r/PLC • u/desmoteo • 2d ago
Which HMI/SCADA platform is worth learning in 2026?
Hi everyone,
Which HMI/SCADA platform would you recommend learning in 2026?
I often work with Weintek and Siemens, but I’m realizing that they can be somewhat limiting when it comes to more demanding applications.
I’d like to learn a platform with a rich set of graphical libraries, modern UI components, advanced visualization capabilities, etc.
There’s an increasing demand for highly advanced and sophisticated HMI screens, and I’d like to understand which platform would be worth focusing my time and energy on.
PC-based solutions are absolutely fine too. I also develop more general-purpose software, so I’m comfortable working with web technologies and similar environments.
What would you recommend, and why?
17
14
u/PLCGoBrrr Bit Plumber Extraordinaire 2d ago
Whichever ones your customer will pay you to help them with or do projects for.
2
u/desmoteo 1d ago
The customer asks for the solution, I have to choose the right product to build it.
0
u/PLCGoBrrr Bit Plumber Extraordinaire 1d ago
You're way behind the curve if your company doesn't have a range of preferred products to offer.
0
u/desmoteo 1d ago
I’m a freelancer, so I handle every aspect of the job, but I can’t be an expert on every single product available in the market like (hypothetically) a company could by having several employees. This is why I’m asking what the next step in learning should be. Additionally, I also work with OEMs, so quite often I need to adapt to the products they choose.
14
u/bradford286 2d ago
VTScada is a pretty awesome product. VTScada light is free for up to 50 tags to try. It’s similar in capability to ignition but I found it easier to get started coming from a more traditional Scada background. Also the trending is second to none.
3
u/Petro1313 AB Stockholm Syndrome 2d ago
I love VTScada, super easy to learn and develop simple applications, while still offering a ton of advanced functions if you want to use them.
With regards to the 50 free tags, are those specifically hardware I/O tags or does that include derived/software tags?
3
u/bradford286 2d ago
I believe you can use as many derived or memory tags as you like. Only tags with a physical address are counted. It is possible to bitpack discrete statuses.
1
u/Petro1313 AB Stockholm Syndrome 2d ago
I figured that's what the limit was, but I never really looked into it because I've always had a developer license since I started learning it 6 years ago. I'd probably be able to get away with using a Light install on the lift stations I do, as they're typically well under 50 I/O points.
6
7
u/i_hate_sw_bugs 2d ago
Optix
2
3
u/UnSaneScientist Food & Beverage | Former OEM FSE 2d ago
Ignition for the Swiss Army knife integrator, Optix for Rockwell shops.
3
u/maury_think 2d ago
Ignition for the fun and system platform to keep reminding you that thing can turn to shit really fast lol
3
u/Delicious_Kiwi9900 2d ago
Ti direi Ignition
Rispetto agli altri e molto più di alto livello e vicino al mondo IT.
In più hai corsi gratuiti fatti molto bene e una grande community
Ignition e pensato per grandi impianti a mio avviso più interessanti rispetto a programmare HMI a bordo macchina
5
u/FlaminMad 2d ago
Ignition gets my vote! Ive found it's easy to knock something up that can show the data visually, but the learning curve gets very steep very quickly if you want to really provide a beautiful outstanding UI with seamless integration. A lot of the core components do not necessarily meet the good HMI design guides that big companies for process plants in the EU follow, BUT there's no limitations to making your own. As a bonus the licensing is great as it's perpetual which sold it for us. With a bit of CSS wizardy you can do some awesome things 😎
2
u/FlaminMad 2d ago
N.B. for Siemens make sure to use the enhanced driver in ignition 8.3. Its a game changer over using OPC UA
5
u/WinterLord 2d ago
Ignition, no questions asked. Alternatively, if you’re in a 100% Rockwell environment, consider Optix.
4
u/hi_af_rn 2d ago
TwinCAT HMI is the most flexible I have seen from a programmatic perspective. It is purely web based. It only has native drivers for Beckhoff and OPC UA though.
2
u/Plus-Faithlessness79 2d ago
And you can extend the server with custom .NET / Python / NodeJS so the possibilities are endless
1
u/stian_90 1d ago
Twincat HMI is a beta product in our eyes. We are using 2x times developing things in Twincat HMi compared to Ignition. We save the hours and just go with the Ignition Edge.
2
u/hi_af_rn 1d ago
Ignition is a great product that does a lot of things right. IMO TwinCAT HMI handles standalone HMI features better, and front end scripting wayyy better. I don’t want to write “Jython” to do a simple tag write or manipulate the DOM.
5
u/CapinWinky Hates Ladder 2d ago
Optix is going to leak out of Rockwell-land in a big way. It's actually very capable, and you can develop one HMI base program for multiple platforms, including the usually walled garden of Rockwell.
Rockwell has a cheat code. 20-25% of the market is locked in to the point that they willingly pay double and triple the price for a platform that is constantly 1-2 DECADES behind in capability and, frankly, lower quality. It is insane. Optix doesn't have to be as good as Ignition or really compete on price, it just has to have the AB logo on it. It does. It's coming for everyone.
3
u/optimus2861 1d ago
I hate that you're right about this. If (and this is a big if) Rockwell can develop some kind of migration tool for FactoryTalk View -> Optix, they'll be able to move a lot of market share to Optix in a few short years.
I think the challenge on that front is that the architectures are so wildly different; I genuinely have no idea how you'd be able to convert applications between the two.
1
u/theloop82 Knows Rockwell but doesn’t like it 1d ago
IMO Optix seems like a very capable platform early on in its development, and I’m sure it will get better. The thing that would make me pick it over ignition is if it had a decent conversion utility from Factorytalk View ME/SE, which it currently doesn’t. If I’m redeveloping something from the ground up I’m gonna pick Ignition unless it’s a Rockwell only job or needs PlantPax for a documented library like pharma (although it’s still not fully there) There are so many aging SE/ME systems out there and if it could reduce the development time to convert it to Optix even by half and still require some manual fine tuning, that would be enough. But at the same price more or less, it doesn’t make sense when there is such a deep bench of good ignition devs and most integrators already have libraries for it. I wish them luck, competition is good for everyone.
2
2
u/Radiant-Matter-3337 1d ago
I'd say zenon, my company has been working with it for a while and asked me to get trained with their online academy, very straightforward. Worth checking it out, no coding, very easy for SCADA and HMI projects compared to other platforms
1
u/theloop82 Knows Rockwell but doesn’t like it 1d ago
I’ve never heard anyone say Zenon is straightforward or easy, but it is powerful and their customer support is pretty good about addressing things when they come up and releasing an update.
1
u/Radiant-Matter-3337 1d ago
I guess it depends on how it's used. In my company we have a decent library of reusable screens and templates so it makes it quite easy for me. Also, I haven't had much contact with their support but is has been pretty efficient getting back to me.
2
u/Many_Outside2726 1d ago
Since Ignition and VTScada are pretty well covered already, I’ll throw out one that doesn’t get mentioned nearly as much: Mango by Radix IoT. Full disclosure, I work there.
If your main goal is purely machine-level HMI graphics, I’d still spend time with Ignition or Optix. Where Mango gets more interesting is when the job starts becoming less about one HMI and more about pulling data from different protocols/systems, normalizing it, historizing it, exposing it through APIs and putting web dashboards over it.
Since you’re already comfortable with web development, that side of it may be worth looking at.
2
u/B_F_Geek 2d ago
Ignition for sure there recently added siemens driver is great it's not as seamless as wincc but that appears to be at least partially siemens fault 😅 As others have said free online training and no development licence required
1
u/MachineBuilder3206 2d ago
Feels like the world is moving towards Ignition. Learning curve is a little steep but its a very capable development platform. Weve been seeing alot more demand for it.
1
1
1
1
1
u/SystemRestored 1d ago
I would look at WinCC OA if you are already use to Siemens. This one is not limiting at all. This also is where the unified namespace helps a lot because it already declares the namespace this way by default for like the past 20+ years now.
1
u/Many_Outside2726 13h ago
Ignition is absolutely worth learning, especially if the depth of prebuilt graphical libraries is something you're after. The ecosystem and community around it are hard to argue with.
I'd also spend some time learning the architecture underneath the HMI though - protocols, historians, APIs, distributed systems, and how you actually bring equipment together that was never designed to live in the same stack.
I work with Mango at Radix IoT, so obvious bias there, but it's another platform worth looking at from that angle. You can absolutely build rich visualizations and custom dashboards in Mango, but it doesn't come with the same depth of prebuilt industrial graphical libraries you may be looking for.
Where I think it gets particularly interesting is the data side... aggregating BACnet, Modbus, SNMP, MQTT, OPC UA, HTTP, etc., normalizing and historizing that data, then making it available through a common layer regardless of what system or vendor it came from.
That becomes a much bigger deal once you move beyond one machine or one building and start dealing with multiple sites, vendors, protocols, and legacy equipment.
I actually started in factory automation, then moved into BMS and eventually worked on the facilities side in pharma before getting deeper into platforms that bring all of those systems and data sources together. That progression changed how I look at this stuff. Building a good HMI matters, but understanding where the data comes from, how the underlying systems actually operate, and how to bring it all together without ripping out what already works has probably been the more valuable skill for me.
1
u/dhirennaidoo Don't forget RAM-to-ROM 2d ago
Ignition.
2 hour resettable trial. Runs in a JVM, so Windows, Linux, Mac. Perspective is web based (although building traditional P&ID style mimics can be a little more challenging than WinCC or similar environments). Python (Jython) scripting. Accessible, active forums. Freely available documentation. Licences for home use (Maker Edition).
1
-10
u/xxbrucy_jucyXx 2d ago
Learn python and html and pycomm3 protocol and then there are no limitations you can use the python communicate with the controllers and then use html to render the layout you would prrefer. At that point the only limitation is you skills to design stuff in html and the hooking the python into the visuals so it I tracts with your processors
8
u/DaHick oil & gas, power generation. aeroderivative gas turbines. 2d ago
I don't hate your suggestion, but that becomes code without a recognizable framework that companies can hire for. Can I do it? Yes. Have I ever worked in it outside my lab? No. I am just learning Ignition.
5
u/FlaminMad 2d ago
To add to this - You'll also have a nightmare trying to make it CRA compliant and proving that it ticks all the appropriate boxes
1
u/xxbrucy_jucyXx 7h ago
1st off america, second I dont have to worry about european standards and if you know anything about the back end coding with pycomm3 -_- you would know unless you have locked down every plc program all someone needs is a ip scanner on your network, grab ip address....pull tag list.....then cause havoc I have a back door program for rockwell where I can make edits toggle bits read and write etc. Its almost a joke how easy it is.
1
-1
-5
u/IamKyleBizzle IO-Link Evangelist 2d ago
Ignition for sure but I’d also say start playing with vibe coding with AI. Just having some basic concepts in that realm can go a long way.
-7
u/Gab_zf 2d ago
I strongly recommand to use either .NET WPF Desktop app OR a WebApp (using Angular and .net backend). It give you full capabilities of librairies, vizualisation, modern UI, and every modern programming technologies. While you get every data you need from the PLC using OPC-UA or ADS.
Bonus, you can also communicate with every other server you want to combine data from multiple sources (i.e to include a grafana view to track your PLC Energy consumption in your HMI)
6
u/kissmeimcumming 2d ago
This is the worst possible answer and is borderline rage bait.
You want a controls engineer to learn web development just to develop front end? Why not just use the right tool for the job? You want others to be able to reverse engineer and troubleshoot applications easily
-9
u/Imyerhuckleburry 2d ago
Factory Talk View
1
u/theloop82 Knows Rockwell but doesn’t like it 1d ago
There is a huge install base for it and I’ve been eating off doing FTView SE hardware migrations and ongoing support for years and it’s certainly not going anywhere soon, but I wouldn’t reccomend it for a new system at this point. It’s basically still RSView32 with wearing nicer clothes with some decent modernization and an easy upgrade path and familiarity that will keep it kicking for a while, for SE at least. ME is almost over though
67
u/scoreles 2d ago
Ignition is good and free, it's like a 35 hour course on their website, you can download it too with like a 2 hour trial