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Metabase vs Microsoft Power BI 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

Metabase
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
26th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Power BI
Ranking in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
319
Ranking in other categories
Reporting (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the BI (Business Intelligence) Tools category, the mindshare of Metabase is 0.8%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Power BI is 21.6%, down from 22.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Ibrahim Izz El-Deen - PeerSpot reviewer
Modern analytics tool enhances user interactions with neat visualizations for improved decision-making
One area for improvement could be in offering more advanced features even in the open-source edition or making the paid versions more cost-effective. Data scalability, especially if the data grows, requires manual infrastructure management, which could be improved. Increased customization and visualization options in the open-source edition would be beneficial. Additionally, it might be helpful if more complex queries and stored procedures were supported.
James Balbach - PeerSpot reviewer
Robust system consistently elevates data visualization and seamlessly updates with user-driven advancements
Power BI is a general-use visualization system. I can express the performance of our network through high-level key performance indicators. It allows me to show detailed improvements in quality and safety and patient experience. I create improvement dashboards for task forces and work teams. I have built analytic dashboards that guide analytics, enabling research and dataset manipulation.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Metabase's key advantage is its modern approach to business intelligence."
"I rate the solution’s stability a nine out of ten."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used to query data into Metabase. I think it is very useful and handy for a novice."
"It is easy for a new user to learn the tool."
"In the process of using data there is the Extract, Transform and Load (ETL). For extracting we are using another software, for transforming we are using our own coding in C#, and then we use Microsoft BI for loading the information. Microsoft BI displays information very well."
"The flexibility of the program is valuable. We are able to add other information to the reporting information and expand upon it."
"They find Power BI's data pull mechanism to be sufficient and cost-effective, especially considering the stability it provides. In comparison with other solutions, Power BI stands out as a fantastic choice. Therefore, I would definitely recommend sticking with the Pro license."
"PowerBI – Self-service BI."
"It's a pretty scalable product."
"With Power BI, you're able to store your data within spreadsheets and SharePoints, and then have Power BI pull the data out and report on it. So we actually saved a ton of money not needing to load the data into databases, which is a big prerequisite for many other reporting tools."
"Power BI allows me to show detailed improvements in quality and safety and patient experience."
"We encourage end users to use Power BI because it's quite easy for them to interact with the menus and the navigation bar. Even for ordinary users, they can create their own dashboard using Power BI."
 

Cons

"The solution could provide more customization."
"One area for improvement could be in offering more advanced features even in the open-source edition or making the paid versions more cost-effective."
"The tool must be made more user-friendly."
"I think there is a need to add a few more advanced visuals in the tool. There are a standard set of visuals in the tool which are available."
"Microsoft Power BI was born native on the cloud, however, it's quite difficult when it has to connect to on-premise data sources."
"I would like to see the product offer more graphics to impact different audiences."
"The licensing needs improvement. There needs to be a middle option between Pro and Premium versions."
"The real-time data refresh capabilities is one of the things I had issues with"
"Needs single sign-on."
"The initial setup is a little bit technical."
"The visualization aspect, while being the most visible to business users, also happens the be the weakest point in the entire Microsoft BI stack."
"The product doesn't support unstructured data. It doesn't support video, streaming, and strings of files."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Using the open-source edition of Metabase on AWS EC2 cost us around $29 per month for the EC2 instance, which was affordable."
"I would not say it is a cheap tool, but it's viable."
"The product is open-sourced."
"Make it low in cost. It is a no-brainer!"
"While Power BI is generally a paid product, particularly for enterprise features and scalability, you can start with the free version and still achieve significant functionality."
"As far as I am aware you do not need a license for the solution."
"Once the trial period for the BI service is over, the cost is approximately $10 USD per user, per month, so it's quite reasonable."
"The costs are small and the benefits are high."
"Regarding cost, the initial investment wasn't too high, but ongoing licensing could add up."
"I have never worked on licensing, but I have heard that it is reasonable."
"Its pricing is reasonable for the desktop stuff, but for enterprise-level, it is a little expensive."
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Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 4, 2015
Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho
1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
27%
Comms Service Provider
18%
Government
8%
Legal Firm
6%
Educational Organization
41%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Metabase?
Using the open-source edition of Metabase on AWS EC2 cost us around $29 per month for the EC2 instance, which was affordable.
What needs improvement with Metabase?
One area for improvement could be in offering more advanced features even in the open-source edition or making the paid versions more cost-effective. Data scalability, especially if the data grows,...
What is your primary use case for Metabase?
I used Metabase for business intelligence and analytics in my organization. We connected Metabase to AWS Athena, allowing us to query and visualize data stored in S3 buckets.
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...
Is Power BI a complete platform or only a visualization tool?
Power BI is an advanced visualization tool oriented to big data with a very complete set of widgets to visualize information, control users accessing information, the configuration of governance po...
How does Oracle OBIEE compare with Microsoft BI?
Oracle OBIEE is great in allowing design and creativity per the individual needs of the organization. Dashboards are fully customizable and very user-friendly. This solution is very stable. Oracle ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
SSRS, SSAS, MSBI, MS Reporting Services, Microsoft BI Tools, Microsoft Big Data, Power BI Pro, MS BI
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Accenture Adidas Aetna AIG Airbus Alibaba Allstate Amazon American Express Aon AT&T Audi Bank of America BASF Bayer Berkshire Hathaway Boeing Coca-Cola Comcast Cisco Coca-Cola Dell Disney Emirates Equinix FedEx Ford GE Google H&M Home Depot Honda IBM Intel JPMorgan Chase Kellogg's Kroger L'Oréal McDonald's Merck MetLife Microsoft Nike Oracle P&G PepsiCo Procter & Gamble Prudential Financial SAP Siemens Snapchat Spotify Starbucks Target Toyota T-Mobile Unilever Visa Walmart WeWork World Bank Xerox
Find out what your peers are saying about Metabase vs. Microsoft Power BI and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.