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Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics vs SAS Data Integration Server comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 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

Pentaho Data Integration an...
Ranking in Data Integration
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
61
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SAS Data Integration Server
Ranking in Data Integration
43rd
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics is 1.9%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAS Data Integration Server is 0.9%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Integration Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics1.9%
SAS Data Integration Server0.9%
Other97.2%
Data Integration
 

Featured Reviews

Michelle Lawson - PeerSpot reviewer
Principal Software Engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Streamlines complex data workflows and has supported automated customer payment notifications
I haven't used Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics in a couple of years, so I don't know how it can be improved. I was pretty pleased with it and was self-taught on it, working a lot with their team at various times, but they were surprised that I was able to learn it all by myself. The documentation is not bad, and documentation is the main thing that any product can do to make themselves better because the easier it is to find examples of what you're trying to do improves the learning curve. I think it took me the longest to learn how to do the asynchronous processing and have things wait for other things to finish processing before continuing on in the workflow. I choose 8 out of 10 because the one reason that it's been rejected at T-Mobile is that everything has to go through a provisioning process and has to get approved, meaning the actual code base has to be investigated by T-Mobile before they'll allow us to use tools of that nature. For whatever reason, we just haven't been able to get that approval; I don't know if it's on Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics' side or if it's on our side. The more you can make it easier for companies to feel comfortable that your product is secure, robustly tested and bug-free, and free of any other kind of negative hacks, the more quickly it will get accepted.
NN
Works at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Offloads processes on the server side but needs better installation syntax
One area for improvement is the installation process. Another point could be the syntax, as it sometimes involves using syntax names that are not intuitive. For example, to calculate the difference between two dates, the general syntax in SAS is called the data difference or data net function. However, another name is used, such as NF and INK. Without knowledge of SAS programming, it becomes unclear what these functions mean. It is not good to define function names this way.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its drag-and-drop interface lets me and my team implement all the solutions that we need in our company very quickly. It's a very good tool for that."
"Using the solution we were able to reduce our ETL deployment time by between 10 and 20 percent, and when it comes to personnel costs, we have gained 10 percent."
"Pentaho Kettle has a very intuitive and easy to use graphical user interface (GUI) and it is possible to understand how to develop an ETL solution even when using it for the first time."
"It's my understanding that the product can scale."
"One of the most valuable features is the ability to create many API integrations. I'm always working with advertising agents and using Facebook and Instagram to do campaigns. We use Pentaho to get the results from these campaigns and to create dashboards to analyze the results."
"The amount of data that it loads and processes is good."
"It allows for rapid prototyping of a wide array of ETL workloads."
"My advice for anybody who is considering this product is if they're looking for any kind of custom transformation, or they're gleaning data from multiple sources and sending it to multiple destinations, I definitely recommend this tool."
"The solution is very stable."
"The solution offers very good data manipulation and loading."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its amazing capabilities in regard to data handling."
"A key feature allows us to enhance job performance by offloading processing to the server side, rather than processing on the server itself."
 

Cons

"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."
"In terms of our decision to purchase Hitachi's product services or solutions, our satisfaction level is average or on balance."
"The support from Hitachi is not the greatest, the fixing of bugs can take a really long time."
"I would like to see improvements made for real-time data processing."
"The only complaint that I have with Pentaho has been with scaling."
"In the community version the scheduling tool is not good, and we had to build it ourselves."
"The web interface is rusty, and the biggest problem with Pentaho is debugging and troubleshooting. It isn't easy to build the pipeline incrementally. At least in our case, it's hard to find a way to execute step by step in the debugging mode."
"Communicating with the vendor is challenging, and this hinders its performance in free tool setups."
"One area for improvement is the installation process."
"The initial setup of SAS Data Integration Server was complex."
"So I would like to see improved integration with other software."
"The transform tool has limited access. They should make it more flexible."
"Something that could improve is writing SQL to integration studio because it is not that straightforward. There should be better integration with other software."
"The initial setup had issues, and even after using it for about one year, it was still not fixed."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I believe the pricing of the solution is more affordable than the competitors"
"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."
"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."
"There was a cost analysis done and Pentaho did favorably in terms of cost."
"The solution reduced our ETL development time by a lot because a whole project used to take about a month to get done previously. After having Lumada, it took just a week. For a big company in Brazil, it saves a team at least $10,000 a month."
"There is a good open source option (Community Edition)​."
"It does seem a bit expensive compared to the serverless product offering. Tools, such as Server Integration Services, are "almost" free with a database engine. It is comparable to products like Alteryx, which is also very expensive."
"The cost of these types of solutions are expensive. So, we really appreciate what we get for our money. Though, we don't think of the solution as a top-of-the-line solution or anything like that."
"It is an expensive program."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Construction Company
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Comms Service Provider
17%
Construction Company
13%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise32
No data available
 

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...
What needs improvement with SAS Data Integration Server?
One area for improvement is the installation process. Another point could be the syntax, as it sometimes involves using syntax names that are not intuitive. For example, to calculate the difference...
What is your primary use case for SAS Data Integration Server?
I am involved in the ETR job. My role is focused on executing the ETR job.
What advice do you have for others considering SAS Data Integration Server?
I use it without further details. For example, if I use SAS to connect to a NetEazt database or purchase a shared asset to ODBC, I can connect to any database with ODBC connection support. The over...
 

Also Known As

Hitachi Lumada Data Integration, Kettle, Pentaho Data Integration
SAS Enterprise Data Integration Server, Enterprise Data Integration Server
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

66Controls, Providential Revenue Agency of Ro Negro, NOAA Information Systems, Swiss Real Estate Institute
Credit Guarantee Corporation, Cr_dito y Cauci‹n, Delaware State Police, Deutsche Lufthansa, Directorate of Economics and Statistics, DSM, Livzon Pharmaceutical Group, Los Angeles County, Miami Herald Media Company, Netherlands Enterprise Agency, New Zealand Ministry of Health, Nippon Paper, West Midlands Police, XS Inc., Zenith Insurance
Find out what your peers are saying about Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics vs. SAS Data Integration Server and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.