Databricks vs ThoughtSpot comparison

The compared Databricks and ThoughtSpot solutions aren't in the same category. ThoughtSpot is ranked #19 in BIT , with an average rating of 7.3, and holds a 1.5% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of Databricks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 87% of ThoughtSpot users who would recommend it.

Databricks

Read 85 Databricks reviews

96% willing to recommend

ThoughtSpot

Read 8 ThoughtSpot reviews

1,855 Views
1,361 Comparison Views

87% willing to recommend

Databricks

ThoughtSpot

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Databricks and ThoughtSpot based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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Buyer's Guide

Cloud Data Warehouse

December 2024

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Helped 831,158 peers since 2012

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

Ranking in other categories

Data Science Platforms (1st), Streaming Analytics (1st)

ThoughtSpot

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (19th), Data Visualization (14th), Embedded BI (8th)

Featured Reviews

Parag Bhosale

Senior Data Engineer at a logistics company with 51-200 employees

Integrating engineering and learning, but cost challenges arise with cluster management

We often use a single cluster to ingest Databricks, which Databricks doesn't recommend. They suggest using a no-cluster solution like job clusters. This can be overwhelming for us because we started smaller. We prefer using a small to mid-sized cluster for many jobs to keep costs low, but this sometimes doesn't support our operations properly. We need to stay in sync with the DVR versions, and migrations can pose challenges. For example, issues arose when we moved a cluster from a previous version to the latest one. We could use their job clusters, however, that increases costs, which is challenging for us as a startup. Maintaining this infrastructure can be a headache.

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Anthony Fiorino

SVP, Head of Enterprise Data Mgmt & Data Intelligence at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees

You can drill down into any data right out of the box, with a straightforward deployment, and great support

The most valuable feature is probably the core functionality itself, which is the ability to search and drill down into any data right out of the box. Of course, there's data modeling needed, and things like that, but I can throw it at a set, and I can get up and running in a matter of hours. If a new group comes to me and says, "Hey, I've heard about ThoughtSpot. I have some data and I want to be able to do some analytics, do some profiling, do some BI against it." In a couple of hours, I connect to their source and I just do it. Now for a production product, we have to model and perform it over time, but at least I can get people up and running extremely fast with a tool that's intuitive and easy to use.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Databricks' most valuable features are the workspace and notebooks. Its integration, interface, and documentation are also good."

"It helps integrate data science and machine learning capabilities."

"When we have a huge volume of data that we want to process with speed, velocity, and volume, we go through Databricks."

"The solution offers a free community version."

"Databricks integrates well with other solutions."

"The tool helps with data processing and analytics with large-scale data or big data since it is associated with managing data at a large scale."

"The most valuable feature is the Spark cluster which is very fast for heavy loads, big data processing and Pi Spark."

"Databricks is a unified solution that we can use for streaming. It is supporting open source languages, which are cloud-agnostic. When I do database coding if any other tool has a similar language pack to Excel or SQL, I can use the same knowledge, limiting the need to learn new things. It supports a lot of Python libraries where I can use some very easily."

More Databricks pros

"The scalability is good."

"ThoughtSpot takes the modifying of existing reports out of our hands."

"It's easy to drill down or expand data to get more details right out of the box."

"I would say the return on investment is good. Whatever we invested, we got results. We have been finding it easy to use and onboard new use cases."

"It is easy to set up the solution."

"The ability to do ad hoc explorations of data has been most valuable."

"I like ThoughtSpot's search capabilities. You can also create custom analytics even if you aren't an experienced data analyst. We have users with no data analytics experience making some of the dashboards we've created, copying components, and customizing them to their specific use cases."

"The initial setup was very straightforward."

Cons

"While Databricks is generally a robust solution, I have noticed a limitation with debugging in the Delta Live Table, which could be improved."

"The data visualization for this solution could be improved. They have started to roll out a data visualization tool inside Databricks but it is in the early stages. It's not comparable to a solution like Power BI, Luca, or Tableau."

"I would like more integration with SQL for using data in different workspaces."

"We'd like a more visual dashboard for analysis It needs better UI."

"Pricing is one of the things that could be improved."

"I believe that this product could be improved by becoming more user-friendly."

"Some of the error messages that we receive are too vague, saying things like "unknown exception", and these should be improved to make it easier for developers to debug problems."

"I'm not the guy that I'm working with Databricks on a daily basis. I'm on the management team. However, my team tells me there are limitations with streaming events. The connectors work with a small set of platforms. For example, we can work with Kafka, but if we want to move to an event-driven solution from AWS, we cannot do it. We cannot connect to all the streaming analytics platforms, so we are limited in choosing the best one."

More Databricks cons

"A customized visualization is lacking in this product."

"The one area of the solution that I do hear needs improvement is on the visualization front."

"The most difficult thing I found is that it only deals with the files and does not have direct connectivity to databases."

"If I want to order columns, this feature is not there."

"ThoughtSpot is a fairly new product, so some usability aspects aren't as mature as we'd like them to be. One example is their organizational methodology, like how objects are organized in their dashboards inside the product. They're all on a flat list, which works if you've got five or 10 dashboards. However, it's insufficient when you're a large enterprise with multiple groups looking at the same dashboards. It isn't organized well."

"I would like to see more flexibility in adding the pins. Currently, we have four different sizes in which I can add pins, but I would like to be able to resize my pins."

"In terms of features, I'd like to be able to pivot data - for example, going from rows to columns. It's not easy to do."

"The dashboards could give you more ability to fine tune the appearance. You get a great deal more control over how something looks in Power BI than you do in ThoughtSpot."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing costs of Databricks is a tiered licensing regime, so it is flexible."

"The price is okay. It's competitive."

"The pricing depends on the usage itself."

"The price of Databricks is reasonable compared to other solutions."

"I would rate the tool’s pricing an eight out of ten."

"The product pricing is moderate."

"The cost for Databricks depends on the use case. I work on it as a consultant, so I'm using the client's Databricks, so it depends on how big the client is."

"Databricks uses a price-per-use model, where you can use as much compute as you need."

More Databricks pricing and cost advice

"I give the pricing a six out of ten."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

24%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Healthcare Company

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 ...

See all answers

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...

See all answers

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...

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What do you like most about ThoughtSpot?

It's easy to drill down or expand data to get more details right out of the box.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ThoughtSpot?

I like the pricing structure. I get billed by how much data I put in, not how many people are looking at the data. It's better for me as I can control pricing a bit more easily.

See all answers

What needs improvement with ThoughtSpot?

We'd like more flexibility with the calendar as our fiscal year does not align with the calendar year. We have to load or create our own custom calendar to actually need our fiscal year-end. With o...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 11% of the time

Informatica PowerCenter vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Dremio vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Amazon SageMaker vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Databricks

Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 25% of the time

Tableau vs ThoughtSpot

Compared 23% of the time

Looker vs ThoughtSpot

Compared 11% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs ThoughtSpot

Compared 6% of the time

TIBCO Spotfire vs ThoughtSpot

Compared 6% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Databricks

January 2025

Download Databricks product report

Buyer's Guide

ThoughtSpot

December 2024

Download ThoughtSpot product report

Also Known As

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash

No data available

Learn More

Databricks

ThoughtSpot

Overview

Databricks is utilized for advanced analytics, big data processing, machine learning models, ETL operations, data engineering, streaming analytics, and integrating multiple data sources.

Organizations leverage Databricks for predictive analysis, data pipelines, data science, and unifying data architectures. It is also used for consulting projects, financial reporting, and creating APIs. Industries like insurance, retail, manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals use Databricks for data management and analytics due to its user-friendly interface, built-in machine learning libraries, support for multiple programming languages, scalability, and fast processing.

What are the key features of Databricks?

User-friendly interface: Simplifies operations and usability.
Built-in machine learning libraries: Facilitates machine learning tasks.
Support for multiple programming languages: Enhances flexibility.
Scalability: Efficiently handles growing data needs.
Fast processing: Improves performance and speed.
Automated optimization: Reduces manual efforts.
Data visualization: Provides insightful visuals.
Collaborative features: Enhances teamwork.
Delta Lake performance: Boosts data management.
Seamless cluster management: Simplifies system operations.

What are the benefits or ROI to look for in Databricks reviews?

Efficiency in handling large datasets: Ensures smooth processing.
Interactive workspace environment: Improves user collaboration.
Integration with platforms: Provides connectivity benefits.
Performance optimization: Enhances overall system performance.
Support for data governance and security: Ensures data integrity and protection.

Databricks is implemented in insurance for risk analysis and claims processing; in retail for customer analytics and inventory management; in manufacturing for predictive maintenance and supply chain optimization; and in pharmaceuticals for drug discovery and patient data analysis. Users value its scalability, machine learning support, collaboration tools, and Delta Lake performance but seek improvements in visualization, pricing, and integration with BI tools.

ThoughtSpot is a powerful business intelligence tool that allows easy searching and drilling into data. Its ad hoc exploration and query-based search features are highly valued, and it is easy to set up, stable, and scalable.

The solution is used for reporting purposes, self-service BI, and embedding into other applications for customers to do self-service analytics. It helps businesses with metrics, KPIs, and important insights by sourcing data from various sources into one golden source and visualizing it in an easy way for the business to consume. The pricing model is ideal, charging for data rather than the number of users.

Sample Customers

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

Primary Capital Mortgage, Sterling Backcheck, RichRelevance, Rambus, Batteries Plus Bulbs

Find out what your peers are saying about Snowflake Computing, Microsoft, Google and others in Cloud Data Warehouse. Updated: December 2024.

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