Power BI vs. Tableau: Which BI tool would you choose?

We are living in a world where data is exceeding to a monstrous level, and the need to tackle and find the gold from the chaff is what we need for our modern businesses. Enterprises daily have to make essential business decisions upon which the entire functionality of the organization depends. To help them make better and much more effective data-driven decisions, companies rely on business intelligence tools to get robust data visualization insights.  

The most prominent leading BI tools are Power BI and Tableau. You might have heard any one of them or both; if so, you should also know which BI tool might be right for you and your business? Power BI is a reasonably recent invention by Microsoft and got introduced in 2013. Whereas, Tableau is a decade older and a highly advanced BI tool that provides prowess in its data visualization and gets introduced in 2003.  

Although there are other powerful BI tools in the data visualization industry, the most widely used and popular BI tools are Power BI and Tableau. In this article, we will discuss in detail why these two tools have taken their seat so firmly in the BI world and which BI tool might be the best fit for your business. 

Let's evaluate both BI tools (Power BI and Tableau) based on the below factors:- 

Functionality and Deployment 

Power BI functions on a SaaS (software as a service) model and is closely related to Excel Office 365, and its integration brings office 365 users to Power BI platforms. In addition, Power Apps and Power Automate also work in integration with power BI which is sufficient in providing end-to-end business intelligence needs. However, when it comes to power BI's strength in handling large datasets, it's slightly inferior to what Tableau BI systems can provide. Power BI functions well with limited data and provides excellent insights. Moreover, Power BI isn't successful with on-premise deployment. 

On the other hand, Tableau is very flexible with its approach to business intelligence anticipated requirements and works well with Cloud storage and on-premise data storage systems, and is more suitable when working with large data warehouses. But at times, it lacks functionality in offering automatic refreshing reports to its users, which is a significant problem for users who cannot create static layouts and data tables.  

Data visualization  

Both Power BI and Tableau are excellent in their ability to depict data visually and bring insights. However, being a decade older BI tool, Tableau has evolved more finely with superior data visualizations. Tableau is known for its visualization prowess which gets seen in its diverse domains like data preparation, data exploration, user interface, interactive visuals, and so on. Although compared to Tableau, Power BI’s data visualization doesn’t match Tableau’s data visualization capabilities.  

Data Modeling 

Data modeling is necessary to define relationships and join data tables, bringing the most compelling insights using multiple dimensions. Power BI is an expert in data models, as it supports data models with various dimensions. Whereas, Tableau falls short in supporting multiple fact tables with more than one dimension. Data modeling is the core in Power BI, whereas, in Tableau, it is quite recently developed and less efficient than Power BI's data modeling capabilities.  

Regarding defining data relationships, using multiple fields is possible in Tableau, whereas in Power BI, users can use only a single field to define data relationships.  

Pricing 

The greatest thing about Power BI is that it's free to use. Even companies can use Power BI service online version for free by adding their company's email. Power BI has one free and two paid plans, including a pro version that costs around $9.99 per user per month and allows users to share reports and dashboards with others.  

The premium plan gets divided into two subcategories and costs according to the required capacity. For a single user, a premium plan costs around $20 per month, and per capacity cost around $4,995 per month. Premium plan based on capacity is for large businesses, whose requirements are higher for advanced administration, deployment controls, cloud computing, and cloud storage resources.  

One of the most significant drawbacks of using Tableau is its price, even though its functionality and visuals are pretty advanced. Its basic plan, "Tableau Creator," starts at $70 per month per user, allowing authorship on the reports. Tableau's pricing plans are 7 times higher than Power BI's, and the user has to pay annually; there is no monthly subscription.  

Conclusion 

Power BI and Tableau are strong competitive BI tools in the data visualization industry. Power BI is much ahead in generating massive market reach and has gained quite an influence due to Office 365. Power BI has been announced as a leader in Gartner's magic quadrant. Although Tableau has also been the leader in the magic quadrant, its reach is not as broad as Power BI. Tableau offers incomparable data visuals, and its ability to take in large data sets and simplify it has placed it in one of the best BI tools in the BI world.  

Now it's up to you to choose which BI tool might best fit your business needs. It depends on your budget and how much functionality you would require. So, the battle between which BI tool is better is in your hands now!