
BI platformSample
Looker Studio
Google’s free, browser-based dashboard tool (formerly Data Studio), strongest with Google Analytics, Ads, Sheets and BigQuery.
Licence
Freemium
Built by
Business users
Languages
Calculated fields
Runs on
Browser (cloud)
Scores
Out of 5. The tick marks the average for BI platforms in the library.
- Ease of use
- 5
- Visual control
- 3
- Interactivity
- 3
- Sharing
- 5
- Governance
- 2
- Low cost
- 5
- Data scale
- 2
Strengths
- Free to start, nothing to install
- Shared like a Google Doc
- Many connectors, including partner connectors
Limitations
- Slows down with large or blended data
- Limited governance and version control
- Basic calculation and statistical features
Best for
- Marketing and web analytics reporting
- Small teams on Google Workspace
Other BI platforms
Power BI
Microsoft
Microsoft’s BI platform: model data in Power BI Desktop, publish interactive reports to the Power BI service and share them across Microsoft 365.
FreemiumDAXPower Query M
Tableau
Salesforce
A visual analytics platform built around drag-and-drop exploration, known for polished and highly interactive dashboards.
CommercialCalculated fieldsLOD expressions

Qlik Sense
Qlik
A BI platform built on Qlik’s associative engine: every selection shows at once which values are related, and which are not, across the whole dataset.
CommercialQlik load scriptSet analysis