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Rally Software vs aqua comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

aqua
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
35th
Average Rating
0.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
AI-Augmented Software-Testing Tools (33rd)
Rally Software
Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
121
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of aqua is 0.8%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Rally Software is 5.0%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Rally Software5.0%
aqua0.8%
Other94.2%
Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites
 

Featured Reviews

it_user347709 - PeerSpot reviewer
Software Test Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
It has JMeter integration which provides visualizations during tests and instrumentation of each agent.
It has a strong reporting and dashboard mechanism. Reporting and metric management are so important in our company that we get value from the reporting functionality of the product. It has Jmeter integration that provides visualization during test and instrumentation of each agent so you do not need to pay extra for a licensed performance test tool.
Amit Anand - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Technical Architect at HCLSoftware
Drilling into change lifecycles has given me clear end to end traceability for every item
Reporting is my main area of concern. Additionally, the migration activity and portability are important areas for improvement. If I needed to move from Jira to Rally Software, having built-in portability or migration utilities would be beneficial. At the time of my use, there was not an inbuilt capability to migrate applications from other third-party solutions to Rally Software. Currently, I am not using Rally Software.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has a strong reporting and dashboard mechanism."
"The Portfolio is the most valuable feature that I found, because it allows us to drive our requirements along with planning at an enterprise level."
"We can work better and at a higher quality, than we were able to before."
"The Kanban board is probably the most useful feature, as it is very customizable and is great for somebody who doesn’t need to run the project with a scrum approach."
"This solution saves us lots of time and it is central for everyone."
"The biggest benefit that we've found has to do with the ease of use, as we can get into the data and actually report out of it, and moving to a tool where you've got easy access to get to the data was a big win for us."
"In my opinion, visibility is the biggest benefit that we have received from implementing CA Agile Central."
"Visibility of the backlog hierarchy and issue status are valuable features."
"Easy drill down and drill up, creating a very user-friendly menu."
 

Cons

"It is a client application, and should have web GUI because the installation and upgrade process is a little bit difficult."
"I think one of the things that we stumble upon is how to organize the teams."
"It could do with a wider range of colours for cards and the Kanban features need some improvement (which I know is on the way this year)."
"What I don't like about it is that it is really hard to find old work to reference information and use the reporting section of the application in terms of trying to analyze trends. If I am trying to find out which interfaces took this long and I want to compare and measure improvement from one quarter to another quarter, the reporting mechanism within Rally is very troublesome. They have an Excel plugin that you're supposed to use, but you literally have to pull the raw data out before you can do the analysis. You can't do it within Rally, and if you can, it is a secret, and I don't know how to do it. It should have better, easier, and user-friendly reporting without having to use the Excel add-in. It is very clunky. There is a lot of data in there, but it is not organized in such a way that makes it intuitive. You really have to kind of look for where do you put your documentation or dates. Some customization is available, but it is not plug-and-play like Jira. When I switched from TFS to Jira, I just went and started using Jira, whereas with Rally, you kind of have to really get in and figure out what you need to do before you set stuff up, or you're going to get yourself stuck. You can just start using Jira and be successful."
"What Agile Central is lacking is more ways to customize notifications and the ability to opt in and out of notifications; this would help with defect tracking as well."
"CA Agile Central does not have a workflow tool included."
"We have experienced some crashing instances."
"The reporting functionalities need improvement. Also, there's too much lag, but they're fixing that."
"With thousands of features, this is cumbersome."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"I don't know the exact pricing, but I think the tool is priced high. They provide quality workmanship, good software, regular upgrades, and they're always attentive and listen to users. Everything comes with a price. I think it's an expensive solution compared to Jira or other competitors, but it's a complete package."
"It is expensive and may not be worthwhile for a small company."
"I understand it's a little more expensive. That is why many people prefer Jira."
"We are always looking for a discount, if the solution was less expensive it would be a benefit."
"The license costs are fairly high as compared to some of the other solutions out there."
"Frankly, pricing is expensive and needs to be carefully planned for when budgeting."
"From a price point, it's a cost effective solution for our needs."
"Rally Software costs $50 a month, and for a base account, that price is acceptable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Construction Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise113
 

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about Rally Software?
Rally offers many features that help the management of activities, coordination, alignment and reports, which applies agility across the organization. If I were to highlight a particular feature, i...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Rally Software?
The setup cost is expensive. I was not responsible for the license part, but it was on a yearly basis.
What needs improvement with Rally Software?
Reporting is my main area of concern. Additionally, the migration activity and portability are important areas for improvement. If I needed to move from Jira to Rally Software, having built-in port...
 

Also Known As

aqua ALM
CA Agile Central, Rally Enterprise, CA Agile Training, CA Agile Coaching, CA Agile Academy, CA Agile Management , CA ALM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Yapi Kredi, Berlin Hyp, megapharm, Crem Solutions, Takko Fashion, Omnicare, Markant
Physicians Mutual, Harvard Pilgrim HealthCare, Editora Abril, Tata Communications, Level 3 Communications, Seagate, TomTom, Philips, Hiscox, Physicians Mutual, MYOB
Find out what your peers are saying about Atlassian, Microsoft, OpenText and others in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites. Updated: July 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.