It won't allow us to submit the form unless we fill out all the details."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with one being very affordable and ten being quite expensive."
"Licensing fees are billed annually and there is no support included with what I pay."
"It is expensive to onboard additional users."
"It's expensive."
"The licensing cost is too high."
"I am not sure why it is so expensive, but one license will cost approximately $15,000 in US dollars."
"We have to pay for a license. I think it's a one-time payment as my company hasn't notified me about more charges. I don't think it's expensive for large corporations, but it will be costly for an average person."
"IBM Rational DOORS is highly expensive."
"The price seems reasonable to me. It's very similar to Splunk."
"It depends on the type of license. In terms of subscription, it is cheap, and it works pretty well."
"I rate the tool's pricing a five out of ten. It's paid yearly."
"We feel that the product is a good value for the cost."
"The basic price of Jira is reasonable, but for each plugin, we have to keep paying more. When you add it all up, it can be expensive. The main problem we face is we are forced to purchases plugin licenses for users who are not going to use them. For example, we have Jira licenses for approximately 450 people but if we only want a purchase a plugin for few people it is mandatory to buy the license for the 450 people who have Jira licensees. This is a problem because sometimes we need plugins for the product manager or for people in charge of the report, not everyone. For us, it can be very expensive in the end, they should alter this policy to allow plugins for only a set number of licenses."
"There are other solutions that are free making this solution seem expensive in comparison."
"The standard package of Jira is for 100 users. They should offer more packages for other increments, such as 500 or 2,000. In my previous company, there was a free package that provided a minimal number of users."
"We are on an annual license to use Jira."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
26%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
16%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Rational DOORS?
The traceability matrix in DOORS improved our project outcomes. It helps ensure coverage of requirements at different levels, from user requirements to software requirements to test requirements.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Rational DOORS?
Over the years, the first version cost something around 5800 euros.
What needs improvement with IBM Rational DOORS?
Compared to today, DOORS' competitors also excel in this discipline. Yet the price is too high. It's often not as generic as it used to be. IBM promised to find a way for a generic format that allo...
Is Jira better or would you go with Micro Focus ALM Octane?
Hi Netanya, Basically , it all depends on the use cases for your environment and the business needs. Hope the below data may be relevant to you for identifying your needs and deciding on the approp...
Which is better - Jira or Microsoft Azure DevOps?
Jira is a great centralized tool for just about everything, from local team management to keeping track of products and work logs. It is easy to implement and navigate, and it is stable and scalabl...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jira?
We operate under a nonlimited license with Jira, allowing a number of users to access it with a single enterprise license.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Rational DOORS
Jira Software
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Infosys, Chevrolet Volt
Square, Nasa, eBay, Cisco, SalesForce, Adobe, BNP Paribas, BMW and LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DOORS vs. Jira and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.