SAP Business Warehouse vs Snowflake comparison

SAP and Snowflake Computing are both solutions in the Cloud Data Warehouse category. SAP is ranked #14 with an average rating of 7.3, while Snowflake Computing is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.1. SAP holds a 2.3% mindshare in CDW, compared to Snowflake Computing’s 15.9% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of SAP users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Snowflake Computing users who would recommend it.

SAP Business Warehouse

Read 26 SAP Business Warehouse reviews

1,051 Views
610 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

Snowflake

Read 104 Snowflake reviews

9,139 Views
5,758 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

SAP Business Warehouse

Snowflake

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 1, 2026

Snowflake and SAP Business Warehouse are significant players in the data warehousing market. Among the two, Snowflake appears to have a competitive edge due to its scalability and ease of use, although SAP Business Warehouse offers strong integration capabilities with SAP ERP.

Features: Snowflake provides robust scalability, allowing efficient handling of petabytes of data. Its distributed architecture enhances performance by processing large datasets quickly, and it offers flexibility through dynamic node adjustments, supporting multiple file formats for accessibility. SAP Business Warehouse is known for advanced data structuring and seamless integration with SAP ERP, excelling in environments where SAP systems are prevalent.

Room for Improvement: Snowflake could benefit from stronger geo-spatial capabilities and a simpler Snowpipe auto-ingest feature. Users desire a more intuitive command-line tool and greater cost transparency, along with integrated basic analytics for better data visualization. SAP Business Warehouse could enhance its user interfaces, provide more advanced analytics options, and improve integration with additional ETL tools.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Snowflake predominantly serves public and hybrid cloud environments, offering easy deployment and responsive customer support, despite the potential for better SLAs. SAP Business Warehouse is typically used in on-premises and private cloud setups, providing robust support but sometimes lacking in responsiveness and transparency compared to Snowflake.

Pricing and ROI: Snowflake's pricing model is flexible and perceived as cost-effective through pay-as-you-go, though costs can be unpredictable, especially with enterprise features. SAP Business Warehouse generally involves higher initial costs tied to company revenue, making it less attractive to smaller businesses. Snowflake users find potential ROI with efficient usage, while SAP offers value by integrating with existing SAP infrastructures.

To learn more, read our detailed SAP Business Warehouse vs. Snowflake Report (Updated: January 2026).

Buyer's Guide

SAP Business Warehouse vs. Snowflake

January 2026

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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

SAP Business Warehouse

Ranking in Cloud Data Warehouse

14th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Snowflake

Ranking in Cloud Data Warehouse

1st

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

104

Ranking in other categories

Data Warehouse (1st), AI Synthetic Data (2nd), Database Management Systems (DBMS) (7th), AI Software Development (9th)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Cloud Data Warehouse category, the mindshare of SAP Business Warehouse is 2.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Snowflake is 15.9%, down from 22.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Data Warehouse Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Snowflake	15.9%
SAP Business Warehouse	2.3%
Other	81.8%

Cloud Data Warehouse

Featured Reviews

VishnuReddy2

Consulting Enterprise Architect at R2V2.ai

Have encountered complexity with programming language while working on large-scale data integration and have experienced improved governance and reporting

The only complexity I find with the product is the programming language; people find it harder, but once you know the language, it's not that difficult. Regarding the future of SAP Business Warehouse, I would to see added features that simplify the product very well now. They are coming up with a terminology called SAP BDC where they are consolidating their tools, SAP Data Sphere for integration and SAP BW for the ETL and warehousing parts, and SAP Analytics Cloud. They are packaging these three features and calling it Business Data Cloud; they are fully coming on the cloud. We have to wait and watch; they have been speaking about BW/4HANA for quite some time now, but the customers or clients I work with are not finding great interest and it was seen as a candidate for evaluation. I have seen people looking at the latest technologies who are already on cloud who started building from scratch on cloud, such as Snowflake or Databricks, which can process very huge amounts of data and also address unstructured data, where SAP lags behind in cases where there is a need to bring in unstructured data. I have worked with SAP Data Intelligence, which earlier used to be called SAP Data Hub. The unstructured data is not greatly handled in SAP at this point in time.

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SunilPatil1

Asset Builder at Genpact - Headstrong

Have prioritized security while managing multi-agent data migration and cloud adoption

We utilize Time Travel with Snowflake because this is a very useful feature. Everyone finds it crucial because in conventional data platforms, it's very difficult to handle these kinds of things. This feature is essential, though I don't have the use cases currently; it is just there for implementation. Regarding Snowflake's automated scaling and suspension features, this auto-scaling is very significant. We had a comparison with Databricks and Snowflake a few months back, and this auto-scaling takes an edge within Snowflake; that's what our observation reflects.

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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

"The most valuable feature of SAP Business Warehouse is its hybrid functionality, allowing users to leverage both SQL-based data warehouse capabilities from HANA and feature-based data warehousing from BW."

"Out-of-the-box reports are very useful."

"Now, because of the HANA integration, the hard disk and RAM are together, and because of that, the output is very quick and very fast actually."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is the advanced structuring of data capabilities. You can get different structures of data to suit your needs."

"In terms of stability, comparatively, the solution is quite stable."

"Having the integration with the reporting tool which is provided by SAP is great."

"The key element in this solution is its rapid response. If you have a question about prices, buyers, customers, providers, or services, you need the answer in a minute or two. That's the key benefit for us that a solution like BW gives us."

"The warehouse is the solution's most valuable feature."

More SAP Business Warehouse pros

"It was relatively easy to use, and it was easy for people to convert to it."

"Once you have finished your designs they can be easily imported to Snowflake and the information can be readily accessed without an IT expert."

"Snowflake is a database, and it is very good and useful. The most interesting part is that memory management is very good in Snowflake. For a business intelligence project, SQL Server is taking a lot of time for reporting services. There are a lot of calculations, and the reporting time is shown as two minutes, whereas Snowflake is taking just two seconds for the same reporting services."

"It is a very well-distributed system. It has different data engines for different applications. Many applications can use different computational engines at the same time. In terms of data processing, the feeling was similar to working with a relational database but in a scalable way."

"A user-friendly and reliable solution."

"The technical support on offer is excellent."

"For us, the virtual warehousing is likely the most valuable aspect."

"I like the ability to work with a managed service on the cloud and that is easy to start with."

More Snowflake pros

Cons

"SAP Business Warehouse could integrate better with other ETL tools."

"It takes more work to get the data, including reporting on that data, because some coding is required, and a significant level of transformation is needed when using SAP Business Warehouse."

"What I'd like improved in SAP Business Warehouse is its setup. It could be more flexible, and it could be a configuration-based setup."

"More integration with Microsoft Office products (not just Excel) would be helpful."

"The way the data is stored is kind of rigid in SAP BW as a product. It could be more flexible so that when we are designing a solution, we can design our own data structures and try to improve performance."

"In the next release, my suggestion would be to have user-friendly interfaces and performance issues be addressed."

"It's a product that is at the end of life so they will not improve it anymore."

"There is room for improvement from a technical perspective."

More SAP Business Warehouse cons

"The solution could improve the user interface and add functionality to the system."

"Snowflake has support for stored procedures, but it is not that powerful."

"Currently, Snowflake doesn't support unstructured data."

"I would like to see more transparency in data processing, ATLs, and compute areas - which should give more comfort to the end users."

"We would like to be able to do modeling with Snowflake. It should support statistical modeling."

"Improvement is needed in integrating external tools, such as data catalogs, which can be complicated due to differing formats and usage across departments."

"These aren't as crucial, but there are common errors sometimes where the database is down, or a table is nullified and a new table is added and you are not given access to that. With those errors, you don't have permissions."

"There are some challenges with loading unstructured data and integrating some message queues or brokers. In one project, we had a problem connecting to one of the message queues and we had to take a different route altogether on Microsoft Azure."

More Snowflake cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is quite expensive."

"SAP Business Warehouse licensing is a bit expensive compared to other products in the market."

"It's quite pricey. SAP changed its pricing policy, so they give you one engine and then you have to buy everything next to it, like MSS, the BPC licenses, and everything else."

"Overall, the pricing is not fixed and is expensive."

"The licensing cost for SAP Business Warehouse depends on your revenue. Its licensing structure is a little bit complicated. The more your revenue is, the higher the price, but SAP does have different pricing structures for various companies. For small businesses, licensing isn't based on revenue, but for big companies, it's revenue-based. There's some agreement regarding pricing for huge companies, so it's different, and SAP Business Warehouse pricing isn't fixed. On a scale of one to ten, I'm rating the licensing cost for SAP Business Warehouse as five because it's very high. As your revenue grows, your licensing cost also increases, so you have to factor that in when calculating your cost."

"I would not recommend it to small-scale companies. The price is too much."

"It's moderately expensive, but definitely has its branding and price value for it."

"The license for SAP Business Warehouse is paid yearly, and there's no extra cost in addition to the standard licensing fees."

"The price of Snowflake is very reasonable."

"Snowflake has consumption-based costs; users only pay for storage and computing."

"We're based on credits. So, we're paying four and a half dollars of credit. There are no additional costs. I would rate it a two out of five in terms of pricing."

"Comparing Snowflake to on-prem options such as Oracle or SAP, it seemed more cost-effective."

"The product's price range falls between average to a bit expensive range. I think the tool is worth the money if you use it properly."

"Its price should be improved. It should be cheaper than Microsoft."

"Snowflake is cost-effective."

"It's expensive."

More Snowflake pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

11%

Retailer

Marketing Services Firm

Energy/Utilities Company

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	15

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	29
Midsize Enterprise	20
Large Enterprise	58

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SAP Business Warehouse?

Out-of-the-box reports are very useful.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP Business Warehouse?

The pricing for SAP Business Warehouse is on the expensive side. I am not sure about the current costing model as such. In my experience on cloud, I did not use BW HANA Cloud. I used the cloud prod...

See all answers

What needs improvement with SAP Business Warehouse?

See all answers

What do you like most about Snowflake?

The best thing about Snowflake is its flexibility in changing warehouse sizes or computational power.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Snowflake?

It is complicated to understand how requests impact warehouse size. Unlike competitors such as Microsoft and Databricks ( /products/databricks-reviews ), Snowflake lacks transparency in estimating ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Snowflake?

Snowflake is currently stable, but it can be improved further. They have a couple of information schemas that can track account usage. If more connectors were brought in and more visibility feature...

See all answers

Comparisons

Databricks vs SAP Business Warehouse

Compared 17% of the time

BigQuery vs SAP Business Warehouse

Compared 17% of the time

Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics vs SAP Business Warehouse

Compared 12% of the time

SAP BW4HANA vs SAP Business Warehouse

Compared 9% of the time

SAP Business Data Cloud vs SAP Business Warehouse

Compared 8% of the time

More SAP Business Warehouse Competitors

Teradata vs Snowflake

Compared 8% of the time

Microsoft Azure Synapse Analytics vs Snowflake

Compared 7% of the time

Azure Data Factory vs Snowflake

Compared 6% of the time

Amazon Redshift vs Snowflake

Compared 6% of the time

Dremio vs Snowflake

Compared 5% of the time

More Snowflake Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

SAP Business Warehouse

January 2026

Download SAP Business Warehouse product report

Buyer's Guide

Snowflake

January 2026

Download Snowflake product report

Also Known As

No data available

Snowflake Computing, Snowflake Data Cloud

Overview

Reporting, analysis and interpretation of business data are crucial to preserve and enhance the competitive edge of companies by optimizing processes and enabling them to react quickly and in line with market needs. SAP Business Warehouse (SAP BW) provides tools and functions that enable companies to attain these goals. In SAP BW, you can integrate, transform, and consolidate relevant business information from productive SAP applications and external data sources. SAP BW provides you with a high-performance infrastructure that helps you evaluate and interpret data. Decision makers can make well-founded decisions and identify target-orientated activities on the basis of the analyzed data.

SAP

Snowflake provides a modern data warehousing solution with features designed for seamless integration, scalability, and consumption-based pricing. It handles large datasets efficiently, making it a market leader for businesses migrating to the cloud.

Snowflake offers a flexible architecture that separates storage and compute resources, supporting efficient ETL jobs. Known for scalability and ease of use, it features built-in time zone conversion and robust data sharing capabilities. Its enhanced security, performance, and ability to handle semi-structured data are notable. Users suggest improvements in UI, pricing, on-premises integration, and data science functions, while calling for better transaction performance and machine learning capabilities. Users benefit from effective SQL querying, real-time analytics, and sharing options, supporting comprehensive data analysis with tools like Tableau and Power BI.

What are Snowflake's Key Features?

Scalability: Easily adjusts to handle growing data volumes.
Seamless Integration: Works with a wide range of platforms.
Consumption-Based Costs: Pay only for what you use.
Time Travel: Access historical data effortlessly.
Data Sharing: Secure and efficient sharing of datasets.
Time Zone Conversion: Built-in feature for global operations.
Security: Robust measures to protect sensitive information.
Compute and Storage Separation: Independent scaling for optimal performance.

What Benefits Should You Look for?

Cost Efficiency: Optimized pricing models for minimal waste.
Enhanced Performance: Fast queries and processing times.
Flexibility: Handles both structured and semi-structured data.
Analytics Capabilities: Supports advanced data analysis and reporting.

In industries like finance, healthcare, and retail, Snowflake's flexible data warehousing and analytics capabilities facilitate cloud migration, streamline data storage, and allow organizations to consolidate data from multiple sources for advanced insights and AI-driven strategies. Its integration with analytics tools supports comprehensive data analysis and reporting tasks.

Snowflake Computing

Sample Customers

Medtronic, Cirque du Soleil, Antarc, B&G Manufacturing, EarlySense, eBay, Ferrero, James Austin Company, Lenovo, Sagem, RAK Ceramics, Vodafone

Accordant Media, Adobe, Kixeye Inc., Revana, SOASTA, White Ops

Buyer's Guide

SAP Business Warehouse vs. Snowflake

January 2026

Free Report: SAP Business Warehouse vs. Snowflake

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