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Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics vs Qlik Compose comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

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

Pentaho Data Integration an...
Ranking in Data Integration
18th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Qlik Compose
Ranking in Data Integration
38th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics is 1.7%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qlik Compose is 1.0%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Integration Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics1.7%
Qlik Compose1.0%
Other97.3%
Data Integration
 

Featured Reviews

Aqeel UR Rehman - PeerSpot reviewer
Transform data efficiently with rich features but there's challenges with large datasets
Currently, I am using Pentaho Data Integration for transforming data and then loading it into different platforms. Sometimes, I use it in conjunction with AWS, particularly S3 and Redshift, to execute the copy command for data processing Pentaho Data Integration is easy to use, especially when…
Sahil Taneja - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy matching and reconciliation of data
The initial setup was easy for the data warehousing concept. But for a person who is new to ETL and warehousing concepts, it may take some time. If someone is familiar with these concepts, they could understand and learn the tool quickly. However, compared to other tools, the UI is complex. It would be helpful to have a better UI and documentation for new users. As of now, there is a challenge in learning the Compose tool for new users altogether. Qlik Compose was deployed on-premises. But the servers, like the SQL servers were maintained on the cloud—the managed instances.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The fact that it's a low-code solution is valuable. It's good for more junior people who may not be as experienced with programming."
"I find the drag and drop feature in Pentaho Data Integration very useful for integration."
"It is easy to use, install, and start working with."
"It makes it pretty simple to do some fairly complicated things. Both I and some of our other BI developers have made stabs at using, for example, SQL Server Integration Services, and we found them a little bit frustrating compared to Data Integration. So, its ease of use is right up there."
"The solution has a free to use community version."
"Lumada has allowed us to interact with our employees more effectively and compensate them properly. One of the cool things is that we use it to generate commissions for our salespeople and bonuses for our warehouse people. It allows us to get information out to them in a timely fashion. We can also see where they're at and how they're doing."
"We can schedule job execution in the BA Server, which is the front-end product we're using right now. That scheduling interface is nice."
"The way it has improved our product is by giving our users the ability to do ad hoc reports, which is very important to our users. We can do predictive analysis on trends coming in for contracts, which is what our product does. The product helps users decide which way to go based on the predictive analysis done by Pentaho. Pentaho is not doing predictions, but reporting on the predictions that our product is doing. This is a big part of our product."
"I like modeling and code generation. It has become a pretty handy tool because of its short ideation to delivery time. From the time you decide you are modeling a data warehouse, and once you finish the modeling, it generates all the code, generates all the tables. All you have to do is tick a few things, and you can produce a fully functional warehouse. I also like that they have added all the features I have asked for over four years."
"Qlik Compose is good enough. It is user-friendly and intuitive."
"It can scale."
"I have found it to be a very good, stable, and strong product."
"It's a stable solution."
"It is a scalable solution."
"One of the most valuable features of this tool is its automation capabilities, allowing us to design the warehouse in an automated manner. Additionally, we can generate Data Lifecycle Policies (DLP) reports and efficiently implement updates and best practices based on proven design patterns."
"The technical support is very good. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten."
 

Cons

"Its basic functionality doesn't need a whole lot of change. There could be some improvement in the consistency of the behavior of different transformation steps. The software did start as open-source and a lot of the fundamental, everyday transformation steps that you use when building ETL jobs were developed by different people. It is not a seamless paradigm. A table input step has a different way of thinking than a data merge step."
"Should provide additional control for the data warehouse"
"While Pentaho Data Integration is very friendly, it is not very useful when there isn't a lot of data to handle."
"I would like to see improvements made for real-time data processing."
"Although it is a low-code solution with a graphical interface, often the error messages that you get are of the type that a developer would be happy with. You get a big stack of red text and Java errors displayed on the screen, and less technical people can get intimidated by that. It can be a bit intimidating to get a wall of red error messages displayed. Other graphical tools that are focused at the power user level provide a much more user-friendly experience in dealing with your exceptions and guiding the user into where they've made the mistake."
"I experience difficulties when handling millions of rows, as the data movement from one source to another becomes challenging."
"Since Hitachi took over, I don't feel that the documentation is as good within the solution. It used to have very good help built right in."
"The product needs more plugins."
"There is some scope for improvement around the documentation, and a better UI would definitely help."
"There should be proper documentation available for the implementation process."
"I believe that visual data flow management and the transformation function should be improved."
"When processing data from certain tables with a large volume of data, we encounter significant delays. For instance, when dealing with around one million records, it typically takes three to four hours. To address this, I aim to implement performance improvements across all tables, ensuring swift processing similar to those that are currently complete within seconds. The performance issue primarily arises when we analyze the inserts and updates from the source, subsequently dropping the table. While new insertions are handled promptly, updates are processed slowly, leading to performance issues. Despite consulting our Qlik vendors, they were unable to pinpoint the exact cause of this occurrence. Consequently, I am seeking ways to optimize performance within Qlik Compose, specifically concerning updates."
"The solution has room for improvement in the ETL. They have an ETL, but when it comes to the monitoring portion, Qlik Compose doesn't provide a feature for monitoring."
"There could be more customization options."
"For more complex work, we are not using Qlik Compose because it cannot handle very high volumes at the moment. It needs the same batching capabilities that other ETL tools have. We can't batch the data into small chunks when transforming large amounts of data. It tries to do everything in one shot and that's where it fails."
"It could enhance its capabilities in the realm of self-service options as currently, it is more suited for individuals with technical proficiency who can create pages using it."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Sometimes we provide the licenses or the customer can procure their own licenses. Previously, we had an enterprise license. Currently, we are on a community license as this is adequate for our needs."
"I mostly used the open-source version. I didn't work with a license."
"There is a good open source option (Community Edition)​."
"We are using the Community Edition. We have been trying to use and sell the Enterprise version, but that hasn't been possible due to the budget required for it."
"When we first started with it, it was much cheaper. It has gone up drastically, especially since Hitachi bought out Pentaho."
"We did a two or three-year deal the last time we did it. As compared to other solutions, at least so far in our experience, it has been very affordable. The licensing is by component. So, you need to make sure you only license the components that you really intend to use. I am not sure if we have relicensed after the Hitachi acquisition, but previously, multi-year renewals resulted in a good discount. I'm not sure if this is still the case. We've had the full suite for a lot of years, and there is just the initial cost. I am not aware of any additional costs."
"You don't need the Enterprise Edition, you can go with the Community Edition. That way you can use it for free and, for free, it's a pretty good tool to use."
"The price of the regular version is not reasonable and it should be lower."
"While they outperform Tableau, there's room for improvement in Qlik's pricing structures, especially for corporate clients like us."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is very expensive, I rate the solution a six."
"The price of the solution is expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise25
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

Which ETL tool would you recommend to populate data from OLTP to OLAP?
Hi Rajneesh, yes here is the feature comparison between the community and enterprise edition : https://www.hitachivantara.com/en-us/pdf/brochure/leverage-open-source-benefits-with-assurance-of-hita...
What do you think can be improved with Hitachi Lumada Data Integrations?
In my opinion, the reporting side of this tool needs serious improvements. In my previous company, we worked with Hitachi Lumada Data Integration and while it does a good job for what it’s worth, ...
What do you use Hitachi Lumada Data Integrations for most frequently?
My company has used this product to transform data from databases, CSV files, and flat files. It really does a good job. We were most satisfied with the results in terms of how many people could us...
Which ETL tool would you recommend to populate data from OLTP to OLAP?
There are two products I know about * TimeXtender : Microsoft based, Transformation logic is quiet good and can easily be extended with T-SQL , Has a semantic layer that generates metat data for cu...
What do you like most about Qlik Compose?
The most valuable is its excellence as a graphical data representation tool and the versatility it offers, especially with drill-down capabilities.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qlik Compose?
While they outperform Tableau, there's room for improvement in Qlik's pricing structures, especially for corporate clients like us.
 

Also Known As

Hitachi Lumada Data Integration, Kettle, Pentaho Data Integration
Compose, Attunity Compose
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

66Controls, Providential Revenue Agency of Ro Negro, NOAA Information Systems, Swiss Real Estate Institute
Poly-Wood
Find out what your peers are saying about Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics vs. Qlik Compose and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
868,759 professionals have used our research since 2012.