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OpenText Professional Performance Engineering (LoadRunner Professional) vs SmartBear LoadNinja comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 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

OpenText Professional Perfo...
Ranking in Performance Testing Tools
2nd
Ranking in Load Testing Tools
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
82
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SmartBear LoadNinja
Ranking in Performance Testing Tools
15th
Ranking in Load Testing Tools
11th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Performance Testing Tools category, the mindshare of OpenText Professional Performance Engineering (LoadRunner Professional) is 15.3%, up from 14.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SmartBear LoadNinja is 2.3%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Performance Testing Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
OpenText Professional Performance Engineering (LoadRunner Professional)15.3%
SmartBear LoadNinja2.3%
Other82.4%
Performance Testing Tools
 

Featured Reviews

SR
Assistant Director at Synapxe
Has enabled my team to identify bottlenecks effectively and deliver reliable performance analysis across projects
I have mentioned many advantages about this product, but to discuss disadvantages or areas that could be improved, I would need to consult with my engineers who are working on it. So far I have not heard of any significant issues. I can gather specific improvement suggestions from my architect and provide that information later.
Kapil Tarka - PeerSpot reviewer
Test Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Easy to use with good documentation and helpful support
It's a new tool when I compare it with LoadViewer and HP LoadRunner. It needs time to mature. For example, it needs to improve concurrency. When you run a test suite, your scripts will generate some test data. If we are running a banking application and then we are running a full end-to-end suite, there are many actions that need testing. There's a lot of data getting generated. There should be a variable that we can store for later in our later test cases. We need data management and dynamic data generation to be able to capture the data which is generated.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I would recommend Micro Focus LoadRunner Professional above all other testing tools."
"It is actually a very good tool because it will support almost all, if not all, industry-standard protocols, and it is also equipped with very nice reporting capabilities, which is why I like it."
"The analysis capability is simply best of breed as it allows you to take data from any source and correlate it with your results."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to create performance test cases quickly and then execute them, and it provides a lot of powerful features to do that very efficiently and effectively."
"The implementation was very straightforward and not an issue."
"My favorite feature in LoadRunner Professional is its ability to group scripts under separate IDs."
"It has good protocol coverage."
"We don't find any features lacking. One of the most beneficial points we have from LoadRunner is we start sizing our infrastructure accordingly. So what we do is when we deploy a new workload, we do performance testing."
"SmartBear LoadNinja is easy to use and implement."
"The most powerful aspect is the ease of use."
"It's a very simple tool for performance testing."
"But for now, we are happy with what have been using."
"We are happy with the technical support."
 

Cons

"Customer Service: Very poor Technical Support: Strictly ok"
"Instead of having too many graphs and tabs, use the analysis section to get a more simplified defect analysis."
"Compared to some other vendors, there is a lack of community support."
"HP as a company has been slow to move to support modern technologies e.g. Oracle ADF."
"Technical support needs to be faster, and the pricing should be more competitive."
"I would rate it 6 out of 10, because LoadRunner is a vast thing, starting from those scenarios and then getting more into users, putting more points, correlation, load testing, and benchmarking."
"Complexity. LoadRunner is not simple to learn by installing it and "doing it"."
"Sometimes, we aren't able to see an accurate page view while replying and executing the script. When you are navigating the application side by side, it needs to be displayed on a random viewer. Sometimes we will get a few applications, and we won't get others."
"Certainly, the cost could be reduced. It requires attention. Clients have expressed dissatisfaction with the price."
"On a smaller scale, there will be no budget issues, but as we expand to a larger user base, I believe we will face some pricing challenges."
"It needs time to mature."
"As we ran the test, we couldn't see the real-time results of how the solution behaved for 200 to 400 virtual users."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"LoadRunner Professional's licensing costs are on the higher side, apart from the Community Edition."
"The fee for LoadRunner Professional is very high - about US$500 per user."
"The pricing model and the software licensing model could be better."
"It is a high-cost investment, particularly for companies with small budgets or limited testing needs."
"There is an annual license required to use Micro Focus LoadRunner Professional. There are not any additional costs other than the licensing fees to use it."
"The pricing model, especially when involving partners, could use some improvement."
"Pricing depends on our choices because it depends on what type of protocol we are getting, what type of licensing we are getting, and what kind of relationships we have with HP and Micro Focus."
"OpenText LoadRunner Enterprise's pricing is reasonable."
"Certainly, the cost could be reduced."
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Comparison Review

it_user104961 - PeerSpot reviewer
Penetration and Neoload Tester at a university with 501-1,000 employees
Apr 13, 2014
LoadRunner vs NeoLoad
The six phases of an IT project Enthusiasm Disillusionment Panic Search for the guilty Punishment of the innocent (the performance tester) Praise and rewards for the incompetent non-participants This article has been put together as part of an evaluation of the performance test tools NeoLoad and…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Construction Company
10%
University
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise67
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Micro Focus LoadRunner Professional?
I have mentioned many advantages about this product, but to discuss disadvantages or areas that could be improved, I would need to consult with my engineers who are working on it. So far I have not...
What is your primary use case for Micro Focus LoadRunner Professional?
I work only with the performance testing tools and not with OpenText Professional Performance Engineering (LoadRunner Professional) for mobile and web applications. With performance testing, I am t...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

Micro Focus LoadRunner Professional, Micro Focus LoadRunner, HPE LoadRunner, LoadRunner
SmartBear LoadComplete
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

JetBlue, GOME, Australian Red Cross Blood Service, RMIT University, Virgin Media
Falafel Software
Find out what your peers are saying about OpenText Professional Performance Engineering (LoadRunner Professional) vs. SmartBear LoadNinja and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.