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Qualitative Analysis Software?

reddit.com › r › PhD › comments › recif4 › qualitative_analysis_software

I used NVivo for my dissertation and I liked it. You might just want to go with whatever the software catalogue at your school offers for free/cheapest, if any. I liked NVivo and I also used their online transcription service which was pretty affordable and accurate. Answer from Striking_Menu9765 on reddit.com

reddit.com › r/phd › qualitative analysis software?

r/PhD on Reddit: Qualitative Analysis Software?

June 27, 2021 -

Does anyone have any thoughts between NVIVO, Tableau, and MAXQDA? I need it to do thematic analysis on some interviews/transcripts.

I am just starting to use NVIVO for my qualitative analysis of video recording transcripts. I really like it so far! Haven't used the others at all so can't compare them.

I used NVivo for my dissertation and I liked it. You might just want to go with whatever the software catalogue at your school offers for free/cheapest, if any. I liked NVivo and I also used their online transcription service which was pretty affordable and accurate.

reddit.com › r/gradschool › best software for qualitative data analysis?

r/GradSchool on Reddit: best software for qualitative data analysis?

May 22, 2019 -

hello, everybody!

I am looking for the best option for data compiling on my PhD thesis. My uni is holding a training on MAXQDA and it looks like a user and budget friendly software. Some reddit posts I've seen suggested Nvivo as well. I've seen some others, like atlas.ti and endnote and I wonder which one is the best.

Looking for: discourse analysis and qualitative analysis, mostly.

I would look at R and see if there are libraries to do what you want. Very powerful skill that you can take anywhere. The learning curve is steep, if you don't know any other programming languages, expect a 3-6 month beginner phase. Tons of resources online though, you will not get stuck.

I have used MAXQDA for three different studies and it is great. There are lots of functionalities and features that really help the user and the audience to see what you did. Check out their visualization tools!

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reddit.com › r/gradschool › preferred qualitative analysis software

r/GradSchool on Reddit: Preferred qualitative analysis software

June 28, 2025 -

Hi folks!

What are your recommendations for qualitative analysis software? I’ve heard good things about Nvivo and MAXQDA. If there is an open source version, that would be ideal, but I’m open to suggestions!

Im Doing QA for the first time. Im using Nvivo and it's kind of ass if you need to manage a lot of codes. I can see it being good for smaller datasets though. Its like mildly more useful than just doing coding by hand imo. I'm stuck using it for now but im disappointed that ut doesn't have some features I'd expect to be essential (like a simple hover to see the code!). Be sure to set up the back ups. Also it crashes with some queries.

I use nvivo but it’s mid.

reddit.com › r/professors › qualitative software suggestions

r/Professors on Reddit: Qualitative software suggestions

April 18, 2019 -

Hi all,

I’m curious as to which qualitative software you think is best for text analysis of legal documents, newspaper article and other large, policy-related documents. I have previous experience using NVIVO but I’m worried about it slowing down due to the size of the different (and many) documents I’ll be analyzing. Thoughts on MaxQDA? Others?

Also- open to any suggestions on text- analysis workshops that you recommend.

Thanks!!

I am a qualitative scholar that uses/has used NVivo, Dedoose, MAXQDA, and Atlas. I think which software you use is entirely dependent on what you want to do with it. Are you wanting the software to do the analysis for you (word counts/ word frequency / word proximity)? Are you wanting to code the data (themes, open coding, etc.)? I would say that I used NVivo for several recent projects that included organizational documents, video, audio, and transcripts. It worked well to code everything. I used Dedoose for my dissertation which was great as my advisor took a job across the country during my final year and is web based (the UI for Dedoose is awful though).

If used maxqda on document and image analysis. I find it much easier to used than nvivo. I've never messed with Atlas, so I can't speak to that and I don't really care for the UI of Dedoose.

reddit.com › r/gradschool › auto coding in nvivo or maxqda

r/GradSchool on Reddit: Auto Coding in Nvivo or MaxQDA

November 29, 2021 -

For those of you familiar with NVivo or MaxQDA, is there a way to auto code specific sections of PDFs? For example, I want to only auto code the "Material & Methods" sections of a bunch of articles.

(I'm new to using both of these programs)

You could do a lexical search (Analysis > Lexical Search) for keywords that would hit what you're interested in and auto code from there--though that would necessitate standard formatting/headings in the articles you are using. Program your hot keys to speed up your code assignment if auto coding doesn't work. Hope this helps you out.

reddit.com › r/phd › best software for qualitative research - on a budget

r/PhD on Reddit: Best Software for Qualitative Research - On a budget

March 12, 2024 -

Looking to analyze 100 interviews. I know I need a software to organize all this information. I am not with a University but this is a very dense project... Any folks have recommendations? I don't think my boss wants to pay more than $50 for two people a month
I am looking to be able to collaborate with another person to both analyze the codes as well.

100 is a huge (and imo unnecessary) sample size for in-depth interviews. 30-50 is closer to normal, and if you have to hand code them, you can. The software (Atlas.ti; QDAMiner etc) will be prohibitively expensive. The only reason to do interviews is because you are after depth of information; if you want to generalize to a population you need to do a survey using random sampling. Doing more interviews will not make your findings more valid, nor will it make them generalizable. There is research showing that generally after 30 interviews you're just hearing the same kinds of things from different people. Source: https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1525/aa.1986.88.2.02a00020

NVIVO and MAXQDA are the cheaper ones I've seen, and the ones that the qualitative peeps (all 4 of us) in my department use. There's also another one (Dedoose I think?) that was recommended to me by my mentor.

reddit.com › r/dataanalysis › qualitative data analysis programs

r/dataanalysis on Reddit: Qualitative data analysis programs

July 21, 2023 -

I’m looking for help choosing the right QDA program for a social science project. Cost is no issue.

The program needs to allow 30+ people to collaborate (not all simultaneously) without crashing or losing data. The data will be many text files (mostly news articles and court documents, but some handwritten docs too) for each case. Each case could have, say, 100-200 text files associated with it. Some of these will be lengthy PDFs. There could be up to 200 cases for the project. It’s important that the program be able to handle thousands of pages of text data, and that we have the ability to code hundreds of variables.

Ability to incorporate multimedia files would be a bonus, but not a dealbreaker. Same goes for statistical analysis and visualization.

Does this sound like a project that NVivo, ATLAS.ti, or MAXQDA could handle well? Is there another program that might be better? Suggestions are appreciated!

Which option did you end up going with? And how has it worked out? I'm looking into these options as well for my master's thesis.

Hi there! I'm on the NVivo team. NVivo has the capabilities you are looking for and can support multimedia files. Would love to offer you a demo of NVivo and discuss how we can assist with your research. Feel free to DM.

reddit.com › r/sociology › good alternatives to nvivo?

r/sociology on Reddit: Good alternatives to nVivo?

July 6, 2022 -

I've been using nVivo a few years and am tired of the difficulty in collaborating with co-authors and just the general lack of quality. Wondering, especially from people who have used nVivo, if you have found a better alternative. I am a Ph.D. student in social science and primarily want simple coding of interview transcripts. If anything can easily include social media then that's a bonus but not required. Thank you!

I switched from NVivo to MaxQDA during my dissertation. I felt like it was more intuitive, coding was simpler, and was easier to see emergent themes because of their "activation" feature. However, I don't know anyone else who uses it, so collaboration isn't really an option. I know a few people who used Dedoose. It's an online platform. Rather than paying one large upfront cost like most options, this one charges a small monthly fee, and only during the months that you actively use it. I think it's much easier to use for collaboration, because you just share links/projects online vs. sending files and hoping the platforms are compatible. You could also check out QDAminer lite, a free version of their more robust software. I've played around with it, but never really used it. It will do the basics for you and it's free. Like I said, my favorite is MaxQDA, but cost and maybe difficulty collaborating might be deal breakers for you.

Dedoose was an affordable option and web-based. Haven't used it in a few years though.

Find elsewhere

Google Bing Mojeek

reddit.com › r/uxresearch › qualitative software

r/UXResearch on Reddit: Qualitative Software

July 7, 2022 -

Hello! What is some of the most commonly used qualitative software? I’m currently learning Atlas.ti during my internship, I was wonder what are some of the others you use in your workplace. Thanks!

Most of the UXR that I've seen in industry hasn't leveraged qualitative coding software. It tends to be overkill and the overhead can slow you down with little ROI. In academia nVivo, Maxqda, and Atlas.ti tend to be the pretty common (there are also some open-source options that are great if you know R). There are some more lightweight tools that are starting to get some traction in industry, but some are coupled with other things (e.g., research repository, data collection, creating video highlight reels). Check out Maze, Dovetail, Reduct, Quantilope, and Delve. There seem to be a lot of startups in this general space, so new tools seem to be popping up all the time! For a lot of projects, sticky notes (either real or virtual on Mural/Maze/Figjam/etc.) will be more than enough ( scroll down on this article to get a sense of how it works ). Unless you are doing a massive project (e.g., 6 segments and +10 participants per segment), you probably don't need all the bells and whistles.

I really like Taguette

reddit.com › r › AskAnthropology › comments › xf245r › best_software_to_learn

Reddit - The heart of the internet

December 18, 2021 - MAXQDA: for qualitative and mixed methods research · NVivo: for qualitative research · I have some questions about your recommendations pertaining to each and any of these. Which of these software do you think is the most user-friendly? Which of these software do you think best prepare you for work either in or outside of academia?

reddit.com › r/phd › i hate nvivo, i just hate it

r/PhD on Reddit: I hate NVIVO, I just hate it

September 1, 2022 -

I have no idea how can someone create such a program with this amount of bugs. it is really impressive and fascinating how they managed to make such horrible software with this many bugs and issues. ANYTHING I DO, ANYTHING makes it crash, from modifying the text to creating simple codes, it keeps loading forever and then crashes. I hate your software and you the developers should be ashamed of it.

FUCK YOU NVIVO

If there's something i learnt between the master's and currently the PhD is that data analysis is way easier done coding. Sadly, most people are never properly introduced to computers.

I don't know what NVIVO is, but I throughly enjoyed your post. Funny shit. You got good storytelling ability.

researchgate.net › post › Nvivo_vs_Maxqda

Nvivo vs Maxqda? | ResearchGate

https://www.researchgate.net/post/which_software_is_known_to_be_the_best_for_analyzing_the_qualitative_data

Thank you so much Jaydip Datta. I did not see that discussion..

reddit.com › r/askacademia › qualitative software

r/AskAcademia on Reddit: Qualitative software

November 10, 2020 -

Hi all!

Wondering if there is any advice on qualitative software analysis. I am an Apple user and not sure if I should use MAXQDA or NVivo!

HELP!!

I love LOVE MAXQDA. I have no experience with the other software you mentioned however. I am also a Apple user and have not encountered any issues with running MAXQDA on my MacBook. Hope this helps!

NVivo is pretty shitty on Mac (lose some functions that has on Windows) If you have the option, I'd go something else.

reddit.com › r/sociology › nvivo or dedoose?

r/sociology on Reddit: NVivo or Dedoose?

March 5, 2025 -

I just passed my dissertation proposal defense and my committee recommended I use one of these two qualitative data analysis software. What are the pros and cons of each?

If the scope of my project affects your answer, my data will include: 25 interviews of 1-2 hours each and content analysis of roughly 1000 pages of court documents. I will not be coding by keywords, but rather doing line-by-line coding using a thematic approach.

I am unlikely to need to collaborate much given it is an individual project.

Congrats on passing the proposal! I agree with much of what has been said. I would only ever recommend Dedoose for collaborative projects. NVivo is better for individual projects. Like Methods-Geek, I have also switched to MAXQDA. The reason for that is that it is far superior to all the other programs for integrating both qualitative and quantitative logics of analysis. For instance, qualitative codes can be easily converted into quantitative document variables in MAXQDA, but it was almost impossible to do when I was using NVivo. Granted, that was a decade ago, but I have not regretted the switch.

I have used Atlas.ti and NVivo. I prefer Atlas.ti to be honest but NVivo is fine. I think it has a free trial version so you could explore before you commit. NVivo is shit for collaboration so luckily that's not an issue for you. There's also a pretty steep learning curve. You might try checking out some YouTube tutorials for each program and seeing which one feels more approachable.

reddit.com › r/askacademia › for those who have done qualitative research with thematic analysis, is atlasti a good tool for this purpose?

r/AskAcademia on Reddit: For those who have done qualitative research with thematic analysis, is Atlasti a good tool for this purpose?

August 27, 2022 -

I tried with Nvivo and it was very difficult in terms of contacting technical support and installing the software.

I'm a beginner with "Atlasti", and have considered it for my qualitative analysis, specifically for thematic analysis.

For those who have done qualitative research with thematic analysis, is Atlasti a good tool for this purpose?

Frankly Google sheets was the best tool we used.

It’s less feature rich than Nvivo, and I find it a bit harder to use. The online version is quite good for coding, but it’s even more light weight. Frankly, none are that hard to use once you get used to them. Maybe watch some more videos about people using them to try and find your groove.

reddit.com › r/research › software for data analysis in qualitative research

r/research on Reddit: Software for Data Analysis in Qualitative Research

December 14, 2024 -

Hi! Please suggest softwares that can analyze data in Qualitative research. Those that can do narrative analysis, thematic analysis, category construction. Thanks!

For qualitative data analysis, I recommend NVivo, ATLAS.ti, and MAXQDA. These software tools excel in narrative analysis, thematic analysis, and category construction, offering robust features for coding, data visualization, and organizing complex qualitative data. They support various data formats, including text, audio, video, and social media content, making them versatile for in-depth qualitative research.

I’m at Temple, and our library actually included AILYZE in our university guide and curriculum for qualitative research. It uses AI to do the analysis. Used it for my thematic analysis on 50 interviews. Got everything done in a month instead of struggling for a whole semester. It does narrative analysis, category construction, and even AI-assisted coding. Definitely worth checking out!

reddit.com › r/gradschool › which qda software do you use?

r/GradSchool on Reddit: Which QDA software do you use?

August 17, 2025 -

Hi there!

For context: I’m starting out a PhD in Law this year. In the context of my research, I’ll be taking a grounded theory approach to study a pretty large sample size of opinions written by Advocates General before the French Conseil d’Etat.

I’m currently looking for QDA software that I would be able to use for this type of research on legal materials.

My supervisor is on board with my approach but can’t really give any advice on the software to use seeing that it’s quite uncommon for legal researchers here to use data analysis software at all. I don’t want to go “analogue” because I expect to be managing anywhere from 300 to 500 opinions that can range anywhere between 15 and 50 pages each (based on similar research completed under my professor’s supervision).

My university doesn’t provide any particular software, so what do you all use for your qualitative data analysis? Are there any legal researchers here that have used QDAS in the past and successfully used it for our discipline? Are there any softwares that I should avoid?

Thanks Reddit ;)

Okay qualitative researcher in a different field here. You’ve got a lot of options but some of it is going to depend on how much you/your advisor are willing to pay. Qualcoder is completely free but you get what you pay for to a point - it’s harder to collaborate and the user interface isn’t the best. Taguette is online and has a free tier but it’s super limited. The interface was “meh” at best. Dedoose seems to be popular but it’s basically browser only so no use while you’re on a plane with no Wi-Fi or anywhere else you’re offline. NVivo is one of the more full featured, expensive programs. It wasn’t super user friendly when I tried it so I abandoned it quickly even though there’s a copy of it on my desktop in the office. Does a lot, costs a lot. Also in the pricey bracket are programs like MaxQDA and Atlas.ti. Lots of features like NVivo. When you get to the level of MaxQDA, Nvivo, and Atlas.ti you’re to the point it’s like Windows vs Mac vs Linux - down to preferences, very specific features, and convenience. I would say to check out who has demos and free trials and see which ones you vibe with. See if any of the paid ones are worth the money and fit with your usual workflows. That way if you do wind up shelling out for something, it’s not something you wind up hating. I personally use QualCoder for interview studies and my literature review project with a couple thousand articles (and their associated PDFs) is actually being coded in excel. The former is because I hated NVivo and the latter is because I don’t have time to train my mentees on something more complicated.

I have just started out with this (in the context of a doctorate in education), but I tried out Dedoose, Nvivo and MAXQDA24 while working on a scoping review and I really strongly prefer MAXQDA. I find it to be the most intuitive of the three and the easiest to use. I also am liking the analysis tools the best - it has been pretty easy to figure out how to create all the various types of analysis visualizations and reports (tables, charts, etc.) that I can think of with the coding I've done, plus some I wouldn't have thought of on my own.

reddit.com › r/sociology › recommendations for free data analysis software? (alternatives to maxqda)

r/sociology on Reddit: Recommendations for free data analysis software? (alternatives to MAXQDA)

April 16, 2022 -

So I’ve been working on my thesis for quite some time but since I don’t have access to any qualitative / mixed methods software I have to give the version I was using back to my professor. Which is why I am currently looking for alternatives to MAXQDA so I can still work on my data after my thesis and also potentially look back into it during my last weeks of writing. Maybe someone here encountered the same problem? Or does anyone have any experience with free, open source software like Taguette or Qualcoder? And also importing MAXQDA files into those programs?

Here’s a good list with links: https://www.etsu.edu/its/rcs/services/datamanagement/qda.php

I use taguette. It doesn't have many features, but it is easy to use and organizes my tags pretty nicely. The developer is pretty responsive to questions on their listhost which is also cool.

reddit.com › r/gradschool › qualitative data analysis software rec?

r/GradSchool on Reddit: Qualitative Data Analysis software rec?

February 22, 2020 -

Can anyone recommend a qualitative data analysis software? I'm pretty new to qual, though I've tried NVivo before. I wasn't happy with their monthly subscription model, but if they're the best, I'm willing to give it a whirl again. The next paper I'm working on is going to be using discourse analysis, and I have my data is transcripts of many interviews as separate Word documents.

I used Atlas.Ti for my dissertation. Its a semester based subscription model, and they had a special COVID discount over the summer so I made full use of it. There's a free trial that you can use on limited documents to see if you like it. I never really used NVivo so I can't compare, but based on reviews I read online they seem to be about similar in terms of ability and functions, it just looks different. My interviews were separate word documents, and you basically import them into the interface, and they appear as tabs. Its a little annoying if you have a ton (I had 11 documents), but there's a quick drop down menu to navigate to the document you need.

I use maxqda. You can get a student license for quite cheap. I like it better than Atlas.TI as it is more intuitive. But check around to see if there are some free demos before buying something. Also, see if your school offers the software for free.

reddit.com › r/uxresearch › tools to go through a huge amount of qualitative data

r/UXResearch on Reddit: Tools to go through a huge amount of qualitative data

May 11, 2021 -

Hello Everyone!

After crawling through some reviews of some competitors, I wanted to code and understand keywords, most frequent complaints, and overall feelings of users. But now I found myself with more than 5000 lines of content on sheets and all of them have somewhat long comments.

I was searching through some tools and was wondering if any of you have any tip of software, or method, to go through all this content.

Thank you!

Dedoose or MaxQDA OR NVIVO

I personally prefer grounded theory when dealing with large qualitative datasets. It's a nice methodology, but you have to be careful not to be affected by previous domain knowledge. Nevertheless, It gives you a good foundation for further theoretical sampling.