KNIME vs Tableau comparison

The compared Knime and Salesforce solutions aren't in the same category. Knime is ranked #1 in DM , with an average rating of 7.8, and holds a 25.3% mindshare in the category. Salesforce is ranked #2 in BIT , with an average rating of 8.6, and holds a 18.3% mindshare. Additionally, 94% of Knime users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 89% of Salesforce users who would recommend it.

KNIME

Read 59 KNIME reviews

1,958 Views
1,398 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Tableau

Read 295 Tableau reviews

18,562 Views
15,629 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

KNIME

Tableau

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between KNIME and Tableau based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Knime, Weka, IBM and others in Data Mining.

To learn more, read our detailed Data Mining Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Data Mining

March 2025

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Helped 842,592 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

KNIME

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Mining (1st), Data Science Platforms (2nd)

Tableau

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.4

Number of Reviews

295

Ranking in other categories

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (2nd), Reporting (2nd), Data Visualization (1st), Embedded BI (1st)

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. KNIME is designed for Data Mining and holds a mindshare of 25.3%, down 27.5% compared to last year.
Tableau, on the other hand, focuses on BI (Business Intelligence) Tools, holds 18.3% mindshare, down 19.0% since last year.

Data Mining

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

Featured Reviews

Laurence Moseley

Emeritus Professor of Health Services Research at University of South Wales

Has a drag-and-drop interface and AI capabilities

It's difficult to pinpoint one single feature because KNIME has so many. For starters, it's very easy to learn. You can get started with just a one-hour video. The drag-and-drop interface makes it user-friendly. For example, if you want to read an Excel file, drag the "read Excel file" node from the repository, configure it by specifying the file location, and run it. This gives you a table with all your data. Next, you can clean the data by handling missing values, selecting specific columns you want to analyze, and then proceeding with your analysis, such as regression or correlation. KNIME has over 4,500 nodes available for download. In addition, KNIME offers various extensions. For instance, the text processing extension allows you to process text data efficiently. It's more powerful than other tools like NVivo and Palantir. KNIME also has AI capabilities. If you're unsure about the next step, the AI assistant can suggest the most frequently used nodes based on your previous work. Another valuable feature is the integration with Python. If you need to perform a task that requires Python, you can simply add a Python node, write the necessary code,

Read full review

ROMIL SHAH

Deputy General Manger - Information Technology at Nayara Energy

Provides fast data access with in-memory extracts, makes it easy to create visualizations, and saves time

When it comes to visualizations, Tableau has a limitation as compared to Power BI. It has a limited set of visualizations. Power BI has the entire marketplace, so you can connect and import many visualizations and use them, whereas Tableau has only 10 or 15 visualizations. There should be more visualizations, and there should also be data integration with more cloud providers. Tableau has recently launched a paid version for the documentation. So, documentation has become a little bit challenging when it comes to Tableau development because we do not have any tool to export the data out of it. It is a license-based feature that you need to purchase to prepare documentation. So, on the documentation front, for preparing clear documentation for any dashboard, it would help if we get an embedded option, rather than buying a license for each user for the documentation. To document anything, if I have to connect to each workbook and see what has been written as a formula and then document in the Word document, it is pretty time-consuming. We have the Microsoft stack, and we are currently evaluating Power BI because Tableau has a limitation of 50 columns for a drill-down report. If we want more than 50 columns, we have found a hack, but there is no ready-made option for doing it. So, we have to use another tool in case we need a drilled report with more than 50 columns. There are many instances where users need 80 or 90 columns for their analysis, and switching between two technologies becomes a challenge. It is not a cost-effective approach for us. Their support should be improved. We are not happy with their support. Whenever we raised queries, we were pointed to a few blogs, and we didn't get a proper solution from them. Their licensing should also be improved. They want us to purchase a Tableau Creator license for business users, whereas Power BI Desktop is free for business users. They should come up with a basic license with one or two connectors that our business users can use for preparing their visualizations. Tableau also charges us per user for users who want the data only through email.

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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

"All of the features related to the ETL are fantastic. That includes the connectors to other programs, databases, and the meta node function."

"What I like most about KNIME is that it's user-friendly. It's a low-code, no-code tool, so students don't need coding knowledge. You can make use of different kinds of nodes. KNIME even has a good description of each node."

"I know I don't use it to its full capacity, but I love the Rule Engine feature. It has allowed me to create lookup tables on the fly and break down text fields into quantifiable data."

"Usability, and organising workflows in very neat manner. Controlling workflow through variables is something amazing."

"It provides very fast problem solving and I don't need to do much coding in it. I just drag and drop."

"The solution allows for sharing model designs and model operations with other data analysts."

"We have found KNIME valuable when it comes to its visualization."

"We are able to automate several functions which were done manually. I can integrate several data sets quickly and easily, to support analytics."

More KNIME pros

"I like the solution's web version, more so than Power BI's web version. It just makes it easier to drag and drop things and to blend data on the backend. It simplifies the process."

"Although Tableau isn't the best for us when it comes to processing and working on live data, it is very good at extracting data for analysis."

"It is an excellent tool for data capture, processing, and visualization."

"Show Me is a feature to help with knowing which chart is an appropriate one for the selected variables, and it makes helps in creating appropriate visuals."

"The solution helps users create dashboards and analyze data without relying on IT or product teams."

"The most valuable part of the solution is the general dashboard features."

"We found Tableau has the quickest learning time out of the few other BI reporting tools that we have used."

"Tableau has many good features. It is user-friendly, has a simple-to-use interface, and has a customizable dashboard."

More Tableau pros

Cons

"It needs more examples, use cases, and MOOC to learn, especially with respect to the algorithms and how to practically create a flow from end-to-end."

"To enhance accessibility and user-friendliness, there is a need for improvements in the interface and usability of deep learning and large-scale learning languages."

"In the last update, KNIME started hiding a lot of the nodes. It doesn't mean hiding, but you need to know what you're looking for. Before that, you had just a tree that you could click, and you could get an overview of what kind of nodes do I have. Right now, it's like you need to know which node you need, and then you can start typing, but it's actually more difficult to find them."

"KNIME is not good at visualization."

"The predefined workflows could use a bit of improvement."

"The main issue with KNIME is that it sometimes uses too much CPU and RAM when working with large amounts of data."

"I wish there were more video training resources for KNIME. The current videos are very short, and most learning is text-based. Longer training sessions would be helpful, especially for complex flowchart use cases. Webinars focusing on starting projects and analyzing data would also be beneficial."

"Not just for KNIME, but generally for software and analyzing data, I would welcome facilities for analyzing different sorts of scale data like Likert scales, Thurstone scales, magnitude ratio scales, and Guttman scales, which I don't use myself."

More KNIME cons

"It will be good if the server, could be more stable, and I would like to have the technical service to be more reliable."

"We would like a report model, because currently there is no schema that we can create in the tool."

"When it comes to visualizations, Tableau has a limitation as compared to Power BI. It has a limited set of visualizations. Power BI has the entire marketplace, so you can connect and import many visualizations and use them, whereas Tableau has only 10 or 15 visualizations. There should be more visualizations, and there should also be data integration with more cloud providers."

"In the next release, I would like to be able to have the option to see more raw data that I'm converting on the dashboard."

"Navigating through activities like cleansing, reshaping, and wrangling extensive or complicated datasets could prove challenging within the Tableau environment."

"I would like Tableau to handle geospatial data better in terms of multiple layers and shapefiles."

"Formatting controls could use some improvement."

"It needs more ETL capabilities, to be able to address the end-to-end BI need."

More Tableau cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"At this time, I am using the free version of Knime."

"There is a Community Edition and paid versions available."

"KNIME Business Hub is expensive for small companies."

"KNIME assets are stand alone, as the solution is open source."

"Scaling to the on-premises version requires a licensing fee per user that is a bit expensive in comparison to R, Python, and SAS."

"KNIME is free and open source."

"This is an open-source solution that is free to use."

"KNIME is an open-source tool, so it's free to use."

More KNIME pricing and cost advice

"For big business, Tableau could be expensive as having a lot of Tableau server users (entering with a browser to reports) could be a bit expensive."

"There is a license for this solution and we pay on an annual basis."

"Pricing could be better. I believe they should offer better pricing for deployment in small to mid-sized companies."

"Its price is reasonable. Everything is included in the license."

"The company chose to purchase a creator license for me, which was $70. With that license, you can also be an administrator. We also have 20-25 extra licenses and they cost around $20-$35 each. Those are for normal users who will be viewing the dashboards. Those are monthly charges."

"It is reasonable based on what it offers."

"Deployment of dashboards to viewers and unit supervisors can be prohibitively expensive."

"Tableau is a little cheaper as compared to Power BI and other technologies that we have used in the past. However, if the business users in our organization want to make presentations, Tableau has been asking us to purchase a Tableau Creator license, and $35 per month is expensive for business users. Power BI is giving a free desktop version for business users to connect to any data source and build their own dashboards. That's why we have proposed to use Power BI for most of the business users in our organization."

More Tableau pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user6330

Product Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

May 2, 2013

MicroStrategy vs. Tableau

After a recent presentation, several attendees asked me about the applications of Visual Insights and Tableau. Many companies are investing in both tools and are trying to figure out the right tool for specific applications Tableau has found its sweet-spot as an agile discovery tool that analysts…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

University

Educational Organization

44%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about KNIME?

Since KNIME is a no-code platform, it is easy to work with.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for KNIME?

I rate the product’s pricing a seven out of ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with KNIME?

For graphics, the interface is a little confusing. So, this is a point that could be improved.

See all answers

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...

See all answers

Tableau vs. Business Objects - Which is a better solution for visualization and analysis?

Both tools have their positives and negatives. First, I should mention that I am relatively new to Tableau. I have been working on and off Tableau for about a year, but getting to work on it consta...

See all answers

Which would you choose - Tableau or SAP Analytics Cloud?

Tableau is easy to set up and maintain. In about a day it is possible for the entire platform to be deployed for use. This relatively short amount of time can make all the difference for companies ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Altair RapidMiner vs KNIME

Compared 27% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs KNIME

Compared 15% of the time

Dataiku vs KNIME

Compared 14% of the time

Alteryx vs KNIME

Compared 9% of the time

Amazon SageMaker vs KNIME

Compared 2% of the time

More KNIME Competitors

Microsoft Power BI vs Tableau

Compared 20% of the time

Domo vs Tableau

Compared 13% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs Tableau

Compared 7% of the time

Databricks vs Tableau

Compared 6% of the time

SAP Analytics Cloud vs Tableau

Compared 4% of the time

More Tableau Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

KNIME

March 2025

Download KNIME product report

Buyer's Guide

Tableau

March 2025

Download Tableau product report

Also Known As

KNIME Analytics Platform

Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Online

Overview

KNIME is an open-source analytics software used for creating data science that is built on a GUI based workflow, eliminating the need to know code. The solution has an inherent modular workflow approach that documents and stores the analysis process in the same order it was conceived and implemented, while ensuring that intermediate results are always available.

KNIME supports Windows, Linux, and Mac operating systems and is suitable for enterprises of all different sizes. With KNIME, you can perform functions ranging from basic I/O to data manipulations, transformations and data mining. It consolidates all the functions of the entire process into a single workflow. The solution covers all main data wrangling and machine learning techniques, and is based on visual programming.

KNIME Features

KNIME has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

Scalability through data handling (intelligent automatic caching of data in the background while maximizing throughput performance)
High extensibility via a well-defined API for plugin extensions
Intuitive user interface
Import/export of workflows
Parallel execution on multi-core systems
Command line version for "headless" batch executions
Activity dashboard
Reporting & statistics
Third-party integrations
Workflow management
Local automation
Metanode linking
Tool blending
Big Data extensions

KNIME Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing KNIME. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Integrated Deployment: KNIME’s integrated deployment moves both the selected model, and the entire data model preparation process into production simply and automatically, allowing for continuous optimization in production and also saving time because it eliminates error.

Elastic and Hybrid Execution: KNIME’s elastic and hybrid executions helps you reduce costs while covering periods of high demand, dynamically.

Metadata Mapping: KNIME enables complete metadata mapping of all aspects of your workflow. In addition, KNIME offers blueprint workflows for documenting the nodes, data sources, and libraries used, as well as runtime information.

Guided Analytics: KNIME’s guided analytics applications can be customized based on reusable components.

Powerful analytics, local automation, and workflow difference: KNIME uses advanced predictive and machine learning algorithms to provide you with the analytics you need. In combination with powerful analytics, KNIME’s automation capabilities and workflow difference prepare your organization with the tools you need to make better business decisions.

Supports enterprise-wide data science practices: The deployment and management functionalities of KNIME make it easy to productionize data science applications and services, and deliver usable, reliable, and reproducible insights for the business.

Helps you leverage insights gained from your data: Using KNIME ensures the data science process immediately reflects changing requirements or new insights.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the KNIME solution.

An Emeritus Professor at a university says, “It can read many different file formats. It can very easily tidy up your data, deleting blank rows, and deleting rows where certain columns are missing. It allows you to make lots of changes internally, which you do using JavaScript to put in the conditional. It also has very good fundamental machine learning. It has decision trees, linear regression, and neural nets. It has a lot of text mining facilities as well. It's fairly fully-featured.”

Benedikt S., CEO at SMH - Schwaiger Management Holding GmbH, explains, “All of the features related to the ETL are fantastic. That includes the connectors to other programs, databases, and the meta node function. Technical support has been extremely responsive so far. The solution has a very strong and supportive community that shares information and helps each other troubleshoot. The solution is very stable. The initial setup is pretty simple and straightforward.”

Piotr Ś., Test Engineer at ProData Consult, says, “What I like the most is that it works almost out of the box with Random Forest and other Forest nodes.”

Knime

Tableau is a tool for data visualization and business intelligence that allows businesses to report insights through easy-to-use, customizable visualizations and dashboards. Tableau makes it exceedingly simple for its customers to organize, manage, visualize, and comprehend data. It enables users to dig deep into the data so that they can see patterns and gain meaningful insights.

Make data-driven decisions with confidence thanks to Tableau’s assistance in providing faster answers to queries, solving harder problems more easily, and offering new insights more frequently. Tableau integrates directly to hundreds of data sources, both in the cloud and on premises, making it simpler to begin research. People of various skill levels can quickly find actionable information using Tableau’s natural language queries, interactive dashboards, and drag-and-drop capabilities. By quickly creating strong calculations, adding trend lines to examine statistical summaries, or clustering data to identify relationships, users can ask more in-depth inquiries.

Tableau has many valuable key features:

Tableau dashboards provide a complete view of your data through visualizations, visual objects, text, and more.
Tableau provides convenient, real-time options to collaborate with other users and instantly share data in the form of visualizations, sheets, and dashboards.
Tableau ensures connectivity to both live data sources and data extraction from external data sources as in-memory data. This gives users the flexibility to use data from more than one source without any restrictions.
Tableau gives many data source option, ranging from spreadsheets, big data, on-premise files, relational databases, non-relational databases, data warehouses, and big data, to on-cloud data.
Tableau has a lot of pre-installed information on maps, such as cities, postal codes, and administrative boundaries.
Tableau has a foolproof security system based on authentication and permission systems for data connections and user access. Tableau also gives you the freedom to integrate with other security protocols.

Tableau stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Some of these include its fast data access, easy creation of visualizations, and its stability. PeerSpot users take note of the advantages of these features in their reviews:

Romil S., Deputy General Manager of IT at Nayara Energy, notes, "Its visualizations are good, and its features make the development process a little less time-consuming. It has an in-memory extract feature that allows us to extract data and keep it on the server, and then our users can use it quickly.

Ariful M., Consulting Practice Partner of Data, Analytics & AI at FH, writes, “Tableau is very flexible and easy to learn. It has drag-and-drop function analytics, and its design is very good.”

Salesforce

Sample Customers

Infocom Corporation, Dymatrix Consulting Group, Soluzione Informatiche, MMI Agency, Estanislao Training and Solutions, Vialis AG

Accenture, Adobe, Amazon.com, Bank of America, Charles Schwab Corp, Citigroup, Coca-Cola Company, Cornell University, Dell, Deloitte, Duke University, eBay, Exxon Mobil, Fannie Mae, Ferrari, French Red Cross, Goldman Sachs, Google, Government of Canada, HP, Intel, Johns Hopkins Hospital, Macy's, Merck, The New York Times, PayPal, Pfizer, US Army, US Air Force, Skype, and Walmart.

Find out what your peers are saying about Knime, Weka, IBM and others in Data Mining. Updated: March 2025.

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