Capterra, founded in 1999, offers free resources to help small businesses make the right technology decisions. It connects software buyers with software vendors using customer reviews to help those buyers find and evaluate solutions. Capterra is part of Gartner Digital Markets, which is a business unit within Gartner, a major analyst firm. Gartner also runs the similar Gartner Peer Insights, detailed below.

Planful earns a 4.1 out of 5.0 among the 300+ vendors in the budgeting software category, which includes everything from Quickbooks and niche $9/month offerings to mammoth SAP and Oracle solutions.

G2 is the largest software marketplace and review platform. It ranks software companies and products based on authentic, timely reviews from real users.

In 2024, Planful maintained its G2 badges for being a High Performer among Enterprise customers for the third year in a row. Planful also earned badges for being a Leader, an Enterprise Leader, and a High Performer for Mid-Market Customers. Planful customers have scored our solutions an average of 4.3 out of 5.0.

In addition, Planful ranks highly in G2 categories, including the Enterprise Results Index for Financial Close; Enterprise Grid® Report for Budgeting and Forecasting; Grid® Report for Corporate Performance Management (CPM); Mid-Market Grid® Report for Marketing Resource Management; and the Grid® for Budgeting and Forecasting Software as a leader with a strong market presence.

Gartner Peer Insights solicits ratings and reviews of enterprise technology solutions from end-user professionals. Planful customers have scored our solutions an average of 4.5 out of 5.0 for Financial Planning Software and 4.6 out of 5.0 for Financial Close and Consolidation Solutions.

TrustRadius collects verified, peer-based guidance and research.

Planful has been awarded the TrustRadius “Top Rated” badge annually since 2021. In 2024, Planful received multiple TrustRadius awards, including four Top Rated Awards in Corporate Performance Management, Financial Close, Budgeting & Forecasting, and Financial Planning & Analysis, and a Buyer’s Choice Award. Planful customers have scored our solutions an average of 7.8 out of 10.

Planful also received a Most Loved badge for reviewers’ high usage of the word “love” in reviews. Reviewers noted Planful’s workforce planning capabilities, support services, and the platform’s flexibility and accessibility.

European analyst firm BARC uses extensive research to help companies worldwide select the right software solutions that align with business goals. Its reports offer insights into market developments and share proven best-practice advice for businesses embarking on a software evaluation project. To be included in the firm’s research, vendors must meet a minimum license and maintenance revenue threshold (€20 million for Financial Performance Management, undefined for Integrated Planning & Analytics). The vendor’s geographical distribution and reach are also taken into account.

In 2024, Planful was listed as a Challenger in two BARC reports: Integrated Planning & Analytics and Financial Performance Management. Challengers are either established vendors entering new markets, smaller innovators, or companies disrupting markets with new approaches. The BARC reports highlight Planful’s business-user-oriented platform, integrated financial performance management functionality, flexibility for companies of all sizes and industries, and high level of customer satisfaction.

BPM Partners is focused exclusively on business performance management (BPM) solutions, which it defines as budgeting, consolidation, financial reporting, and more. BPM publishes a Vendor Landscape Matrix based on interviews with a vendor’s existing customers. The questions drill down on 15 key product attributes, and the output of these interviews forms the basis of the Vendor Landscape Matrix. The matrix provides a vendor ranking to help companies choose the best solution for their needs.

In 2024, Planful achieved an “Outstanding” BPM Pulse Rating based on overall customer satisfaction. BPM lists Planful’s core strengths as intuitive, quick implementation, and integrated business planning. Planful also remains a BPM Core Vendor in 2024. Core Vendors are selected annually based on their depth and breadth of functionality and demonstrated market and customer success.

BPM also joined with BARC for a new survey-based report, “Global CPM Priorities and Trends for 2025.”

Read BPM’s 2024-2025 Vendor Landscape Matrix for Performance Management Solutions.

Constellation Research looks at technology solutions that help companies achieve their digital transformation goals. The prestigious Constellation ShortList for Cloud-Based Planning Platforms identifies the top vendors based on technology investment, use cases, strategic vision, customer value, executive leadership, and price. The firm talks to a vendor’s customers and partners all year long and then develops its own research methodology to identify the six leading vendors.

Constellation Research’s analysis is a helpful tool for early technology adopters. Constellation Research puts vendors on its ShortList to support buyers. In 2024, Planful has been on the Constellation ShortList™ 12 consecutive times.

Dresner Advisory Services focuses on data, analytics, and performance management solutions. Each year, it releases a flagship report, Wisdom of Crowds®, that is 100% based on customer input across 33 criteria.

In 2024, Planful was named an Overall Leader in Enterprise Performance Management based on ratings in the Customer Experience and Vendor Credibility models in Dresner Advisory’s flagship Wisdom of Crowds® market study. It’s the ninth consecutive year Planful has achieved that distinction. Planful was also named a Credibility Leader quadrant of the Enterprise Performance Management Vendor Credibility Model. Both are in Dresner Advisory’s flagship Wisdom of Crowds® market study.

Planful has been ranked #4 out of 17 vendors in the latest 2024 Sales Performance Management Market Study by Dresner. This study covers sales planning, analysis, and execution. Planful is considered a Top Vendor in this study and is described by Dresner as “best in class for understanding customer business/needs, sales responsiveness, business practices, reliability of technology, and ease of administration.” Planful also maintains a perfect recommended score.

Forrester is one of the most recognizable analyst firms globally. Its proprietary research relies on annual surveys of business and technology leaders, who then look to its Forrester Wave™ evaluations to guide decisions that provide a growth path. Planful falls under Forrester’s Digital Operations Planning & Analytics Wave (gated), which uses a “22-criterion evaluation” of solution providers to identify the most significant ones and show how technology professionals can select the right one for their needs.

For Q4 2023, Planful is positioned as a “strong performer,” with Forrester highlighting our expansion into more business and financial planning areas, strong capabilities across crucial planning areas, and easy “innovation consumption and collaboration.” The firm also pointed out that reference customers were happy with our solution’s flexibility and simplicity, that our solution stands out with its purpose-built tools to jump-start key planning initiatives, and that we continue investing in AI.

Read Forrester’s 2023 Digital Operations Planning & Analytics Wave.

Gartner provides many types of advice across a wide range of topics for “enterprise leaders,” primarily at large, global enterprises—the firm’s client list includes 73% of the Global 500. It publishes hundreds of reports and guides each year, with Magic Quadrants as its flagship reports. Each Magic Quadrant evaluates vendors on many factors, but they all roll up to the intersection of Completeness of Vision and Ability to Execute. Magic Quadrants are now accompanied by another document outlining how each vendor compares on a set of pre-defined Critical Capabilities.

In 2023, Planful was named a “Visionary” listed in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant, in addition to being listed as a Strong Performer. Gartner noted Planful’s “innovative” Budget Manager Experience and strengths of workflow automation, user adoption, and customer experience. Planful was also listed as a Challenger in the Magic Quadrant for Financial Close and Consolidation Solutions. Gartner noted Planful’s prebuilt support for 160 currencies and strengths of data integration, innovation, and implementation support.

Gartner also recently published two helpful reports related to AI in the Office of the CFO. “How Leading Finance Organizations Achieve AI Success” and “What Are CFOs’ Main Methods of Acquiring AI?” are available here.

In 2024, Gartner published its report, Voice of the Customer for Financial Planning Software. Planful was placed as a Strong Performer, winning a “willingness to recommend” rating of 95% overall from surveyed customers. Planful was also included in Gartner’s 2024 XP&A Market Guide, which noted Planful Predict’s machine learning capability and Planful’s hundreds of pre-built integrations with popular enterprise applications and a diverse array of partners.

In late 2024, Gartner also published its Magic Quadrant for Financial Planning Software, which lists Planful as a “Visionary” and noted our innovative use of AI and automation, that our Solution Hub increases time to value, and how our product development is aligned with market and customer needs.

IDC, founded in 1964, is one of the oldest analysts covering technology, having been launched in the days of RCA, Univac, and Xerox. Today, the firm offers expertise on technology and industry trends to help organizations and investors make fact-based technology decisions. It’s also known for its market-sizing analysis, particularly the IDC MarketScape models designed to provide an overview of the suppliers in a given market.

For 2022, Planful was named a Major Player in the Worldwide Enterprise Planning, Budgeting, and Forecasting Applications MarketScape, which noted Planful’s strong workforce planning capabilities, ability for Finance to own the entire implementation without IT support, favorable cost, and strong reporting capabilities.

For 2024, Planful was named a Leader in IDC’s Worldwide Enterprise Planning, Budgeting, and Forecasting Applications for Midmarket Organizations MarketScape, which noted Planful’s strengths as “more than just record-to-report capabilities,” price, and reporting and dashboards. Planful was also named a Major Player in IDC’s Worldwide Office of the CFO Record to Report 2024 MarketScape, which noted Planful’s strengths as a scalable platform, ease of use, and Microsoft 365 integration called Planful Spotlight.

Nucleus Research uncovers how technology drives ROI. Its Value Matrix specifically assesses software vendors using customer feedback to rate solutions on usability and functionality. The usability angle helps you understand how quickly solutions will be adopted by your teams, and the ROI angle puts a heavy weight on tangible benefits.

In 2024, Planful was named an Accelerator in the 2024 Nucleus CPM Value Matrix.

Ventana was recently acquired by Information Services Group (ISG). That combination makes ISG a formidable global research firm offering market coverage, analyst insights, advisor perspectives, and more. For CFOs, this will expand and add capabilities to the benchmarks, market perspectives, insights, and Value Index reports already published by Ventana.

Planful falls under Ventana’s Business Planning category, which looks at “technology such as in-memory computing, advanced analytic technologies, and interactive planning” and has a particular focus on budgeting. It’s a wide-ranging market perspective that leans towards large, all-in-one enterprise platforms that combine ERP, CRM, HR, Sourcing, Supply Chain, and other comprehensive modules. SAP, IBM, Oracle, and other large, centralized, enterprise-focused vendors stand out in this report.

Ventana’s most recent coverage of Planful provides the firm’s perspectives on our Planful: Predict suite of AI tools, among other innovations. Predict puts us years ahead of our competitors, with Ventana’s Robert Kugel, Executive Director, Business Research, saying that “by 2026, almost all vendors of planning and budgeting software will incorporate AI.” In a press release, Kugel added: “Planful’s approach, in providing these [AI] capabilities natively within a business-owned platform, has the potential to bring deeper levels of insight to financial processes.”

In another recent analysis, Ventana says that “midsize organizations that are thinking about adopting a planning platform consider Planful for that role, especially if they wish to make their marketing budgets more effective.”