Tableau Reviews

We are into the distribution of licenses, and we also have a services arm that takes care of the implementation.

Our customers use it for different use cases, such as fleet management, HR analytics, and retail analytics. They also use it for forecasting and predictive modeling. In the EMEA region, the analytics market isn't very mature. Therefore, many customers just restrict themselves to basic statistics in Tableau. At the most, they go for the predictive functionality, which is inbuilt in Tableau.

Its deployment depends on the use case. Some customers use it on the cloud, which is Tableau Online, and some of them go for Tableau Server, which is on-premises.

Our customers love the visual capabilities on top of it and the ability to explain and get the required data. There is no other product like Tableau in the business intelligence and analytics space.

Tableau is an end-to-end analytics platform, and it is doing a pretty good job in terms of connecting to the data and analyzing it. It can, however, do better in terms of data management and the ETL features, which are not on the advanced analytics or machine learning side. Tableau Prep is where users would want to see more advancements. They can improve Tableau Prep, which is an analytic platform tool for data cleansing. People who work with data spend most of their time curating the data. Cleaning up the data and getting it ready for analysis is what takes the most time. If Tableau can invest more time in improving the Tableau Prep platform, it would be great. 

Previously, Tableau didn't have the functionality for writing to a database. So, you couldn't really alter the database tables and write to your database, but they fixed that in one of the very recent releases. However, it isn't really advanced and should be improved.

I have been using Tableau for three years.

With respect to stability as a performance-driven metric, it is wonderful. Tableau is being used by one of the biggest gaming companies. Stability has mostly got to do with:

• Connectivity to your different data and database platforms
• The amount of data that you're dealing with

The Tableau platform can handle both of these because there is no limit per se in terms of the data size. However, a big fee is a challenge for everybody, and there is no escape from it. 

Tableau has recently acquired Hyper, which speeds up the performance. Hyper is also something that Facebook uses. Therefore, when it comes to stability, it is one of the best solutions in the market. You don't need to worry about it. 

If there are some glitches because a huge amount of data is coming in, there is an inbuilt performance monitoring option in Tableau where it actively monitors every user click on the platform. It will show you the results on the fly and tell you the part of your dashboarding or activity that is consuming the most memory. This way, you can optimize its performance.

It is scalable. The beauty of this product is that it is for everyone. Tableau is a good fit for small enterprises to large enterprises. It can also be used in small departments of a company. The mission of Tableau is to help people see and understand data. So, it is not only for the IT people who understand the technicality of it. It is end-user-centric, and therefore, everybody can use it. It can be used by the marketing, finance, credit, and sales departments. The developers, data scientists, statisticians, and other people can also use it. It is for everyone. 

You can scale it vertically or horizontally, or you can go both ways. You can have a single node configuration and add more RAM or more memory to the same node, or you can have a multi-node configuration. Both are supported. You can add nodes depending on the number of users who want to consume the analytics.

I am not completely aware of it because I mostly handle pre-sales, but I do know that you can raise a support ticket with Tableau very easily. They have 24/7 support, and the priority of your use case depends on the agreement or the contract that you have with Tableau. There is Tier 1, 2, and 3 support.

I have used SQL on different platforms. I have also worked on Python and R to generate plots. I can't stress enough on the fact that as compared to other solutions, Tableau is much easier, clearer, and more intuitive while using your data. You can actually see every bit of your data. They are able to achieve their mission and help people see and understand data. 

Its initial setup is very easy because Tableau has a new graphical user interface, and there is no need for you to script or code your installation process. It only takes a day to set up everything, and it does most of the configuration on its own. It is a very easy process.

In terms of maintenance, there are product upgrades that get released every quarter. It has quarterly upgrades and updates because it is enhanced so rapidly. They spend 25% of their annual revenue on R&D. They have constant interaction with its broad community, and they constantly take in user feedback. If there is a maintenance requirement or some issue with the product, most of the time, it automatically gets resolved in the next upgrade.

Tableau has core-based and user-based licensing, and it is tied to scalability. The core-based licensing is about you buying a certain number of cores, and there is no restriction on the number of users who can use Tableau. The restriction is only on the number of cores. In user-based subscription licensing, there is a restriction on the number of users. Big companies and government organizations with a lot of users typically go for core-based licensing.

User-based subscription licensing is a more common model. It has user roles such as creator, explorer, and viewer. A creator is someone who does the groundwork or development work. An explorer is someone who is into middle management but is not technically savvy, such as a category head. A viewer is like a typical decision-maker in senior management. For each role, Tableau is priced differently. The viewer role has the minimum price, and the creator role has the highest price. This pricing is available on their website. Everybody can see it.

I would advise checking your minimum configuration. There is a specific hardware configuration that you need before installing the software, which varies based on your development, test, and production. You should also decide on whether you need Tableau Online or Tableau Server. Tableau Online supports most of Tableau Server functionalities, but there are some limitations for certain data connections and refreshes. This is something that you need to be aware of while choosing between Tableau Online and Tableau Server.

Sometimes, organizations that can spend or have a good budget just go for Tableau Online because they don't have to worry about maintenance and upgrades. You're already on the latest version, and everything is taken care of by Tableau. The trade-off is that sometimes you may not have your refreshes and connectivity in the widest section possible, which is something that you can do with Tableau Server, but it happens only in rare cases.

It is the best product at the moment. If you look at Gartner's report for BI and analytics, Tableau has been the leader for nine years in a row, which is a very big achievement. There is nothing else like it. You will see Microsoft above Tableau, but Microsoft provides a product suite, whereas Tableau is just BI and analytics. It is not an apple to apple comparison. 

I would rate Tableau a nine out of ten.

We use the solution to capture all the data from the business, we use it for many things.

It is a complete solution allowing a lot of integrations, different graphics, multiple operations and analyzes our date and gives us meaning from it. 

Some of the functionality of the dashboard can be difficult to operate and the color pallets are limited. They need to improve the icons and the filters, because they look too old, resembling Excel from 1997. It would be helpful if the solution was less difficult to use.

The stability was good, it worked well.

The scalability is not the best because the software is complicated to learn, this limits the number of people using the product.

I did not use the support. However, there are many different platforms out there, such as forums on the internet, that you can get information that you require for assistance.

The setup is really easy but it is hard to use it.

The deployment is easy, it installs like a standard piece of software would.

The solution is very expensive. If you have many users then it is going to cost your company a lot of money.

When purchasing the product, start out by only getting a minimal amount of licenses. This solution is not like Microsoft Office where many people know how to use it and can learn fairly quickly. This solution takes time to learn, buying too many licenses could be a waste of money if you do not have employees that can use it. Additionally, when you are using the solution work closely with stakeholders to make sure what you are processing what they are looking for by using the mock-up feature. If you do not then you could have completed a lot of work that they did not want.

I rate Tableau a nine out of ten.

We use Tableau for working with data.

Compared to other products, visualization features are really good. When it comes to data availability and visualization, some tools like PowerBI give 20% to the visualization and 80% to the data. With Tableau, it gives 80% to the visualization and 20% to the data.

All of the BI tools have graphical interfaces but when it comes to the learning environment, not every tool has everything. To be the best in the market, Tableau has to improve its user interface and also look into developing implementing the best machine learning algorithms.

Including data storage capabilities would be helpful.

During the data crunching phase, it takes time for Tableau to connect, integrate, and download the data. In general, it takes a lot of time for the ETL process.

Increasing the trial period to six months would allow people to better learn and assess the tool to determine whether it suits their needs.

Given the price of BI tools, Tableau should consider giving a scholarship to people so that they can learn how to work with the tool. It would be helping some of the people who lost their jobs during this pandemic. If the users learn and become certified on Tableau, it would help to get more people interested in the tool.

I have been working with Tableau for approximately five years.

The price of Tableau is reasonable compared to other products. One thing to keep in mind is that price is not the only thing to consider. The first time that you want to test any BI tool, you have to give the user some time to work with it and learn it. This means that the trial period should be as long as possible.

Many startups can't afford most of the BI tools, so they are looking for open-source platforms.

We are currently focused on building a data lake. Whether it is ultimately a data lake, data warehouse, or other data storage, we will require tools. There are several that we are looking into now. It is a collective effort with the data and the tools that we have, and what BI tools are necessary and required. Some of the solutions we are looking at are Alteryx, Azure, and Qlik Sense, in addition to Tableau.

With Qlik Sense, there is an ETL component and there is also a data storage option.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

I used this solution for providing dashboard analytics from MySQL data.

This solution has improved insights into quantitative data.

The most valuable features are the user filters for data security and subscriptions to distribute images of reports.

The cost of the solution should be improved.

Reports should be downloadable as PDF files. Emails containing images of dashboards can  be scheduled, but there is still demand for creating printable PDF snapshot views of dashboards. UPDATE - In fairness to Tableau, with the right design, dashboards that are downloadable can be created ad-hoc.

I have been using this solution for three years.

Good

Good - by licebnse model can be replaced by an enterprise model solution for large numbers of licenses.

Good - customer success program is a great service

I've looked briefly at Google Data Studios (good basic solution) and Amazon QuickSight which also looks good.

Check that you need the functionality that you pay for - Tableau is not cheap. 

No

None

Our primary use case of Tableau is for reporting purposes for our clients. We provide analytics for clients, giving them the ability to build reports. We also have our own product which provides the data analytics platform. I'm a product manager and we are a customer of Tableau. 

I like the data flow and the ability to easily manage the data. The solution also has good building capabilities. When we apply filters, we tend to order different reports and it becomes easier for us.

The solution requires a lot of user training before reports can be created. That can make things difficult and require us to have Tableau specialists. It's difficult for a newbie to start developing reports. 

Tableau queries and analytics, as well as development could be improved. The solution could also include an option to incorporate more open source libraries. I know Tableau has this closed loop so they might not want to provide that but if they did have integration capabilities with open-source libraries, I think that would be great. 

I've been using this solution for three and a half years. 

This is a stable solution. 

This is a scalable solution. 

We don't generally need technical support although the clients do but I'm not sure if they provide good service. There are Tableau videos we can use if necessary. Whenever we need some solution we go to Tableau training and go through the videos.

People who have always used Tableau want to stick with it but those just getting into the field will look at options that can provide almost a similar functionality with the main difference being the cost. It's a trade-off between the different features offered on the solutions in this market and the cost. 

The initial setup is straightforward and can probably be completed in two or three hours. The client is responsible for maintaining their own solution, we only implement. If they want to upgrade the platform, that's their responsibility. 

Licensing is charged per user, I believe. Even if they're just providing you a minimum specification there will be added costs if you need more processing power. If you want to connect to the data sources, then that needs to be included in the complete solution. It's an adaptive cost. 

I would recommend anyone looking at this solution to check the validity of the business case. If you don't have a very expensive business case and you're going to be on the data processing side, I wouldn't necessarily recommend the product. But if you have standard templates and can just put in the data, export the defaults and send it, then it's a good solution because there's no complexity.

I would rate this solution a seven out of 10. 

The most valuable features are:

• Ease of setup
• Ability to create visualizations
• Level of interaction.

The users required no training after visualizations have been presented to them.

There are some areas where finding answers required asking specific individuals and searching through many emails. Tableau has allowed us to combine and visualize data from many entry points and provide users with a single source of consistent and reliable information.

While noted that the product is specifically designed for visualization, it would be the perfect tool if it had more ETL features.

My company has been researching a BI tool for the past year. We came across Tableau and have been using the public version for approximately six months.

There have not been any areas of instability, thus far. The identified areas were a result of a lack of knowledge.

Based on the analysis currently being done, the public version is sufficiently meeting our needs.

Technical support has been awesome. We met a partner based in Trinidad and they have been providing us with assistance as we need it.

This is our first visualization solution being used. Attempts were made on another platform, but setup and use of tool were a huge challenge for the team.

The initial setup was very straightforward. The team was able to follow the videos posted on the Tableau website and required no technical assistance from the Tableau team.

I am quite pleased that Tableau has now revised their pricing and licensing. The initial model was quite expensive but the current model allows you to scale up as you need to and it is far more attractive. The ability to license on a per user per month basis is now very affordable.

The team looked at Pentaho, Microsoft Power BI, and IBM Cognos. The members of the team who were exposed to aspects of the evaluation were far more receptive to Tableau than the others.

It is very important to do an evaluation of your users who will be interacting with the tool. Their technical abilities will determine if a cumbersome tool is suitable for them. Secondly, if you do not have the technical expertise to administer a product, then it may not be the solution for you. Some of the other tools require a high dependence on the vendor for administrative purposes.

The most attractive feature for our users is the ease of visualizing data in a meaningful manner. The ease of experimenting with different visualizations is also very useful.

The ability to load and work with large volumes of data without requiring very high level of system resources is also valuable for us.

Key users of Tableau are from the Internal Audit team. Introduction of the tool has allowed the team to move away from data sampling to working with the entire data population in most cases. More importantly, the ability to present the analysis results in a visual manner to stakeholders, which has enhanced the ease of communicating the impact of the audit findings.

Improvement is required in the way filters operate when applied on large data sets. Having the ability to select and deselect filters without having to retrace the original path would make it easier to demonstrate the results.

More than two years.

The maximum volume of data we have connected is approximately six million records each having about 130 data fields. We did not encounter stability issues when connecting to a pre-downloaded copy of the data. However, on trying to access the live data (a flat file system), the operation was very slow.

No.

With reference to the issue stated above, we noted that Tableau did not attempt to provide any resolution for the issue. We felt that they just left it with the local vendor to sort out the issue (which was never resolved).

We have used (and continue to use) ACL for data analytics. However for simple analytics, and in particular, data visualization, we prefer to use Tableau. We have also seen that users are able to understand Tableau faster than ACL.

The initial setup was for the desktop version of the tool connecting to Excel files and stand-alone databases at the back end. We did not have any issues with this.

However, on attempting to move to the server version, we faced issues with data connectivity for our core ERP which were not resolved. Attempting to connect to the Oracle HRMS module went without a hitch, and within a few seconds, we were able to perform live data analysis without any degradation in performance. Connecting to our core ERP (Kerridge Autoline, now known as CDK Autoline) failed due to ODBC driver version issues (we presume).

The Desktop and Professional version pricing is straightforward. Cannot comment on the Server licensing aspect.

Qlik Sense and ACL.

Thoroughly test your data connectivity requirements to make sure everything works well.

From an end user perspective, it is a very easy tool to use.

Data connectivity, data transformation, and web editing, because being able to connect to a variety of data sources and bring them together, and store that dataset in an environment where others can also access it, consistently, drives a lot of self-service within the organization without a lot of fear of dispersion of truth. The Web Editing capabilities allow us to grant end users enough capabilities for them to do self-serve discovery without the added cost of needing to get everyone desktop licenses.

Still working to get properly implemented at my current organization. However, it has helped my previous locations be able to get a pre-built visualization that anchors them on the truth, with access to datasets for them to explore and continuously push the envelope on new inquiries. The more questions we ask, and get answers to, the more informed we are to make better decisions, which leads to revenue growth and cost reductions.

At the organizational level, increasing the servers' capabilities to support us as an enterprise tool: data management, semantic layer, and integration with other collaboration tools. At the analyst level: Better connection with Python data frames.

I have used it since 2011.

No.

Yes. In earlier versions, it was tough to scale without a lot of expense. With the addition of Web Editing, you can control your costs better and keep your usage to the things they do the most frequently. Still experiencing challenges in the VM world, but sounds like they are exploring options to address this.

If you are fortunate enough to have a dedicated technical guy, it is great. If you have to work through the common help desk, it is tough. In most cases, analysts have problems they need to solve right away; having them spend hours pouring through KB files to only find something similar, but not exact, and then waiting 5-10 days to get resolution from a help desk agent generates a lot of frustration on the team.

Several companies ago, we were using Cognos and switched to Tableau due to ease of deployment, total cost of ownership. At my last three places, Tableau was already in-house.

Not applicable.

Really work across the organization to understand the user personas of your audience. Who is a builder, who is an audience member? Being able to set up the server licensing right (core vs user seats) is the fastest way to manage your costs. Paying for users you never setup or buying expensive desktop licenses for users who can solve their users with web editing on the server are the two biggest expenses.

Not applicable.

First and foremost, outline the value proposition of BI. Getting a plan on whether you are going to go with a centralized, decentralized, or blended approach will help aid you in how you can maximize the tool. On its own merits, it is a great tool. Most failures come from a mismatch in the organizational needs and the implementation approach.