Competitive comparison: Power BI vs. Jaspersoft

The enterprise reporting and business intelligence world has seen a couple of legacy vs modern comparisons in recent years. Crystal Reports vs. Jaspersoft is one such face-off. However, one of the newest comparisons to watch is between Jaspersoft and Power BI. 

In this article, we'll compare Jaspersoft and Power BI for reporting and embedded analytics. By the end of it all, you'll have the insight you need to make the best decision for your organization's needs.

Jaspersoft vs Power BI: which tool best serves which audience and why?

While Jaspersoft and Power BI have similar offerings, each tool has unique offerings that have been designed with their specific audience in mind. 

Jaspersoft

Organizations that need pixel-perfect reporting or to integrate seamless, highly tailored reporting into their application environment should consider Jaspersoft. Built on an open-source foundation, their platform offers flexibility and customization. 

Beyond that, it excels in:

• Cost-effective licensing models, particularly where per-user licensing is expensive

• An embedding focus, making it a good choice for software developers and independent software vendors (ISVs) alike

• Robust, ready-to-go deployment and ad hoc reporting capabilities

Power BI

Power BI is a good fit for organizations using Microsoft products and wanting basic business intelligence capabilities. Its interface is user-friendly and it has Excel integration, perfect for users who are just starting out on the business intelligence front. The tool also enables cloud-based collaboration.

However, it must be noted that the opportunity cost of not having what you need — be that flexible report delivery or to-the-pixel customization — could be significant as your data needs grow. If your organization relies on highly formatted, production-grade reports that must be exported exactly as designed, such as invoices or regulatory filings, platforms like Power BI might struggle to meet those precision requirements. 

In the same vein, if you need the agility and freedom to deploy reports anywhere, including on-premises, in the cloud, behind a firewall, or even in white-labeled environments, you’ll find Power BI to be quite limited in scope. And if your business model requires embedding analytics directly into customer-facing applications, the kind of architecture and multi-tenancy support that operation needs might be challenging or expensive to implement with mainstream BI tools. 

Key similarities between Jaspersoft and Power BI

• Data connectivity: The number of data sources these platforms allow users to connect to is, quite frankly, limitless. Businesses can pull from databases to XML and everything in between.

• Reporting and visualization: Both tools have strong reporting and visualization capabilities built in. Turning raw data into meaningful insights is a seamless experience, no matter the tool of choice.

• Data exploration and analysis: Jaspersoft and Power BI both provide potent tools for filtering, analyzing, charting, and visualizing insights hidden deep within databases and silos. 

• Scheduling and distribution: As for users wanting to disseminate reports to specific stakeholders at specific times, both tools can be called upon.

Key differences between Jaspersoft and Power BI

The difference between Jaspersoft and Power BI comes down to four all-important comparison points.

Pixel-perfect reporting

Jaspersoft

For complex reports that require precise replicas of a pre-designed layout, Jaspersoft helps ensure that every element, from text and images to layout and formatting, appears exactly as intended. Their report designer provides fine-grained control over writing scriptlets, defining macros, calling sub-reports, sorting group data, and more. In addition, their software has the ability to export to multiple formats, including PDF, Excel, HTML, RTF, and even XPS, precisely the way you designed it. 

Power BI

While Power BI features easy-to-use visualization tools, it doesn't put as much emphasis on precise layout control. The tool’s best attempt at emulating pixel-perfect reporting is through paginated reports which are optimized for printing. If your organization needs more flexibility in export formats, this limitation might be an obstacle.

Embedded analytics

Jaspersoft

Jaspersoft offers an API first approach that allows for the seamless integration of rich reporting and analytics into host applications. Based on modern REST web services with an HTML5/CSS-driven user interface, developers can further customize the look, feel, and user experience of embedded reports and dashboards.

Add to that multi-tenant support for serving multiple clients from a single instance and flexible deployment options, and you have a genuinely unbeatable embedded BI platform. One that feels refreshingly yours from the get-go.

Power BI

Power BI's embedded analytics capabilities are constantly evolving, but they are still secondary to its core offering. The tool isn't as customizable and flexible as Jaspersoft in terms of control over branding and functionality.

And because the tool’s embedded analytics are deeply integrated within the Microsoft ecosystem, organizations seeking more versatile options will prefer Jaspersoft.

Deployment flexibility

Jaspersoft

Jaspersoft provides flexible deployment options that support cloud, hybrid, on-premise ecosystems, or some combination of all three. No matter the target application environment, Jaspersoft’s architecture-agnostic framework makes embedding reports and analytics a total breeze.

The tool’s extensibility also manifests in containerization support. Jaspersoft integrates with Docker, for instance. The outcome is a level of consistent multi-environment deployment previously thought impossible.

Power BI

In an age where developers constantly look beyond cloud-centric deployment, it's a pity that Power BI is still only cloud-based. This translates to little or no infrastructure scalability for businesses outside the Microsoft universe. 

Besides, Power BI's embedding options are pretty limited. A user has to be a top-tier coder to embed data visualizations successfully. There's no such thing as a low-code/no-code approach. 

Ad-hoc and self-service reporting

Jaspersoft

What Jaspersoft does ever so brilliantly is provide self-service reporting with a degree of flexibility. That means end users can create custom reports on the go without sacrificing pixel-perfect rendering. Businesses that require users to generate dynamic reports within a controlled framework will particularly appreciate this delicate balance of control and customization.

Power BI

Power BI makes up for the lack of control over formatting with fully customizable reporting. While that might appeal to non-technical users, many technical users would prefer a more balanced approach.

Is Jaspersoft a no-brainer alternative to Power BI?

If you are looking for a reporting tool with pixel-perfect reporting and unparalleled flexibility, we believe it's a resounding yes!

Jaspersoft is constantly evolving and innovating, its pixel-perfect reporting capabilities are unlike anything in the industry, and its level of embeddability is unrivaled. Plus, Jaspersoft's deployment options are endlessly flexible, precisely what the modern developer needs.

That said, making a solid choice comes down to four questions: 

1. What's your budget and preferred licensing model? 

2. What's your team's technical expertise? 

3. How vital is embedding analytics in the grand scheme of your reporting goals? 

4. What about integration with existing systems? Is it something you can compromise on? 

Once you’ve gotten honest answers to all these questions, it’ll be much easier to arrive at the right tool for your team. If you're still unsure, consider trying Jaspersoft first before making a conclusive decision. 

Try now free for 30 days to see all our platform offers and decide if Jaspersoft is right for you.

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