Metabase is a popular open-source business intelligence (BI) tool that anyone can quickly install to set up a basic BI system in their local environment. Metabase is targeted as a self-service BI platform for business users without IT, Database, or technical skill sets. In this article, we cover an overview to help you do business intelligence with Metabase.
Table of content
1. What is Metabase?
Metabase is an open-source, web-based business intelligence tool that lets you analyze data from various destinations and sources. It also follows a simple and fast setup process to provide clear business information straight from the database. Its data visualization capabilities are exceptional and can be showcased in a user-friendly way - without using SQL. With Metabase, you can easily share live dashboards, automated reports, and questions with the rest of your team.
2. Why Metabase?
Metabase is an easy-to-use BI tool that allows users to ask questions about the data and display the answers in various graphs to easily read and process information.
Users can explore data, drill down into charts, reports and graphs, apply filters and uncover key insights to make robust data-driven decisions.
Metabase helps build and deliver reports to customers faster with embedded reporting capabilities that facilitate quick development and iteration cycles.
Insights can be shared with other team members to facilitate collaboration.
3. Highlight Features
Metabase is an all-in-one platform with many features that will solve your business intelligence and analytics needs. Some of the features include:
Collecting data from multiple data sources: MySQL, Postgres, Mongo, SQL Server, AWS Redshift, Google BigQuery, Druid, H2, SQLite, Oracle, Crate, Google Analytics.
Offering an extensive array of graphical data visualisations for precise, understandable reports: With a strong focus on UI and UX, Metabase excels at presenting data and changes in a clear and immediately understandable style.
Syncing data: Metabase automatically updates from the data source on an hourly basis, but you can also manually adjust the sync time. Dashboards can also be set to update at specified intervals.
Supporting SQL Mode for writing simple and complex queries using the query editor.
Receiving periodic alerts via email or Slack for dashboards or queries via Dashboard subscriptions: Metabase will automatically create reports about data changes in your database with alerts.
Sharing dashboard or queries by link: Your Metabase must be hosted on a server, and recipients must have Metabase accounts to co-create, use and organize visual collections and data sets.
Set constraints and permissions on certain tables for different users to protect data.
4. Pricing
The pricing for Metabase starts at $85 per month. Metabase has 3 different plans:
Startup (Metabase Cloud) at $85 per month.
Business (Metabase Cloud) at $500 per month.
Enterprise (Metabase Cloud) starts at $15K per year.
Metabase also offers a free open-source plan free trials and with limited features. Learn more about Metabase pricing.
5. Limitations
Metabase has some drawbacks that could make or break a specific use case:
Quite advanced deployment of the self-hosted open-source version
Lacks dedicated customer support
Slow data rendering if multiple users access it simultaneously
Lacks advanced dashboarding capabilities
Cannot combine data sources in a query
Limited and scope data governance
Limited granularity and ad-hoc options
6. Conclusion
I hope this article can help you make a decision when choosing to use Metabase for your business intelligence needs. If you’re a small or medium size business and are searching for an open-source business intelligence tool, Metabase is an ideal option. It’s actively developed, and new features are released every few months.
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Alternatives
Although Metabase is an effective business intelligence tool, numerous other tools support data collection and analysis for businesses. Depending on your needs, you might be able to pick the right option to replace or use alongside Metabase.
Data Insider Rocket.BI: Rocket.BI is a good alternative to Metabase as it is also an open-source business intelligence solution of Data Insider specifically designed for analytical databases. However, it offers a better comprehensive self-service capability and performs advanced data analysis, ad hoc, and more. See us introducing Rocket.BI
Apache Superset is an open-source software application for data exploration and data visualization that is able to handle data at petabyte scale. Here is an article introducing Apache Superset
Looker is a business intelligence software and big data analytics platform that helps you easily explore, analyze, and share real-time business analytics. Discover more about Looker here
Here is a summary comparison table between Metabase and other alternatives:
​ | Metabase | Rocket.BI | Superset | Looker |
Data Visualization | Lacks advanced dashboarding capabilities | Fully customizable informative reports | Extensive dashboard exploration | Interactive visualization capabilities |
Data Integration | Multiple data sources | Highly diverse data sources with no-code ETL | NoSQL data sources are not supported | Multiple data sources and deployment methods |
Drag-and-drop Interface | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
User Access Control | Users and groups | Role and Contribution | Admin and Gamma users | Users and groups |
Working with CSV/Google Sheets | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Advanced Analytics Function | No | Yes | No | No |
Join tables from different databases | No | Yes | No | Yes |
Dynamic Metric Control | No | Yes | No | No |
Pricing | From $17/user/month with a free self-hosted open-source option | From $9/user/month with unlimited free trials | From $20/user/month with a free open-source option | Customized pricing around $300-$500/user/month |
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