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No Magic MagicDraw vs erwin Data Modeler comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 19, 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

erwin Data Modeler
Ranking in Business Process Design
10th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (4th)
No Magic MagicDraw
Ranking in Business Process Design
14th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of erwin Data Modeler is 2.0%, down from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of No Magic MagicDraw is 2.9%, down from 3.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Design
 

Featured Reviews

JorgeSanz - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamline data modeling and automate network changes for increased efficiency
The initial setup depends on the tool if you are using the data model environment. Stopping the server could be complex and require strong expertise. If you have everything set up and configured, Erwin is straightforward. You can deploy it in a few hours. In our case, it took a couple of months to address internal conditions, assign machines, and set up everything for the services. I rate the initial setup a six out of ten, where one is difficult and ten is easy.
DiegoRangel - PeerSpot reviewer
Enhanced team communication and design exploration with integrated simulation tools
I was using No Magic MagicDraw to model operations, such as using different kinds of operations with ships or crafts and other systems No Magic MagicDraw facilitated great communication within the team and allowed for the exploration of different designs and architectures, which was beneficial…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is excellent in providing a visual representation of a database and can generate DDL for implementing changes. We use DDL for logical purposes to review with business people, ensuring they have the required fields for processing. We also use it as a data dictionary for the physical data model to understand all the purposes of the terms. This helps us map the logical and physical terms with the business definition to understand our data."
"We find that its ability to generate database code from a model for a wide array of data sources cuts development time. The ability to create one model in your design phase and then have it generate DDL code for Oracle or Teradata, or whichever environment you need is really nice. It's not only nice but it also saves man-hours of time. You would have to take your design and just type in manually. It has to take days off out of the work."
"We can create mappings in erwin and possibly data dictionaries."
"The fitting model is very intuitive."
"The most valuable features are the ability to reverse engineer and do model comparison. With the reverse engineering, I can understand the databases from third-party products. With the model comparison, I can track the differences between two versions of the same database."
"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."
"erwin has versioning so you can keep versions, over time, of those models and you can compare any version to any version. If you're looking at a specific database and you want to see what changed over time, that's really useful. You can go back to a different version or connect that to your change-control processes so you can see what was released when."
"The most valuable features are being able to visualize the data in the diagrams and transform those diagrams into physical database deployments. These features help, specifically, to integrate the data. When the source data is accumulated and modeled, the target model is in erwin and it helps resolve the data integration patterns that are required to map the data to accommodate a model."
"The most valuable features with No Magic MagicDraw are its ease of use; you can put this in front of a 12-year-old and they would know what to do right away."
"The most valuable feature of No Magic MagicDraw is the simulation capabilities and interface."
"I think one of the key things is the plugins for integration with requirements management tools like Doors"
"The most valuable feature is the amount of flexibility that one has to model, which is great for an individual."
"When you look at it, No Magic is an all-encompassing tool. You can use it for business architecture design. You can use it for deploying an ERP system across your enterprise. However, it was initially designed and developed for model-based systems engineering. That's the systems engineering required to either produce an IP system or product. It takes away the mounds of paper and puts it into a model. It enables you to generate significant savings by modeling that new product or that system before you ever start developing a prototype."
"The technical support is very good."
"Offers good standards compliance and is user-friendly."
"The beauty of MagicDraw is that it has a simulation part, so you can simulate your model to validate it. The simulation allows you to bring in code off of an external code that you can write to set up the simulation and execute the code."
 

Cons

"We can only get licenses through partners."
"As someone who has used it for a long time, I have seen stability vary from version to version."
"The modeling product itself is far and above anything else that I've seen on the market. There are certain inconsistencies when it comes to keeping up with other platforms' databases in the reverse-engineering process. It should also support more database platforms."
"The Bulk Editor needs improvement. If you had something that was a local model to your local machine, you could connect to the API, then it would write directly into the repository. However, when you have something that is on the centralized server, that functionality did not work. Then, you had to export out to a CSV and upload up to the repository. It would have been nice to be able to do the direct API without having that whole download and upload thing. Maybe I didn't figure it out, but I'm pretty sure that didn't work when it was a model that sat on a centralized repository."
"I'd really like to see the PDF function become available. It would make my life much easier than what it is at the moment because whenever I need to collaborate with people that do not have erwin, I have to go through the wonkiness of going to Word and then save it from Word into PDF. There's a lot of differences between erwin 4.4 and 2020."
"erwin generally fails to successfully reverse engineer our Oracle Databases into erwin data models. The way that they are engineered on our side, the syntax is correct from an Oracle perspective, but it seems to be very difficult for erwin to interpret. What I end up doing is using Oracle Data Modeler to reverse engineer into the Oracle data model, then forward engineer the DDL into an Oracle syntax, and importing that DDL into erwin in order to successfully bring in most of the information from our physical data models. That is a bit of a challenge."
"The only real complaint I have is the time it takes to do a database comparison on a large model. If they could speed that up, that would be the only thing I can think of that needs improvement."
"There is a lack of local support in the China region."
"The cost of upgrading the product should be lower."
"Some of No Magic MagicDraw's most valuable features were its integration with other simulation tools, such as MATLAB, the seasonal plugin, and the Rangel simulation toolkit."
"The documentation for MagicDraw and the video tutorials compared to other competitors is an area for improvement."
"For the next releases, I would like to have them import requirements from other sources. They could make it very easy to do that because there are a lot requirements management tools like DOORS, D-O-O-R-S, Dynamic Object Oriented Management. A lot of folks use DOORS to create a requirement. For those requirements you allocate them to a component in the architecture and a verification method for that requirement. It would be good if we could import those into MagicDraw as components so you don't have to manually do these things."
"It would be better if the User Interface were updated. At the moment, it's a classic environment. It reminds me of the old Windows interface, for example, Windows 95. It would be better to make it more user-friendly. It would also be better if it could integrate with SAP solutions. It isn't easy to find experts in the field. It's hard to find people around the globe that have the necessary skills and expertise to manage this solution. For example, in our case, we needed someone with refrigeration knowledge that also knew how to use the tool, and that was a challenge. We also had issues relating to erasing. Sometimes, it kept it in the background and didn't erase it at all. We had to review the entire list to ensure that the item was deleted."
"The technical support is not very good."
"There are some technical features that you have to study and do research on to be able to understand."
"One potential area for improvement is the recommendation feature. At times, we face challenges in locating specific features, and we have to reach out for assistance in finding the information we need."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We've continued to use the product for many years and compared it with others on the market. The pricing is reasonable considering what the solution offers and what we pay. There are cheaper tools, but they may not be as robust and easy to use, so it's worth the money."
"The solution is 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."
"Pricing is very high compared to any other product."
"The price of erwin Data Modeler is very expensive, in particular for this part of the world."
"Likewise, the solution is a little pricey."
"Price-wise, erwin Data Modeler is okay. You can purchase a single license and it is not very expensive."
"The primary reasons that erwin was selected were that it was much more affordable for us [than Embarcadero] and it was easily maintainable."
"I would say licensing would be anywhere from $3,500 to $6,500 per person or per seat (it's a per seat style license)."
"In addition to the initial cost, you have to pay annually for support in order to get the upgrades."
"The price of No Magic MagicDraw could improve. The price of the solution is too expensive for smaller-sized companies. There should be a better pricing model."
"I rate the pricing a ten out of ten. It is an expensive product compared to software for model-based system engineering."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis, and it's expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
22%
Government
14%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
Forward engineering, DDL generation, reverse engineering, and reporting are the most valuable features of the solution.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
The product is expensive. I rate the product’s pricing a nine out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.
What needs improvement with erwin Data Modeler by Quest?
As a documenting tool, it's solid, though its reporting could be more robust. The reporting mechanisms could be more intuitive regarding report creation. It can generate reports in CSV files, displ...
What do you like most about No Magic MagicDraw?
There is a lot of documentation available on the Internet to understand its functionality.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for No Magic MagicDraw?
Maybe the price is a little bit high for a small company to acquire this tool. However, they offer trial versions and trial licenses for members of INCOSE.
What needs improvement with No Magic MagicDraw?
For CAMEO, it's not only the ease of use, it's versatility, its communicability, but Rhapsody is the worst tool I've ever used. It is very difficult, not user-friendly, and very expensive. It works...
 

Also Known As

erwin DM
MagicDraw
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

 Premera, America Honda Motors, Aetna, Kaiser Permanente, Dental Dental Cali, Cigna, Staples
Northrop Grumman, Labcorp, Deposco, ClearView Training, IT Services Promotion Agency, Intelligent Chaos, Metalithic Systems Inc., Sodifrance
Find out what your peers are saying about No Magic MagicDraw vs. erwin Data Modeler and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.