We performed a comparison between IBM Blueworks Live and Visio based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out in this report how the two Business Process Design solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI."We are you using the product as a process mapping tool and as part of a larger process improvement project. We use it with IBM BPM and IBM ODM. We get an automated workflow solution for our customers, an improved workflow automation."
"The solution is stable. All the refreshes run very well."
"The stability is pretty good. It is highly available, which is key. You don't lose your work and can autosave."
"The reporting that we can generate from IBM Blueworks Live has been interesting. We found the KPIs, risks, process modeling, format, and colors, to be very good. We use the EY template and it is interesting to generate reporting in this format."
"You can use if from your mobile device or you can be on the desktop. It doesn't matter. You are always connected. It is cloud-based, so you don't have to install anything."
"The solution is easy to operate. Also, there is an automatic mode to make the business flow. You don't have to put any lines or arrows in a decision point in IBM Blueworks Live; it's very automatic."
"It enables decisions based upon processes that we do model, and ultimately move forward with."
"The business process discovery is excellent. The diagram or blueprinting functionality of the solution are very good. It's quite easy. You can link the sub-processes and get a big overview of the whole process then."
"The most valuable feature is that it is integrated with other tools in the Microsoft Office suite, as well as at the backend with products like SharePoint and Microsoft Teams."
"It works really well for flowcharting, it can label."
"Visio has improved my workflow by making it easy to create charts, diagrams, and basic illustrations that I can use in my client reports and proposals. It has saved me a lot of time I would otherwise spend creating visuals for clients by hand."
"We are all familiar with it, and it is easy to use. There is a lot of flexibility, and you can add shapes if you want."
"I find the control flow and settings features valuable."
"The diagrams Visio creates are quite impressive in the sense that we can cooperate with more colleagues in one task and see the flow of the process."
"Simple to use and very intuitive."
"The solution is user-friendly."
"Spaces are not well organized; space controls are lacking."
"The APIs are great, except the normal business user doesn't know how to create APIs. So it's hard because IBM comes to us as the business users and tell us to create reporting with APIs, except we don't know that, so we have to turn around and flip it to our IT people."
"In the Blue Works Live software boxes and lines are automatically placed by the programme and can't be easily manipulated."
"In the solution Signavio, they have a customer journey mapping feature that should be added to IBM Blueworks Live. It's valuable to map or document the customer journey to identify the pains and opportunities in this process."
"I can't insert any images. For example, within the process map, if I want to put it in the box or rectangle, or circle. If I have to use one image or icon, that's not possible."
"I wish Blueworks Live had simulations built in, but it doesn't. It also lacks a feature of reporting; ad hoc, drag and drop reporting. A lot of senior people are always asking for reports, and there's no reporting feature within IBM Blueworks."
"Sometimes, the tool is automatic, which can complicate it, but once you're accustomed to manipulating it, you can use it very effectively."
"The ability to create a very structured rule. With the capability that we have right now, Blueworks Live is more process focused. We should be able to enhance it to include a lot more of decisions as well."
"It does not integrate well with other solutions."
"Occasionally, the automation feature that helps you easily add the "next step" goes crazy and it will move a bunch of stuff."
"The price could be better."
"I would like to see better integration with external data sources."
"There are some issues in Visio with the connectors, and it gets tricky when you want to connect objects with each other."
"I would like to see traceability. It doesn't have it. You cannot find one object amongst several sheets of Visio diagrams."
"If you look at ARIS, for example, or Signavio, the flowchart combines all the details and with the click of a button I can create a process manager. That would be something that Visio could add. It would cut my workload in half."
"It's not the easiest software to use. It's not user-friendly out-of-the-box."
IBM Blueworks Live is ranked 12th in Business Process Design with 20 reviews while Visio is ranked 1st in Business Process Design with 101 reviews. IBM Blueworks Live is rated 8.2, while Visio is rated 7.8. The top reviewer of IBM Blueworks Live writes "An easily scalable and affordable solution that enables users to document and digitize processes with ease". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Visio writes "A software for drawing a variety of diagrams which include flowcharts, org charts, building plans, floor plans, data flow diagrams". IBM Blueworks Live is most compared with SAP Signavio Process Manager, Lucidchart, ARIS Cloud, Camunda and Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect, whereas Visio is most compared with Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect, Bizagi, Visual Paradigm, SAP Signavio Process Manager and Lucidchart. See our IBM Blueworks Live vs. Visio report.
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