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3SL Cradle vs IBM DOORS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 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

3SL Cradle
Ranking in Application Requirements Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
9.2
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
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
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Application Requirements Management category, the mindshare of 3SL Cradle is 1.6%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM DOORS is 32.5%, down from 35.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Requirements Management
 

Featured Reviews

Siegmar-Schuenke - PeerSpot reviewer
Flexible solution that manages all your needs
I mainly use 3SL Cradle to manage the requirements from service projects 3SL Cradle's most valuable feature is its flexibility in managing all your needs immediately.  3SL Cradle could be improved with better support for SysML functionalities. In the next release, I would like 3SL Cradle to be…
SHRINIVAS ALAGERI - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers a well-refined ASPICE template and satisfying requirement management features
IBM DOORS effectively synchronizes with Polarion. But suppose when Polarion is running on Linux and you want to integrate with IBM DOORS on Windows, that is when compatibility issues arise. For the aforementioned issue we often receive advise in our company to migrate Polarion to Windows before integration. IBM DOORS is a heavy-duty application compared to competitors such as PTC Integrity. Exporting an IBM DOORS module is highly time-consuming for its bulkiness. PTC Integrity is a lighter solution that allows the development of a gateway template. It's crucial to consider the use cases and the other vendors that need to be integrated before using IBM DOORS. Our company is a PTC competence center, so most of our customers are from PTC. The customer integrations our company deals with include modeling tools such as Simulink, MATLAB, and Integrity Modeler to synchronize documents. The digital threat maintenance between IOD and Windchill is also a crucial part of our organization's operations. The solution should be more compatible with thin clients, there should be focus on web-based clients who can be more effective in IBM DOORS. At our company, we don't want every customer to use the thick client format with the solution. I would like to witness the seamless integration of IBM DOORS with Windchill in the future version. The integrations in IBM DOORS should be web-based, I don't prefer to use multiple plug-ins. For example, I want to integrate IBM DOORS with MATLAB, Simulink and Jenkins effortlessly which is possible in Codebeamer. I want every feature of Codebeamer to be present in IBM DOORS in the future releases.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"3SL Cradle's most valuable feature is its flexibility in managing all your needs immediately."
"I like the way we can simply link requirements with one another and with test descriptions and then automatically produce reports that are required to show compliance to our customers. It is a combination of requirements management and reporting that I like, but I really have very little to do with the reporting part of it. I don't know how easy or hard it is to create those reports."
"Rational DOORS' most valuable feature is that you can write any kind of requirement you want."
"Starting to use the solution is pretty straightforward. There isn't too much of a learning curve."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is traceability. We can track every requirement, including what the stakeholder must do and component-level requirements."
"It helps to manage requirements efficiently, which significantly improves the way requirements are managed."
"It is a mature product that is stable."
"It has the features of: traceability, configuration management, and user access."
"It is very customizable and easy to scale."
 

Cons

"3SL Cradle could be improved with better support for SysML functionalities."
"It's difficult to set the code on the solution."
"The low performance of the solution is probably because it is quite an old tool."
"I would like to see them improve in agile management the Scrum/Kanban Board to work with overseas team members."
"The solution should be more compatible with thin clients"
"The interface is not very user-friendly and has not evolved in a long time."
"They need to provide users with information on what options would be best for their setup."
"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."
"It used to be very clunky."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The licensing cost is too high."
"The licensing costs for the product are quite high."
"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with one being very affordable and ten being quite expensive."
"It is expensive to onboard additional users."
"I don't personally know what the numbers are. I just know that one of the reasons we've limited it to three seats is a function of cost."
"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."
"It's expensive."
"IBM is a bit too expensive in terms of pricing. Customers are paying a lot for the license, and the price is quite high for this kind of environment. It is quite high as compared to what we can get today with other solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Aerospace/Defense Firm
27%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Energy/Utilities Company
10%
Educational Organization
6%
Manufacturing Company
26%
Computer Software Company
8%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with 3SL Cradle?
The support is consistent globally. However, heavier support is provided in certain locations. Improvement in support is necessary. Assistance is available to acquire information and utilize userna...
What advice do you have for others considering 3SL Cradle?
If you have time to take some courses about 3SL Cradle, it will give you more time in the project to familiarize yourself with Cradle. I recommend it, but you need to do it within a very short time...
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...
 

Also Known As

Cradle
Rational DOORS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA, In-Depth Engineering Corporation, Avibras
Infosys, Chevrolet Volt
Find out what your peers are saying about 3SL Cradle vs. IBM DOORS and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.