As someone who integrates with both systems, I personally prefer Ignition.
Ignition’s a developers Scada, although I come from a technician background and love it. If you want to do something, it’s possible. It’s very flexible if you’re willing to learn the potential of the different modules, python and sql. The complexity of the project can really vary depending on your needs, it is powerful enough to have lots of scripting and dynamic screens or can be much simpler and utilize all the regular functionality (like tag and property bindings) to build a very capable system. On this forum I’m sure you can find a million reasons as to why everyone likes Ignition more so I’ll highlight the pros and cons of VT.
VTScada’s number one pro is that it has tons of drivers. As someone who works in O&G mostly, I deal with a lot of different flow computers, RTU’s and PLCs. VTScada more than likely has a driver built for that device, saving you the hassle of messing around 3rd party opc software.
Secondly, the tag udts (tagtypes in VT). If you create an instance of a tagtype and opt to not use all the different tags in the tagtype, that tag will not throw a configuration error like it does in Ignition. It cleanly lets you use and address tags or not.
Templating-wise, like Ignition, you can template everything with tag paths and relative tagpaths on VT. A plus for VT is that you can also parameterize objects as well (think global object factorytalk). You have the ability to use mix and match if you want as well, allowing great flexibility when developing.
More graphics and templating, if you move a tag that’s been linked to a graphic, that link will automatically update rather than breaking. As others have mentioned, it also has built tools so that if you click on a tag, you’ll get popups with trends and historical info, tag properties and meta data, flow computer screens and communications screens where applicable, etc.
The biggest con of VT is it’s reporting. If you want to do anything more than a simple csv, you’ll need to do it out of application.
Overall I would say VT is faster to develop in and has better drivers. Ignition can really let you do anything you want. Once you’ve got templates built I would say the development speed then becomes very comparable. I mentioned VT having trending and tag data popups when you click on tags, all that same functionality can be in Ignition, it’s just needs to be built first.
I’ve also been working on more with MQTT and and Edge gateways as of late. Ignition has a lot of tools to integrate into different systems and lots of ways to view and analyze data within itself. I think its an extremely useful system for any company forward thinking company whos wanting to better utilize their data.
Both system have free trials, download them and check them out. Get a feel for each and see what you like better. I think either way you go, you’ll have a good system in the end.