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Databricks vs Looker Studio comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Databricks
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
88
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (7th), Data Science Platforms (1st), Streaming Analytics (1st)
Looker Studio
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Reporting (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. Databricks is designed for Cloud Data Warehouse and holds a mindshare of 8.4%, up 3.2% compared to last year.
Looker Studio, on the other hand, focuses on Reporting, holds 2.5% mindshare, down 2.7% since last year.
Cloud Data Warehouse
Reporting
 

Featured Reviews

ShubhamSharma7 - PeerSpot reviewer
Capability to integrate diverse coding languages in a single notebook greatly enhances workflow
Databricks offers various courses that I can use, whether it's PySpark, Scala, or R. I can leverage all these courses in a single notebook, which is beneficial for clients as they can access various tools in one place whenever needed. This is quite significant. I usually work with PySpark based on client requirements. After coding, I feed the Databricks notebooks into the ADF pipeline for updates. Databricks' capability to process data in parallel enhances data processing speed. Furthermore, I can connect our Databricks notebook directly with Power BI and other visualization tools like Qlik. Once we develop code, it allows us to transform raw data into visualizations for clients using analysis diagrams, which is very helpful.
Srini-Dhanaraj - PeerSpot reviewer
Available for free and can help businesses resolve their data migration problems
It is a stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten. Google Data Studio is a cloud-based tool. With cloud-based tools, there can be two challenges, the first one being associated with the bandwidth of your data strength. If I run a report from my home because of the wi-fi connection, it may give an excellent response. When I run the reports, Google Data Studio develops reports from my home, and because of wi-fi, it works in an excellent manner. When I am on the road or at the wheel, if I use the internet data from my mobile to browse my reports, the performance may not be good, and this issue is not because of the product but because of the bandwidth. The second issue arises when you connect Google Data Studio to a source system to extract the data to do the visualization. If the source system is not responding as quickly as expected, it could be the reason why the report may be printed slowly. Considering the aforementioned aspects, the problem may not be because of Google Data Studio but because of the source system.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Databricks is based on a Spark cluster and it is fast. Performance-wise, it is great."
"Databricks' most valuable feature is the data transformation through PySpark."
"The ease of use and its accessibility are valuable."
"Ability to work collaboratively without having to worry about the infrastructure."
"Databricks is a robust solution for big data processing, offering flexibility and powerful features."
"The initial setup is pretty easy."
"The simplicity of development is the most valuable feature."
"The most valuable feature of Databricks is the integration of the data warehouse and data lake, and the development of the lake house. Additionally, it integrates well with Spark for processing data in production."
"The ability to integrate with a great variety of data sources."
"Valuable features include advanced integrated analysis and easy implementation."
"I am impressed with the tool's scheduling mechanism, refresh mechanism, and different types of charts."
"The best thing about the tool is that it allows you to share information easily and dashboards with colleagues and teammates because it's all online. No matter where you are, as long as you have the Internet, you can connect and use these dashboards. Google made good documentation for this tool. There are many examples of how to use and create dashboards and videos on YouTube. So, I think it's easy to learn."
"The product's initial setup phase is very simple."
"Data Studio integrates seamlessly with other Google products, and we can use it with other APIs if we like."
"The solution is free so that is a good feature."
"I find it favorable regarding speed of development, ease of building, and flexibility."
 

Cons

"There should be better integration with other platforms."
"The stability of the clusters or the instances of Databricks would be better if it was a much more stable environment. We've had issues with crashes."
"Databricks requires writing code in Python or SQL, so if you're a good programmer then you can use Databricks."
"Scalability is an area with certain shortcomings. The solution's scalability needs improvement."
"Databricks would have more collaborative features than it has. It should have some more customization for the jobs."
"Doesn't provide a lot of credits or trial options."
"The tool should improve its integration with other products."
"The solution could improve by providing better automation capabilities. For example, working together with more of a DevOps approach, such as continuous integration."
"It's not yet a replacement for a complete BI tool."
"Stability and scalability an be improved for a full ten."
"The tool should come up with data modeling layer features that are present in other products like Power BI."
"The tool should improve on live data integration for quicker data reflection."
"There is a significant degree of sophistication required to compete with Tableau or Cognos."
"When you physically install a product on one machine instead of the cloud, you have a better visibility, best icon quality, etc.. It's more of an issue with how we are adapting to the transition. We are still in the early moments of using this tool, and we need to go deeper to discover some improvements."
"The challenges with Google Data Studio are associated with the security part, making it an area where improvements are required."
"There are issues with integration and I encountered limits and warnings, especially with my pivot table size."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We're charged on what the data throughput is and also what the compute time is."
"The licensing costs of Databricks depend on how many licenses we need, depending on which Databricks provides a lot of discounts."
"Databricks are not costly when compared with other solutions' prices."
"The solution requires a subscription."
"My smallest project is around a hundred euros, and my most expensive is just under a thousand euros a week. That is based on terabytes of data processed each month."
"Databricks' cost could be improved."
"The price of Databricks is reasonable compared to other solutions."
"I would rate Databricks' pricing seven out of ten."
"The solution is free but the Google Looker is expensive."
"I think the tool is cheap because you don't need to pay anything for using the tool. However, when connecting and analyzing other data sources, you should consider where to analyze this information because Google Data Studio doesn't handle much data well. You must also consider how you will connect this data to it. In this case, you might need to hire DevOps or a data team to help with these issues."
"The product is available for free."
"The cost is quite affordable based on feature analysis."
"The tool is free."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which do you prefer - Databricks or Azure Machine Learning Studio?
Databricks gives you the option of working with several different languages, such as SQL, R, Scala, Apache Spark, or Python. It offers many different cluster choices and excellent integration with ...
How would you compare Databricks vs Amazon SageMaker?
We researched AWS SageMaker, but in the end, we chose Databricks. Databricks is a Unified Analytics Platform designed to accelerate innovation projects. It is based on Spark so it is very fast. It...
Which would you choose - Databricks or Azure Stream Analytics?
Databricks is an easy-to-set-up and versatile tool for data management, analysis, and business analytics. For analytics teams that have to interpret data to further the business goals of their orga...
What do you like most about Google Data Studio?
The company dashboard is useful because we could share it via a link as a reminder for everyone to check it weekly. We observed the progress of our portfolio from last week to the current week, all...
What needs improvement with Google Data Studio?
The tool should improve on live data integration for quicker data reflection. Currently, changes in Google Sheets take about three to five minutes to reflect in Looker Studio. Overall, the interfac...
What is your primary use case for Google Data Studio?
I use Looker Studio primarily for dashboard creation and data analytics. I have integrated it with Google Sheets, and I use it for project plan maintenance and data tracking.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash
Data Studio
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Elsevier, MyFitnessPal, Sharethrough, Automatic Labs, Celtra, Radius Intelligence, Yesware
Genesys, Shueisha
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