Nothing stops the evaluation. Forrester says it may evaluate any product whether or not the vendor takes part, and it will not consider requests to be removed. Non-participants are scored from public information, briefing data and independent client interviews, and they lose the right to give feedback on their scorecard.
What counts as full participation
Per Forrester's participation policy, vendors that meet the inclusion criteria are invited. A vendor becomes a full participant by returning the questionnaire and giving a briefing or demo on schedule. Skip either step and it is not treated as a full participant.
The methodology page adds that participation is not all or nothing. A vendor can supply a questionnaire, a demo, a briefing, references or feedback on results in any combination.
How a non-participant is scored
The policy says non-participants are scored using primary and secondary research. That can include public information, briefing data and independent client interviews. Forrester may ask for an abbreviated briefing or reference customers, and it may rely on estimates.
The methodology page says vendor participation is noted in the report text, not on the graphic. So a reader of the chart alone cannot tell who took part.
What non-participants give up
Only full participants are covered by the vendor review policy. Non-participants cannot give feedback on their scorecard or escalate disputes to a manager. If the analyst reads a product wrongly from public material, the vendor has fewer routes to correct it.
Why this matters when you read a report
Absence from a chart and low placement are different things, and so are participating and not participating. If a product you care about is missing, the report text and the firm's inclusion criteria will say why. Ask the vendor directly whether they participated and what inputs they supplied.
If a vendor did not participate, treat the evidence behind its score as thinner and test the product yourself. The same holds for any vendor that participated but whose strengths sit outside the criteria.
Questions to put to any vendor
- Did you return the questionnaire and give a briefing?
- Which of your references were interviewed?
- Which criteria do you think the report under-weights for our use case?
- What changed in the product after the data collection date?
Why a vendor might not take part
Public pages do not say why any given vendor declines, so avoid guessing. Common practical reasons in any research program include timing, staffing a four-week questionnaire, a product in transition, or a view that the market definition does not fit. None of these says anything about product quality.
What matters to you is the effect. A non-participant has supplied less first-hand information, and Forrester says it may rely on estimates. If you are weighing a product that did not take part, ask the vendor for the same material a participant would have supplied: a demo against your scenarios and references from customers like you. That puts it on equal evidence.
Quick check
Can a vendor ask to be removed from a Wave?
Forrester says it will not consider vendor requests to remove themselves, and the methodology page says vendors cannot request removal.
Do non-participants get to review their scorecard?
No. Per the participation policy, only full participants are covered by the vendor review policy.
Safeguard offers asset discovery and SBOM and dependency scanning, which you can run on your own repositories while you compare any vendor's claims.
Sources
Last reviewed: 19 October 2026.
