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AWS Well-Architected Tool vs erwin Data Modeler comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 1, 2026

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

AWS Well-Architected Tool
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
22nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.9
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
erwin Data Modeler
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
50
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Design (5th), Data Governance (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the mindshare of AWS Well-Architected Tool is 1.5%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of erwin Data Modeler is 7.3%, down from 10.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Architecture Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
erwin Data Modeler7.3%
AWS Well-Architected Tool1.5%
Other91.2%
Enterprise Architecture Management
 

Featured Reviews

Dayanand-Ksheemakaari - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Solution Architecht at GlobalLogic
Has an efficient adaptability feature and helps us set up a high-performing architecture.
We use the product for building enterprise applications with the help of microservice technology The tool helps us establish a baseline for the architecture. Our organization can follow all guidelines and adhere to the industry standards to set up a high-performing architecture. The product's…
Sushree Panigrahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Snowflake Data Engineer| Senior PLSQL Developer |Data Modeler|Assitant Vice Pre at Jp Morgan Chase & Co.
Data modeling has transformed regulatory reporting and collaboration across cloud environments
In erwin Data Modeler, areas that have room for improvement include performance improvements. I see that large models sometimes cause it to be slow when opening. Impact analysis can lag as well. Version control is another aspect. If we have developed a current version, it is not integrated with Git where we can easily compare different versions. UI modernization is also something we cannot utilize as it is primarily for development. Additionally, cloud-specific optimizations are needed when it comes to Snowflake or Databricks. When it comes to AI aspects, auto-suggestions for normalization or identifying primary, foreign, or surrogate keys are areas that can be improved.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product's most valuable feature is adaptability."
"My favorite feature of erwin Data Modeler is that we can export and import tables directly from the databases, and it is easy to map from table to table and column to column."
"Being able to point it to a database and then pull the metadata is a valuable feature. Another valuable feature is being able to rearrange the model so that we can display it to users. We are able to divide the information into subject areas, and we can divide the data landscape into smaller chunks, which makes it easier to understand. If you had 14 subject areas, 1,000 entities, and 6,000 columns, you can't quite understand it all at once. So, being able to have the same underlying model but only display portions of it at a time is extremely useful."
"I have used most of the modeling tools available, but I found that erwin Data Modeler is the most suitable data modeling tool in our current industry."
"It reduces monthly savings by hundreds of thousands of dollars. Think about a company like Costco and all of the points of sale systems in Costco, all of the systems, the applications, but if all the applications in Costco all had their own data model, trying to integrate those, upgrade them and manage their different versions of the same model throughout the store, is an absolute nightmare. It's phenomenally expensive. This helps reduce that cost significantly. I'm talking on the orders of hundreds of thousands of dollars."
"They have a lot of features and the most up-to-date technology integration, which I haven't seen in other products."
"The accuracy and speed of the solution in transforming complex designs into well-aligned data sources makes the cost of the tool definitely worth it."
"Forward engineering, DDL generation, reverse engineering, and reporting are the most valuable features of the solution."
"The solution’s ability to generate database code from a model for a wide array of data sources cuts development time from two weeks to one day or even hours."
 

Cons

"They could provide a simplified process for building and deploying solutions in the cloud."
"We are planning to move, in 2021, into their server version, where multiple data modelers can work at the same time and share their models. It has become a pain point to merge the models from individual desktops and get them into a single data model, when multiple data modelers are working on a particular project. It becomes a nightmare for the senior data modeler to bring them together, especially when it comes to recreating them when you want to merge them."
"I love the product. I love the ability to get into the code, make it automated, and make it do what I want. I would like to see them put some kind of governance over the ability to make changes to the mart tables with the API, so that instead of just using the modeler's rights to a table -- it has a separate set of rights for API access. That would give us the ability to put governance around API applications. Right now a person with erwin and Excel/VBA has the ability to make changes to models with the API if they also have rights to make changes to the model from erwin. It's a risk."
"I would like to see the reporting capabilities be more dynamic and more inclusive of information. The API is very sparsely understood by people across the user community."
"The reverse engineering in Oracle Databases needs improvement, as there are issues."
"The solution's reporting side needs to be improved."
"I still use Visio for conceptual modeling, and that's mainly because it is easier to change things, and you can relax some of the rules. DM's eventual target is a database, which means you actually have to dot all the Is and cross all the Ts, but in a conceptual model, you don't often know what you're working with. So, that's probably a constraint with erwin. They have made it a lot easier, and they've done a lot, but there is probably still room for improvement in terms of the ease of presentation back to the business. I'm comparing it with something like Visio where you can change colors on a box, change the text color and that sort of stuff, and change the lines. Such things are a whole lot easier in Visio, but once you get a theme organized in erwin, you can apply that theme to all of the objects. So, it becomes easier, but you do have to set up that theme."
"The UI in erwin Data Modeler can be improved significantly because when any new person opens the tool, all the toolbars are kept open with many tools in view, making it appear chunky."
"The navigation is a little bit of a challenge. It's painful. For example, if you've got a view open and you want to try to move from side to side, the standard today is being able to drag and drop left and right. You can't really do that in the model. Moving around the model is painful because it doesn't follow the Windows model today."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The platform’s pricing depends on the specific project requirements."
"Pricing is very high compared to any other product."
"erwin is expensive compared to other solutions. We are paying almost $6,000 per seat a month."
"The primary reasons that erwin was selected were that it was much more affordable for us [than Embarcadero] and it was easily maintainable."
"Price-wise, erwin Data Modeler is okay. You can purchase a single license and it is not very expensive."
"erwin has this option where you pay a one-time fee and you have the license for six years, which makes sense because I don't upgrade my database engine every other year. I have an application that depends on it. This is something weird about PowerDesigner. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fee."
"There are no costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"An issue right now would be that erwin doesn't have a freely available browser (that I am aware of) for people who are not data modelers or data engineers that a consumer could use to look at the data models and play with it. This would not be to make any changes, but just to visually look at what exists. There are other products out there which do have end user browsers available and allow them to access data models via the data modeling tool."
"It is not a very expensive solution. Only the licensing and maintenance fee needs to be paid."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise38
 

Questions from the Community

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
I have no idea about the setup cost because I did not buy the license.
What needs improvement with erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
The UI in erwin Data Modeler can be improved significantly because when any new person opens the tool, all the toolbars are kept open with many tools in view, making it appear chunky. If possible, ...
What is your primary use case for erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
I primarly use erwin Data Modeler for modeling purposes. Once we have the business requirement, we create the models in erwin Data Modeler, and then we perform forward engineering to get the query ...
 

Also Known As

AWS Well Architected Tool
erwin DM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CyberAgent, Inc., nClouds
 Premera, America Honda Motors, Aetna, Kaiser Permanente, Dental Dental Cali, Cigna, Staples
Find out what your peers are saying about Quest Software, SAP LeanIX, SAP and others in Enterprise Architecture Management. Updated: May 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.