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Google Cloud Datalab vs Qlik Sense comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

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

Google Cloud Datalab
Ranking in Data Visualization
17th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Data Science Platforms (19th)
Qlik Sense
Ranking in Data Visualization
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
124
Ranking in other categories
Embedded BI (2nd), AI Data Analysis (16th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Data Visualization category, the mindshare of Google Cloud Datalab is 1.1%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Qlik Sense is 5.6%, down from 7.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Visualization Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Qlik Sense5.6%
Google Cloud Datalab1.1%
Other93.3%
Data Visualization
 

Featured Reviews

LJ
System Architect at UST Global España
dashboards are good and data visualization is more meaningful for the end-user
Access is always via URL, and unless your network is fast, it would be a little tough in India. In India, if we had a faster network, it would be easier. In a big data environment, like when forcing your database with over a billion records, it can be tough for the end-user to manage the data. You need to have a single entity system in each environment. It's not because of GCP, but it would be great to have options like MongoDB or other similar tools in GCP. Then, we wouldn't always need to connect to the cloud and execute SQL queries. Even if your application is always connected to its database, the processing can be cumbersome. It shouldn't be so complicated. Once the data is collected, it should be easily sorted.
reviewer2592669 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director Software Engineer at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
In-memory data storage boosts performance
The advantages compared to other BI tools show architectural differences. The main feature is that it keeps all the data in memory. It doesn't retrieve the data from data sources when I need it on the dashboard; instead, it quickly provides the desired data, making it very fast compared to other BI tools. The ROI is very high using Qlik Sense. It offers many benefits of BI. It is flexible from a developer's point of view, allowing me to accomplish many tasks compared to other BI tools. From an end-user perspective, it's convenient and performance-oriented, providing something meaningful from all the organization's data.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"All of the features of this product are quite good."
"In MLOps, when we are designing the data pipeline, the designing of the data pipeline is easy in Google Cloud."
"The APIs are valuable."
"The infrastructure is highly reliable and efficient, contributing to a positive experience."
"For me, it has been a stable product."
"Google Cloud Datalab is very customizable."
"The product is reasonably priced."
"We can bring data from multiple sources and easily blend it in Qlik and create a data model (star schema)."
"It automates recurring processes to save time and money."
"Set analysis is a powerful scripting functionality which calculates complex queries into simple terms."
"This tool not only allows for consumption of the data in a visual way, but also allows the user to modify the question to get new answers."
"All the necessary information is available to everyone in real time."
"Faster time to delivery utilizing useful charts and graphs, which allows for on-demand generation of analytical data in tables, graphs, and charts."
"The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are the integration and panel for reports. The integration is very fast even though we process a lot of information."
 

Cons

"Connectivity challenges for end-users, particularly when loading data, environments, and libraries, need to be addressed for an enhanced user experience."
"The product must be made more user-friendly."
"Even if your application is always connected to its database, the processing can be cumbersome. It shouldn't be so complicated."
"We have also encountered challenges during our transition period in terms of data control and segmentation. The management of each channel and data structure as it has its own unique characteristics requires very detailed and precise control. The allocation should be appropriate and the complexity increases due to the different time zones and geographic locations of our clients. The process usually involves migrating the existing database sets to gcp and ensure data integrity is maintained. This is the only challenge that we faced while navigating the integers of the solution and honestly it was an interesting and unique experience."
"The interface should be more user-friendly."
"There is room for improvement in the graphical user interface. So that the initial user would use it properly, that would be a good option."
"I would like to see more types of visual elements and better configuration options for additional flexibility when developing charts."
"A valuable improvement for this solution would be the enabling of us to host dashboards for our customers."
"Branding is not the product's strongest point. More control over the presentation colors would be great. A basic printing function would also be good. Easy connection to external tools like R Server would be nice."
"Even though a huge set of learning material is available, anyone starting his/her journey on learning the software doesn't even know where to start it. The so-called Continous Classroom service is not cheap, but there are many free tutorials, they are not sorted or enlisted adequately though."
"Qlik Sense has better performance, particularly in its archival system. However, Power BI has better visualizations and interactions with updates in 2023 that provide ease of use. Power BI is more user-friendly than Qlik Sense."
"As we are a very process-oriented company, we would like to see more extensions maintained from Qlik, because it's a huge budget problem to choose the right one."
"More pivot table options, like the ability to have the totals row at the bottom of the table, would be helpful."
"One area of improvement is that it doesn't offer an API for accessing processed data stored in the QED files."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is quite reasonable, and I would give it a rating of four out of ten."
"The product is cheap."
"It is affordable for us because we have a limited number of users."
"I believe pricing is similar to other products in the same category, if you have it on-premise."
"Licensing: Review the named model and move towards a usage model (e.g., cores, memory, computers, API calls, etc.)."
"Qlik Sense pricing and licensing is like that of QlikView. It's on the high side for a small company, but it’s competitive among its peers. Use of licenses (referred to as tokens) is a bit confusing. There is a login access pass for infrequent or anonymous access."
"Qlik Sense is pretty good in terms of price."
"I'm not able to reveal the licensing cost for Qlik Sense, but because it was a huge deal, the cost was less than the usual cost. The license wasn't that costly. It was the infrastructure that was very costly."
"You need to pay 5,000 Norwegian kroner per user. Microsoft Power BI is slightly more expensive than Qlik Sense."
"You will spend more time on educating your staff than licensing the product."
"Licensing can start to get expensive, but compared to other tools in this space it is about average."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
25%
Computer Software Company
10%
University
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise40
Large Enterprise86
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Google Cloud Datalab?
Google Cloud Datalab is very customizable.
What needs improvement with Google Cloud Datalab?
Access is always via URL, and unless your network is fast, it would be a little tough in India. In India, if we had a faster network, it would be easier. In a big data environment, like when forcin...
What is your primary use case for Google Cloud Datalab?
It's for our daily data processing, and there's a batch job that executes it. The process involves more than ten servers or systems. Some of them use a mobile network, some are ONTAP networks, and ...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
There are many...It would rather depend what System BI architecture or Enterprise legacy you have at your end...I would recommend as follows: 1) If you have legacies of SAP, Oracle - look for SAP...
What do you like most about Qlik Sense?
The most valuable features of Qlik Sense are its speed and seamless development of web technologies.
 

Also Known As

No data available
QlikSense, Qlik Analytics Platform
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Abbvie, Airbus, Barclays, BT Openreach, BMW, Daimler AG, HSBC, IKEA, Nationwide Building Society, Royal Mail Group, Sanofi, Siemens, Wendy'', Vodafone, Volvo
Find out what your peers are saying about Google Cloud Datalab vs. Qlik Sense and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,711 professionals have used our research since 2012.