Oracle Essbase vs Toad for Oracle comparison

Oracle and Quest Software are both solutions in the Database Development and Management category. Oracle is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.1, while Quest Software is ranked #7 with an average rating of 9.0. Oracle holds a 0.9% mindshare in DDM, compared to Quest Software’s 4.3% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Oracle users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Quest Software users who would recommend it.

Oracle Essbase

Read 18 Oracle Essbase reviews

1,850 Views
130 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Toad for Oracle

Read 16 Toad for Oracle reviews

1,065 Views
1,033 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Oracle Essbase

Toad for Oracle

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 23, 2025

Oracle Essbase and Toad for Oracle operate within the data management arena, each specialized in distinct functionalities. Oracle Essbase is more adept at offering advanced analytics through multidimensional data analysis, whereas Toad for Oracle has superior capabilities in database management and query execution, making it preferable for database administrators.

Features: Oracle Essbase delivers powerful multidimensional analysis, detailed forecasting, and flexibility for various analytical models beyond finance, including mathematics and statistics, with a scalable solution that effectively manages significant data volumes. Toad for Oracle stands out for its UI navigation, session management, and PL/SQL debugging capabilities. It provides excellent query tools including session browsers, schema browsers, and performance tuning, all packed into a single software package.

Room for Improvement: Oracle Essbase could enhance its user experience by simplifying setup processes and reducing initial learning curves. Users might benefit from more flexible licensing options. Its complex interface can also be streamlined for easier navigation. Toad for Oracle may improve by offering more intuitive user interfaces and better visualization tools. Enhancements in real-time collaboration features could also be beneficial. Pricing transparency and more extensive documentation might address some user frustrations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Oracle Essbase requires considerable setup and training, which extends deployment time. However, it compensates with comprehensive support options post-deployment. Toad for Oracle, in contrast, boasts a straightforward deployment, benefiting from developer-friendly features and strong support services that facilitate continuous integration and ease initial setup.

Pricing and ROI: Oracle Essbase involves higher initial costs due to its complex implementation but provides substantial long-term analytics value, justifying its higher price by delivering data insights. Toad for Oracle is cost-effective in initial deployments, with a focus on efficient database operations that enhance ROI in maintenance and querying tasks, offering better value in database management scenarios.

To learn more, read our detailed Oracle Essbase vs. Toad for Oracle Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Oracle Essbase vs. Toad for Oracle

July 2025

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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

Oracle Essbase

Ranking in Database Development and Management

11th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Toad for Oracle

Ranking in Database Development and Management

7th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Database Development and Management category, the mindshare of Oracle Essbase is 0.9%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Toad for Oracle is 4.3%, down from 5.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database Development and Management

Featured Reviews

Bhavya N

Senior System Engineer at Infosys

Ensuring efficient data analysis and reporting while identifying areas for calculation and export improvements

The features of Oracle Essbase are valuable, such as its multi-dimensional database used for dynamic calculations and reporting purposes. These features are valuable because they support multi-dimensional data views, allowing users to analyze relationships across various data categories and establish a comprehensive perspective on business operations. Moreover, dynamic calculations allow real-time data analysis, significantly improving the accuracy and depth of financial insights. I have utilized Essbase's data aggregation capabilities. The Oracle Essbase interface provides a good user experience, allowing users to easily navigate and analyze data with fast query performance, effective data visualization tools such as charts, graphs, and tables, and flexibility for customizable analysis and reporting, including the ability to create ad hoc reports. The benefits of the interface include improving productivity and enhancing decision-making.

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Bikramjeet Singh

Senior Reg Reporting Consultant at Bank of America

Advanced query optimization and tuning features

Sometimes when I write a query, it gives an unusual error code. Toad for Oracle does not have a particular resolution within the application. Then, I have to search for the code and find a solution. I would like Oracle to implement error codes so that we don't have to search for solutions on Google. It would be more convenient if the error codes were included within the application.

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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

"Essbase is a kind of backbone, or back end, for systems like Hyperion Planning."

"Essbase is extremely stable and low-maintenance."

"Unlike relational, where you're linking together multiple tables, with Essbase, you basically define what the dimensions are beforehand, and you define the hierarchy, and then load the data. This allows you to do a pretty sophisticated analysis so that you can drill into it and slice and dice the data."

"The solution can handle a large volume of data."

"The solution is stable and reliable."

"Oracle's capability to define custom hierarchies and dimensions has helped my organization in performing nuanced data exploration and advanced modeling because we use Oracle Essbase for dimension definition and also to define the properties of these members, such as dynamic members, stored members, shared members."

"It's a very powerful analytical engine with Essbase as the back end. We can analyze, transform, or utilize a big chunk of data for our calculations."

"It helps us fetch specific data sets per users' requirements."

More Oracle Essbase pros

"Toad for Oracle has proven to be better than other tools since we have never experienced any crashes."

"The tool evaluates non-optimized queries and generates the queries in a way that is more optimal - in addition to giving us some good practices for code development."

"The most valuable feature of Toad for Oracle is the fashion browser and the Schema browser. It is very complete."

"I haven't seen any issues with scalability. We have about 1000 people on our IT team who use the solution."

"I like that it's very flexible and helpful in query accuracy, analysis, and data visualization. I also like the move facilities available in Toad for Oracle. Overall, I think it's a fantastic product for analyzing SQL queries and managing all kinds of queries."

"Toad has a lot of features that are very useful, fast, and well developed."

"Simply the best GUI software for administration is the most valuable aspect for me."

"The most valuable feature is the navigation within the UI, where you can right-click on an object in an SQL query and go right to it, versus going through all of the menus to find what you are looking for."

More Toad for Oracle pros

Cons

"The main concern is that Oracle is ending on-premises server support, so it would be better if there was a cloud platform available for Oracle Essbase."

"There is room for improvement in terms of cost-effectiveness."

"A significant area for improvement in Oracle Essbase is that financial statement analysis, CAPEX and OPEX analysis, and financial consolidation must be done manually, as Oracle Essbase doesn't include the financial consolidation module that is available in EPM."

"The solution could enhance business analytics. I delved into the data using Oracle Essbase to create a new support tool."

"The initial setup is pretty complex."

"It's an expensive product to use."

"The initial setup could be simplified."

"The reporting tool of Essbase needs improvement."

More Oracle Essbase cons

"It would be beneficial if Toad for Oracle could incorporate OEM features, as having monitoring capabilities in the same interface would simplify workload and management tasks."

"Improvement wise, for the user it should show the minimum features on the screen and not all the features. Toad has a lot of features, but most users will use only 5 or 10 based on their role. Nobody needs all the features, and they should provide the option to choose only the required features. Only minimum requirements should be enabled by default. When all the features are shown, the performance is not good; it loads slowly and has hundreds of popups and unnecessary questions."

"I'd like reporting to be more available. If it was a feature that was already installed, more people would take advantage of it."

"There may be an issue with processing limitations but this cannot be confirmed as a problem with the product or with the newest releases."

"Once in a while, I may encounter a memory exception and have to abort the application. On a few occasions, the file that stores the saved connections for the New Connection window will become corrupt and I will lose all of my saved connections. I am not sure if that is a Windows or TOAD issue, but it has happened to all of my developers at some point or another."

"Query optimization is still very resource-intensive."

"Sometimes it works in some areas, but in others, it doesn't. Like when you copy, you find that it's blank and doesn't copy anything. So, there are some objects that do copy, and sometimes they don't."

"There should also be a better "cancel query" option as sometimes one cancels a query, but then it still might run for a long time, and then one has to crash Toad in order to cancel the query."

More Toad for Oracle cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a costly solution."

"Essbase is competitively priced."

"The solution is expensive."

"I believe the licensing is on a monthly base."

"My advice is to try to use the three-year maintenance agreement if possible."

"The product's pricing is just right because if it were slightly higher, it would not have been as widely adopted as it currently is in our organization."

"The professional edition is about $1,000 AUD ($700 USD) and the developer version is about twice that much."

"There are paid and free-for-use versions of the product."

"The pricing is okay, it's reasonable."

"Toad for Oracle has a relatively high cost compared to other similar tools."

"In my opinion, this solution is a little expensive, but I understand that good programs cost more money."

"I would rate it six, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

10%

Insurance Company

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

19%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

11%

Performing Arts

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Essbase?

It's not that expensive, but also not cheap. I'm not sure because it's a private license.

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What needs improvement with Oracle Essbase?

Improvements for Oracle Essbase could be made, as there are many tools available now, such as FCCS, TRCS, and ERCS. I find managing the database difficult, especially regarding optimization and dat...

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What is your primary use case for Oracle Essbase?

I have been using Oracle Essbase for the last thirteen years and I am into this space for thirty years. I am working on the sales-based platform where I work with different clients for GE, Thomson ...

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What do you like most about Toad for Oracle?

The product's most valuable features are UI and monitoring.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Toad for Oracle?

The licensing cost for Toad for Oracle is relatively high, with their license and DPA suite totaling around five thousand dollars.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Toad for Oracle?

It would be beneficial if Toad for Oracle could incorporate OEM features, as having monitoring capabilities in the same interface would simplify workload and management tasks.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Power BI vs Oracle Essbase

Compared 24% of the time

SAP Analytics Cloud vs Oracle Essbase

Compared 11% of the time

SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform vs Oracle Essbase

Compared 10% of the time

IBM Cognos vs Oracle Essbase

Compared 7% of the time

IBM Planning Analytics vs Oracle Essbase

Compared 7% of the time

More Oracle Essbase Competitors

Toad Edge vs Toad for Oracle

Compared 25% of the time

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs Toad for Oracle

Compared 23% of the time

Oracle Enterprise Manager vs Toad for Oracle

Compared 16% of the time

Toad Data Modeler vs Toad for Oracle

Compared 15% of the time

DbVisualizer vs Toad for Oracle

Compared 13% of the time

More Toad for Oracle Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Oracle Essbase

August 2025

Download Oracle Essbase product report

Buyer's Guide

Toad for Oracle

July 2025

Download Toad for Oracle product report

Also Known As

Essbase

No data available

Overview

Oracle Essbase is an OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) Server that provides an environment for deploying pre-packaged applications or developing custom analytic and enterprise performance management applications.

Oracle

With Toad for Oracle, you'll reduce costs and risks by easily ensuring the health and performance of your Oracle Cloud Platform and on-premises databases. ... On the operations side, you can automate administration tasks and proactively manage your databases while embracing performance optimization and risk mitigation.

Quest Software

Sample Customers

CHU de Rennes, Bellco Credit Union, Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd, Deutsche Telekom AG, Samarco MineraÊo S.A., PCCW Ltd., QDQ media S.A.U., Boiron Italia, Specialized Bicycle Components Inc., Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd., Air Canada, Daelim Industrial Co. Ltd.

intel, ebay, uber, mars, microsoft

Buyer's Guide

Oracle Essbase vs. Toad for Oracle

July 2025

Free Report: Oracle Essbase vs. Toad for Oracle

Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Essbase vs. Toad for Oracle and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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