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Anaplan vs Board comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

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

Anaplan
Ranking in Business Performance Management
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Production Planning (5th), Predictive Analytics (4th)
Board
Ranking in Business Performance Management
10th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (23rd), Reporting (20th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Business Performance Management category, the mindshare of Anaplan is 13.3%, down from 15.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Board is 6.8%, up from 5.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Performance Management
 

Q&A Highlights

CC
Aug 10, 2021
 

Featured Reviews

Antonio Flor - PeerSpot reviewer
Real-time data integration enhances operational efficiency and flexibility
As a client developer and solutions architect, I use Anaplan for building modules and deploying logic end-to-end. I work closely with the business in an agile manner to ensure the model aligns with business needs Anaplan offers flexibility in building different options within the platform. The…
Wiboon Thabsuwan - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use and requires less time to learn or understand its features
I think the product is good in terms of ease of use. The interface looks really nice and very easy to use. Every command appears in the icon. It looks like you don't have to understand everything about the command. You do not necessarily have to know more, or I would say that there is less time for our study about the products. Functionality-wise, it is quite easy to use and requires less time to understand or learn about the product. I am a software vendor, so I do not use the tool myself. I use it for my clients. My clients mostly use it for budgeting and timing purposes. I would say that's really less maintenance at all because they can do everything by themselves. It is good in terms of ease of use.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's real-time connected planning, so the calculations are pretty much seamless as far as your model is connected."
"Where we're seeing the opportunity in the market is at the Fortune 100 companies that have far more complex modeling type scenarios where you need to be able to have a lot of people collaborating together, and you need a lot of information all at everyone's fingertips. This is where you see the big advantage of a solution like Anaplan."
"You don't need to have a programming language to use Anaplan."
"Technical support has been good."
"Anaplan's in-memory calculation engine is super-fast compared to the old tools we previously used. You enter the data and everything shows up in one go."
"The most valuable feature of Anaplan is machine learning. The solution is constantly evolving from feedback. Additionally, there is a wide range of training material online."
"It's simple to use with a lot of functions."
"The features that I have found most valuable are that it is web-based and easy to use."
"I think the product is good in terms of ease of use."
"The reporting part has been very valuable as the capabilities of the tool do not have to change graphs, change how grids are displayed, and can create reports on the fly."
"With the combination of 24/7 global support and their community, there was great customer service, tech support, and community support."
"​Our data is now more structured. Between our data warehouse and BOARD, which are both brand new, we now have a more structured data view with more accurate, timely data."
"The dynamic selections on the screen and details by function are also valuable for inside the data view."
"we are able to easily export data. When directors need financial information, we can go in the system and export the data, then send it out so they have it ready and available. If they are not in the office, we can email it to them. In addition, all the managers are now more on top of their expenses and their budget."
"By using Board we can do a lot of free analysis. We can change the layout of a table and even the end-user can change the layout of a table. And in Board 11.2 you can save the layout. That's very useful for the customer, it's a very good function."
"What is very valuable is the ability to customize. We didn't see a solution out there that really matched exactly what our functional requirements would be. So we were able to work with New Brain, our integrator, and we were able to build from the ground up what we wanted, and I think that's pretty unique to BOARD."
 

Cons

"One area of improvement is conditional formatting. It's not very practical, and you need to specify additional formatting."
"Anaplan's workflow component is probably the biggest area for improvement. I'd also like to see Anaplan add an ad hoc reporting tool that allows users to query things. It's going to factor into how you design your data set and your models, but I'd like the ability to create ad hoc queries against the data that's in there."
"Automation needs to be built into this solution."
"The price of the solution can improve."
"The visualization tools in the product are limited in comparison to other reporting tools."
"The dashboard could be better. Because within a dashboard or report, you have to do a lot of scrolling. You need to scroll down because the table doesn't fit in a single view. That's why even the users aren't happy with that kind of user experience. They need to scroll to see all the data, and it could be better if it fits in just one page. That way, you can see everything. In the next release, I want automation that's connected to Anaplan. For example, to load master data from SAP to Anaplan. I don't know if this already exists, but a log where you can see the progress and see if there's an error will also help. It would be better to give you the error message, for example, if there is an error within the automated process importing to Anaplan."
"When there is a lot of data, it sometimes takes long to load."
"Anaplan should come up with flexible options to connect to a data warehouse rather than an Anaplan hub."
"I would like to see better relationships with the partners."
"It needs more export to Excel functionality. Right now, we're having to build within the cloud-based platform, as well as build within the Excel add-in, because the export to Excel is somewhat ugly."
"It's very powerful, but there is also a big learning curve. ​It should be a little more intuitive."
"Sometimes, the data disappears from the product."
"The initial setup was very complex for us."
"We have had some challenges with newer version of the rollout in terms of stability."
"​My analysts have used the technical support. Sometimes they have felt like they did not receive the answer that they needed, or you have to go and upgrade in order to address a problem. ​"
"​We are looking for ways to distinguish zeros versus nulls in BOARD."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of Anaplan is a challenge for clients, especially if they don't have an ongoing long-term use case for it. It's a $50,000 licensing fee just to get started. Clients need a strong business case to switch from Excel to Anaplan. But if clients have used something similar in the past, such as Hyperion or other solutions, that's not a factor because they know what to expect."
"The license is a yearly subscription. There are three licensing tiers: the model builder, planner, and the reporting."
"Anaplan is a bit pricier compared to its competitors - the license costs about $4,000 per user annually."
"A value-for-money product and a very reasonable price compared to competitors like SAP or IBM."
"The entry-level is anywhere from about $30,000 to $50,000 a year, however, it does go up significantly after that depending on the complexity and how much space you're using."
"This is an expensive product and if the price were reduced then it would attract more customers."
"We are currently using a free workspace license for 90 days. We are satisfied with the price of the solution. There are additional costs if you want more storage, the default limit is 250 GB."
"This is a yearly subscription. So a customer initially buys a workspace and specifies how much GB they want. The minimum starts at around 30 GB. You can buy multiple workspaces."
"The tool's price is a bit high compared to other solutions."
"The solution is quite expensive, if it is made cheaper then we can have more clients. I rate it four out of ten."
"​In terms of the pricing, it was reasonable. BOARD is not the lowest in the market, but it was reasonable for us."
"Find a partner who will take responsibility for the implementation, and be available for support."
"It is not the cheapest product on earth, but you get so much. It provides good value for money."
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Answers from the Community

CC
Aug 10, 2021
Aug 10, 2021
We've had several FP&A departments include Anaplan in their analytics discussions, and while BI information IS generated, the focus is generally on compiling input from various sources and simultaneous users to speed the planning process. We see Anaplan competing with Host Analytics, Hyperion, Adaptive, that sort of thing. BI evaluations generally include Qlik, Tableau and whatever the tea...
2 out of 6 answers
EB
Aug 3, 2021
Hello @Muskan Jhingan, @Chang Geng, @Sumanth NR. Can you please share your professional opinion with @Charles C?​   Thank you!
CG
Aug 3, 2021
Usually, we say Board provides lots of toolkits to achieve both CPM and BI. But, the Anaplan mainly focuses on CPM solutions. If the enduser doesn't have any existing planning strategy, maybe they can refer to Anaplan solution directly and easily. If the enduser already has a clear planning strategy, and they just want to find a tool to achieve it, maybe Board is a better choice because its smart toolkits can be used easily and give more possibilities. BTW, if you want to fully use the BI function (colourful charts, dashboard, multi-dimensional analysis), Board will be absolutely better. Just for your reference.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
30%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What are your main use cases for Anaplan?
Anaplan is an industry-leading cloud-based corporate performance management (CPM) platform that combines business planning and analytics in a single solution. It is designed to assist organizations...
Is Board better than Anaplan as a Business Intelligence (BI) solution?
We've had several FP&A departments include Anaplan in their analytics discussions, and while BI information IS generated, the focus is generally on compiling input from various sources and simu...
Is Anaplan better than SAP ERP?
There are different aspects of both Anaplan and SAP ERP that I like and dislike. Anaplan improves forecast accuracy and drives up the quality of analytics. Rather than spending all of their time co...
What do you like most about Board?
All the reports are prepared automatically.
What needs improvement with Board?
Some of my company's customers are interested to see the predictive analytics part of the tool. Some customers would like to leverage or prioritize predictive analytics as the main feature, but som...
What is your primary use case for Board?
I use the solution mainly for budgeting purposes. Budgeting and planning are its main use cases. The product itself is designed for budgeting and planning processes.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

HP, ForeScout, DocuSign, EAT, Pandora, Aviva, Intel Security, Zalora
Coca-Cola, Puma, Desigual, Ricoh, KPMG, H&M, Groupe SEB
Find out what your peers are saying about Anaplan vs. Board and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.