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Visio vs erwin Evolve 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

erwin Evolve
Ranking in Business Process Design
21st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (12th)
Visio
Ranking in Business Process Design
2nd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
110
Ranking in other categories
Mind Mapping Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of erwin Evolve is 2.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Visio is 7.0%, down from 12.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Design Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Visio7.0%
erwin Evolve2.3%
Other90.7%
Business Process Design
 

Featured Reviews

ScottLawson - PeerSpot reviewer
Director IT Architecture at QAD
Enables us to present data and objects visually, in diagrams, and to make them available via the web. Also enables web-based editing of data.
We tried their collaborative web modeling and we used it with a few people but we tend to not use that piece. We tend to collaborate with the people and then my team of architects draws up the diagram using the modeling tool. We then iterate through those. I would like to use it, but it was a little clunky when they first rolled it out. Overall, it's more about the company having room for improvement. What they need to do is to consolidate more of their products. For example, I was just looking and I couldn't figure out what erwin DT is. It's on the website but it would help if they could put information together and make it more clear as to what products they have and how they work with other things. I hear them talking in the support forums and, when I talk to the representative, they say they're going to do a bunch of stuff but it seems the progress is slow. The changes they need to make are to take their old, legacy product, which we use, and focus a lot on it so they can transform it into a modern cloud tool so that we have fewer little pieces to deal with. They could also fix their security model. It's very confusing to get new people onto the tool and to make sure that your content isn't being exposed to the wrong people.
NitinSharma - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Network Specialist at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Created detailed rack and network diagrams that streamline documentation and collaboration
For creating diagrams, I definitely use Visio for HLD, LLD, and traffic flow diagrams. Apart from Visio, I use Jira only if the customer specifically requests it; otherwise, I do not use an in-house version of Jira in my organization. One of the good features of using the Microsoft umbrella product is that if I create a big diagram and then work on the HLD or LLD in Word, I can select everything from Visio and paste it as an image without needing to resize it, which streamlines the process of creating documentation for customers. The main benefits Visio provides me include simplifying processes, saving time on manual work with diagram creation, and delivering a clean architecture, whether it is network architecture or application flow. I have created diagrams for AWS, Azure, GCP, and on-premises data centers, including rack elevation diagrams and organization charts. Modifications can be made easily and reflected immediately, and I can create PNG images to share with the executive team.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Evolve is like a tank. You can do whatever you want with the solution, but you need to customize it. I think that it's not very aligned with the framework for enterprise architecture. MEGA is focused on these enterprise architectures, but it's only for that. With Evolve, you can do everything you want with professional services."
"Evolve is like a tank; you can do whatever you want with the solution, but you need to customize it."
"Forward and reverse engineering were valuable features."
"Customer Service: Outstanding Technical Support: Outstanding"
"We use erwin Evolve to publish to the website. This allows us to enable publishing our website using parameterisation features. In a very fast, quick way, we can publish a table or chart onto a website."
"The most valuable features for us are impact analysis, where I can easily visualize the impact of change."
"This is the first time that we have a central repository in our company where we can see and look at all the legacy applications which are used to serve the world."
"Its flexibility and scalability to support all stakeholders in making informed decisions are powerful capabilities."
"I find the control flow and settings features valuable."
"The interface of the solution is very good. It's easy to navigate."
"Visio makes it easier than with other tools to do such tasks as changing things or coming up with one's own visual style for presentation purposes."
"Microsoft Visio is a robust tool for quick mapping."
"Visio is the cheapest solution because it has the basics."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to draw models quickly."
"Drawing BPMN diagrams."
"I like that once you create what you need, you can group that, at least within that drawing, and you have access to that new stencil object or that custom object throughout that drawing."
 

Cons

"With the Excel importing, the "up to date" part is the challenge. If we had a real-time integration, we could keep things up to date for whatever kinds of change points we had. With Excel, it is more that you have to export from one system then import it to another, so it's better for data that doesn't change that often."
"Add some ability to do conditional Visualization on the models and in reports (some ideas) – maybe as a specialized Theme or Diagram or Display."
"With the Excel importing, the "up to date" part is the challenge."
"Would like to see canonical modeling supported for web services."
"erwin Evolve by Quest could have additional features to manage the architecture of enterprises and businesses."
"You can integrate it with almost everything, but you have to watch what you are doing because when too much is integrated it's really hard to manage your errors."
"Few clients looking are going with Evolve these days because I don't think they even appear on Gartner's Magic Quadrant."
"The implementation process is too complicated."
"Visio should implement more complex tools or graphics to facilitate processing and use flexible templates. The tools supplied or provided are very basic, and there are not enough tools for design."
"Integration with other applications need improvement. Having the functionality to integrate with databases will also make this solution better."
"It is now being used for just basic drawings; it is no longer an enterprise-quality development or documentation tool."
"The tools panel at the top, et cetera, seems really complicated."
"Importing templates can sometimes be a bit hit and miss."
"It is not flexible in terms of functions and modeling deliverables."
"The big downside to Visio is that it's very difficult to push the design through to Power Automate, to become a workflow that you can use."
"But, for beginners, or for anyone who wants to prepare a more informative diagram, I'm not sure if Visio is a very helpful tool."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost is something like $15,000, per license. But I haven't looked at those numbers in three years. It was over $100,000 to initially set everything up and get it all configured."
"Yearly, our cost is €100,000."
"Unless you are a one person shop – always go with the Workgroup edition and Concurrent licensing."
"On a yearly basis, our licensing costs are 50,000 euro. There are no additional costs because we are on a SaaS model."
"The licensing enables you to differentiate between people who edit the content and the people who consume it. We are able to keep the licensing costs down by keeping the "contributor" licenses to a minimum, and we then just roll out the content in a read-only version for the rest of our users."
"I think erwin is quite expensive. I have difficulty selling the portal, in fact."
"I estimate that we pay between $40,000 and $50,000 a year for the solution, not including the upfront costs to buy things the first time."
"Our license for Visio is including with the Office 365 subscription."
"The product is inexpensive if you already have Microsoft products in your environment. The license encompasses all the required services."
"We have about 10 to 15 people with Visio licenses in my company, but I wasn't involved in the direct negotiation of the prices since this was taken care of by my administrative office."
"Now we pay about $200, which is maybe $10 per user per month."
"The pricing is reasonable and I would rate it 6 out of 10."
"Visio is included with our Microsoft enterprise license."
"The cost of the software is reasonably priced."
"There are some cheaper as well as free solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Performing Arts
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
Construction Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise12
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business36
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise61
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
How easy is it to migrate process flow charts (modeled using tools like Visio) into Bizagi?
I have been using Bizagi with a major project for a state government agency for about four years now. It is pretty straightforward to load in files that are BPMN 2.0 compliant. The option to load V...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Visio?
The pricing is reasonable now. Whereas before, I had used it when it was paid for by my work, but then as I moved to different projects, I wasn't paying $2,000 to have it. Visio is supplied by the ...
What needs improvement with Visio?
I would have said the pricing, but the pricing is fine now, so it's a good tool and a powerful one. When you know how to use it, it's very intuitive. People who don't know how to use it might want ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

erwin EA, erwin Business Process, erwin Enterprise Architecture
Microsoft Visio
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

AT&T, Bank of America, Chevron, Duke University, ESPN, Fidelity, GE, JP Morgan Chase, KPMG, McGraw Hill, NASA, Pfizer, Royal Bank of Scotland, Teradata, Union Pacific, Vodafone, Wells Fargo.
Thomas College, Hamburg Port Authority, Portigon AG, Conseil G_n_ral du d_partement des Hautes-Alpes, AAA Auto a. s., Commonwealth Financial Network, ICA, Abu Dhabi National Energy Company
Find out what your peers are saying about Visio vs. erwin Evolve and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.