IBM SPSS Modeler vs Weka comparison

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IBM SPSS Modeler

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Executive SummaryUpdated on May 21, 2025

IBM SPSS Modeler and Weka are both key players in the data analysis and machine learning sector. IBM SPSS Modeler stands out with its strong enterprise integration and support, whereas Weka is favored for its open-source accessibility and comprehensive algorithm library.

Features: IBM SPSS Modeler provides advanced predictive analytics, easy integration with enterprise systems, and strong visualization tools. Weka offers a wide array of machine learning algorithms, open-source access, and flexibility in algorithm implementation.

Room for Improvement: IBM SPSS Modeler could improve by enhancing open-source collaboration, reducing costs, and increasing algorithm diversity. Weka might benefit from richer visualization capabilities, professional customer support, and improved large-scale data handling.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM SPSS Modeler offers professional deployment services with dedicated customer support, ideal for enterprise-level needs. Weka is straightforward to install with community-backed support, catering to users valuing self-reliance and flexibility.

Pricing and ROI: IBM SPSS Modeler has higher initial costs but potentially greater ROI for businesses demanding extensive analytics and enterprise features. Weka is cost-effective with zero-cost setup, attracting budget-conscious users and educational institutions focused on efficiency over high upfront investment.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM SPSS Modeler vs. Weka Report (Updated: September 2025).

IBM SPSS Modeler vs. Weka

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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

IBM SPSS Modeler

Ranking in Data Mining

3rd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Science Platforms (16th)

Weka

Ranking in Data Mining

4th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Anomaly Detection Tools (4th)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Data Mining category, the mindshare of IBM SPSS Modeler is 20.6%, up from 16.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Weka is 12.7%, down from 20.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Data Mining Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
IBM SPSS Modeler	20.6%
Weka	12.7%
Other	66.7%

Data Mining

Featured Reviews

PeterHuo

Application Architect at Canada Border Services Agency

Good tool for extracting data from data warehouses, creating streams, and manipulating logic to extract final data

There are performance issues. Extracting data from many combined tables can take hours and occasionally crash the server due to memory leaks. This performance problem bothers people. The performance issue seems to be related to the server. We design streams on the client and submit them to the server, which generates a large SQL statement. There are two potential bottlenecks: one in the server and another in data extraction. I'm unsure about the exact mechanics of data splitting when fetching from the database. When streams become larger, performance bottlenecks may occur in the IBM SPSS Modeler server or the database. Sometimes the server crashes and needs to be restarted to release memory on both sides. I'm not sure exactly where the problem is caused, as I focus on stream design rather than server issues. The problem could be on the IBM SPSS Modeler server and database.

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AwaisAnwar

Treasury Management in Finance Department at National University of Pakistan

Open source, good for basic data mining use cases except for the visualization results

I haven't found it particularly useful. It lacks state-of-the-art algorithms and impressive outcomes. While it might offer insights for basic warehouse tasks, it falls short of deeper understanding and results. Moreover, a new user interface would be great, especially for beginners. Something that guides them through the available tools and helps them achieve their goals. I haven't seen anything like that myself, though maybe it's there and I missed it.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I was familiar with using IBM SPSS Modeler separately in the private sector before that. It's a good tool for extracting data from data warehouses, creating streams, and manipulating logic to extract final data."

"We have integration where you can write third-party apps. This sort of feature opens it up to being able to do anything you want."

"A lot of jobs that are stuck in Excel due to the huge numbers of rows are tackled pretty quickly."

"We have been able to do some predictive modeling with it"

"It continues to be a very flexible platform, so that it handles R and Python and other types of technology. It seems to be growing with additional open-source movement out there on different platforms."

"We are using it either for workforce deployment or to improve our operations."

"It’s definitely scalable, it’s all on the same platform, it’s well integrated. I think the integration is important in terms of scalablility because essentially, having the entire suite helps a lot to scale it"

"It's very easy to use. The drag and drop feature makes it very easy when you are building and testing the streams. That's very useful."

More IBM SPSS Modeler pros

"In Weka, anyone can access the program without being a programmer, which is a good feature since the entry cost is very low."

"The interface is very good, and the algorithms are the very best."

"I mainly use this solution for the regression tree, and for its association rules. I run these two methodologies for Weka."

"It doesn’t cost anything to use the product."

"Working with complicated algorithms in huge datasets is really easy in Weka."

"Weka is a very nice tool, it needs very small requirements. If I want to implement something in Python, I need a lot of memory and space but Weka is very lightweight. Anyone can implement any kind of algorithm, and we can show the results immediately to the client using the one-page feature. The client always wants to know the story. They want the result."

"The path of machine learning in classification and clustering is useful. The GUI can get you results. No programming is needed. No need to write down your script first or send to your model or input your data."

"Weka eliminates the need for coding, allowing you to easily set parameters and complete the majority of the machine learning task with just a few clicks."

More Weka pros

Cons

"I would like better integration into the Weather Company solution. I have raised a couple of concerns about this integration and having more time series capabilities."

"It would be helpful if SPSS supported open-source features, for example, embedding R or Python scripts in SPSS Modeler."

"Requires more development."

"Unstructured data is not appropriate for SPSS Modeler."

"It would be good if IBM added help resources to the interface."

"We have run into a few problems doing some entity matching/analytics."

"It's not as user friendly as it could be."

"Time Series or forecasting needs to be easier. It is a very important feature, and it should be made easier and more automated to use. For instance, for logistic regression, binary or multinomial is used automatically based on the type of the target variable. I wish they can make Time Series easier to use in a similar way."

More IBM SPSS Modeler cons

"I believe is there are a few newer algorithms that are not present in the Weka libraries. Whereas, for example, if I want to have a solution that involves deep learning, so I don't think that Weka has that capability. So in that case I have to use Python for ... predict any algorithms based on deep learning."

"The visualization of Weka is subpar and could improve. Machine learning and visualization do not work well together. For example, we want to know how we can we delete empty cells or how can we fill in the empty cells without cleaning the data system and putting it together."

"The filter section lacks some specific transformation tools. If you want to change a variable from a numeric variable to a categorical variable, you don't have a feature that can enable you to change a variable from a numeric variable to a categorical variable."

"Weka could be more stable."

"If you have one missing value in your dataset and this missing value belongs to a specific attribute and the attribute is a numeric attribute and there is only one missing data, whenever you import this data, the problem is that Weka cannot understand that this is a numeric field. It converts everything into a string, and there is no way to convert the string into numerical math. It's really very complicated."

"Weka is a little complicated and not necessarily suited for users who aren't skilled and experienced in data science."

"Not particularly user friendly."

"A few people said it became slow after a while."

More Weka cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The scalability was kind of limited by our ability to get other people licenses, and that was usually more of a financial constraint. It's expensive, but it's a good tool."

"If you are in a university and the license is free then you can use the tool without any charges, which is good."

"It is a huge increase to time savings."

"It got us a good amount of money with quick and efficient modeling."

"Its price is okay for a company, but for personal use, it is considered somewhat expensive."

"$5,000 annually."

"This tool, being an IBM product, is pretty expensive."

"Having in mind all four tools from Garner’s top quadrant, the pricing of this tool is competitive and it reflects the quality that it offers."

More IBM SPSS Modeler pricing and cost advice

"Currently, I am using an open-source version so I don't know much about the price of this solution."

"The solution is free and open-source."

"We use the free version now. My faculty is very small."

"As far as I know, Weka is a freeware tool, and I am not aware if they have an online solution or if it is a commercial product."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Educational Organization

11%

Government

10%

University

19%

Educational Organization

17%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	32

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	2

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM SPSS Modeler?

Compared to other tools, the product works much easier to analyze data without coding.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM SPSS Modeler?

The government has funds and a budget, it's hard to say if it's expensive or cheap. In Canada, they have a yearly budget. They used to encourage people to use the modeler for development. If ten us...

What needs improvement with IBM SPSS Modeler?

The customer comes to you and says they want to deploy it and make a production out of this, which is very difficult and expensive with IBM SPSS Modeler. With MATLAB, there is no problem. I have a ...

What do you like most about Weka?

It is a stable product.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Weka?

Weka is free and open-source software. That is why I used it over KNIME.

What needs improvement with Weka?

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Product Reports

IBM SPSS Modeler

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Also Known As

SPSS Modeler

No data available

Overview

IBM SPSS Modeler is an extensive predictive analytics platform that is designed to bring predictive intelligence to decisions made by individuals, groups, systems and the enterprise. By providing a range of advanced algorithms and techniques that include text analytics, entity analytics, decision management and optimization, SPSS Modeler can help you consistently make the right decisions from the desktop or within operational systems.

Buy
https://www.ibm.com/products/spss-modeler/pricing

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https://www.ibm.com/account/reg/us-en/signup?formid=urx-19947

IBM

Weka is a collection of machine learning algorithms for data mining tasks. The algorithms can either be applied directly to a dataset or called from your own Java code. Weka contains tools for data pre-processing, classification, regression, clustering, association rules, and visualization. It is also well-suited for developing new machine learning schemes.

Sample Customers

Reisebªro Idealtours GmbH, MedeAnalytics, Afni, Israel Electric Corporation, Nedbank Ltd., DigitalGlobe, Vodafone Hungary, Aegon Hungary, Bureau Veritas, Brammer Group, Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, InSites Consulting, Fortis Turkey

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IBM SPSS Modeler vs. Weka