We compared Tableau and MicroStrategy across several parameters based on our users' reviews. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Based on the user feedback summaries, Tableau is preferred over MicroStrategy due to its superior data visualization capabilities, user-friendly interface, and strong customer service and support. Users highly value Tableau's ease of use, powerful data analysis capabilities, and ability to handle large datasets. They also appreciate Tableau's prompt and efficient support team. Additionally, the favorable pricing and positive return on investment from Tableau make it a preferred choice. On the other hand, MicroStrategy could benefit from improvements in areas such as scalability, user interface design, collaboration features, and expanded functionality.
Initial Setup: When comparing user reviews, it is evident that there are differences between Tableau and MicroStrategy in terms of the duration required for deployment, setup, and implementation phases. Some Tableau users spent separate timeframes on deployment and setup, while in MicroStrategy, these terms likely refer to the same period.
Features: Tableau is praised for its ease of use, interactive dashboards, and storytelling functionality. Meanwhile, MicroStrategy stands out for its intuitive interface, powerful visualization tools, and seamless integration with other systems.
Room For Improvement: Tableau's room for improvement lies in enhancing data visualization capabilities and offering more advanced data analysis features. Users also request improvements in customization options and menu navigation, as well as better support and documentation for beginners. On the other hand, MicroStrategy could benefit from enhancements in scalability and performance, especially with larger datasets. Users also suggest improving the user interface for a more intuitive and user-friendly design, and expanding collaboration features and data visualization options.
Pricing and ROI: Comparing the setup costs, Tableau has reasonable and efficient implementation process. MicroStrategy also offers reasonable setup costs with flexible licensing arrangements according to user experiences. In comparing the ROI between Tableau and MicroStrategy, Tableau users reported significant impact in terms of return on investment. They praised its valuable insights, data visualizations, and user-friendly interface. MicroStrategy users also found the ROI to be positive and satisfactory, with improved data analysis and decision-making capabilities.
Customer Service: Tableau's customer service is highly praised for its exceptional assistance, promptness, expertise in troubleshooting, and effectiveness in providing solutions. MicroStrategy's customer service is commended for efficient assistance, prompt response, knowledgeable staff, and proactive issue resolution. Customers highly regard both companies' customer service.
The summary above is based on interviews we conducted recently with Tableau and MicroStrategy users. To access the review's full transcripts, download our report.
"It scales well. It used to have only a max of four I-servers, but I think recently, somewhere in version 10, they doubled that, so you can have eight I-servers now."
"Tech support has been great, very responsive. We usually hear back within a day. We usually email them and that works out perfect. The right person always gets back to us."
"I have shown our users how to stop using Excel. They would create these vast Excel files, and I showed them how to do the same thing with MicroStrategy, which saves a significant amount of time for them everyday."
"Getting more data to people more quickly. Providing more flexibility for how they use the data."
"We prefer having the analytic capabilities in a single platform, like MicroStrategy provides, because it is easier. The customer gets used to one type of tool, then sticks with it."
"We pretty much use the knowledge base. We feel that Microstrategy's community is a good forum to use."
"Cube performance and easy integration with third-party tools/products, are valuable features."
"The simplicity of MicroStrategy is what I like the most."
"Very user friendly."
"It has been the best tool to work with from a self-service point of view."
"The most valuable feature is the geographic data analysis."
"It’s good for quick visualization and being able to quickly consume unstructured data to play around with."
"Tableau is an advanced specialized tool. One of the best features I've seen is the lack of an intermediate semantic layer. I think that's an advantage compared to any other tool like BusinessObjects or Power BI, which are Tableau's biggest competitors."
"Tableau's initial setup was straightforward."
"Tableau's visualization features let you present information insights quickly and practically. So it's something which I prefer with Tableau. In terms of reporting, I have to point out the sheer quality and function of the Tableau server, but the first impression is that it's a great visualization tool."
"Tableau is very flexible and easy to learn. It has drag-and-drop function analytics, and its design is very good. It is a very good tool, and it basically brings life into data with good design. We have been creating a lot of interactive visualizations and dashboards. It has a public version. There are public communities from where you can get a lot of examples for practice."
"There are a lot of offerings, and we are not fully using everything to its advantage."
"The interface you can design in MicroStrategy is great, but I feel it needs to be refreshed, add a bit more functionality. I would like to see more capabilities on the mobile side, to bring it on par with apps that you see in the App Store."
"Preparation, data loading and data management application is challenging with MicroStrategy. It lacks cube-based analytics as it is outdated, meaning there is no memory or fast processing analytics or MMA deployment."
"If you compare it with Power BI with the DAX language, it would be great to put that into MicroStrategy."
"Getting our data to work with the tool is where we are having issues."
"I know we are not competing against Tableau, but MicroStrategy needs to step up its game on the GUI side."
"Its price should be lower. In terms of features, what we have is quite encompassing right now."
"If they can make it more stable, in terms of the connectivity, that would help."
"Improvements can be made in template support. The workbook file structure is really hard to version control. If there was some sort of version control support offered particularly for workbooks, that would help big time."
"When compared to Power BI, it is less user-friendly."
"Its integration with Microsoft products such as Teams should be improved."
"There should be more widgets that would help less trained individuals create charts with less difficulty."
"The charting is overly complex in comparison with Power BI's"
"Include forecasting on table calculation fields."
"Its documentation can be improved so that a user can get a good hands-on experience. Tableau is well documented, and on their website, there are a lot of tutorials that are available for free. I started my learning process through those tutorials, but there are certain loopholes in those tutorials, which only got filled through a couple of good YouTube channels that talk about Tableau. YouTube helped me a lot. So, the documentation could be better, I understand that it is evolving day by day, and with more usage, there would be more such documentation."
"The solution could improve the scalability, it is difficult to make changes."
MicroStrategy is ranked 4th in Embedded BI with 155 reviews while Tableau is ranked 1st in Embedded BI with 290 reviews. MicroStrategy is rated 8.2, while Tableau is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of MicroStrategy writes "A robust solution for powerful data analytics". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Tableau writes "Provides fast data access with in-memory extracts, makes it easy to create visualizations, and saves time". MicroStrategy is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, IBM Cognos, SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform, Qlik Sense and Oracle OBIEE, whereas Tableau is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, Amazon QuickSight, Domo, SAS Visual Analytics and Looker. See our MicroStrategy vs. Tableau report.
See our list of best Embedded BI vendors and best BI (Business Intelligence) Tools vendors.
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