This comparison takes into account BI tools features that are important for embedding:
| Feature | Importance | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Application embeds are secure | Critical | Means that embeds cannot be accessed outside your app. All necessary security context (like user's ID) used in report's query is passed in a secure way and cannot be modified by the end user (signed/encrypted). |
| PDF/Excel/CSV exports | Critical | Exports are very important for end users. PDF export should be identical to the report's web view (layout/formatting/colors). Many BI tools don't have Excel export that preserves pivot table's layout, or don't support conditional formatting (cells colors, links). Only few BI tools support export to Excel PivotTable. |
| Live (direct) connections to data sources / filters are applied in-query | Critical | When reports are embedded it is important to display actual data to end users. This is possible only when BI tool works directly with a database (= dataset is not imported and doesn't need to be refreshed). Also this allows to utilize DW (if present) and its OLAP capabilities. Live connection also supposes query-driven filters, when you have some control over DB query generation. |
| Fixed price for unlimited users | Critical | If pricing works only per-user this can make embedded reports very expensive. Most embedded BI solutions offer fixed prices and allow any number of viewers (of embedded visuals). |
| White-labeling / CSS-theming | Critical | When you embed reports / dashboards into your app they should look like a part of your app, not like a foreign thing. CSS-theming means that you may adopt embedded visuals appearance by adding own CSS rules to match your app style. Most likely, you don't want to see BI tool's logo/brand in embeds (this is called white-labeling). |
| On-premise (self-hosted) installation | Important | Embedded visuals are parts of your app, and if they are hosted outside you cannot control their availability. For sensitive data it might be a requirement to keep it in-house, and the only way to satisfy this is usage of on-premise BI tool version that is hosted on your server and managed by your admins. |
| Version control / deployment strategy | Important | Most likely you want to use a standard development flow for embedded reports - like for other (coded) parts of your app. This means that reports are created/changed in a dev environment, then tested on staging/QA env, and then go to production env as a part of app's release. It is a big plus if data models/reports have human-readable text representation and maybe stored under the version control (git), so all changes may are tracked and may be reviewed. |
| Parameters can be hidden in embeds | Important | In this way your app can control what report parameters are available for end users. |
| Advanced pivot tables | Nice to have | Many BI tools offer only basic pivot tables; advanced capabilities usually include an ability to expand/collapse groups, pagination (if the matrix has many rows/columns), table calculations like percentages/diffs/running totals and other things. |
| Product | Price | Pros | Cons |
|---|---|---|---|
| SeekTable | $ | All must-have features are present. Powerful pivot tables with real Excel exports (preserves layout/colors) + supports unique export to Excel PivotTable.
Custom visuals (any HTML/JS) are supported in dashboards. Version control/diffs/automated deployments are supported with XML backup/restore. Very afforable pricing ($233/month, including white-labeling). |
Developers-oriented dashboards (HTML template, no code-less designer). Only basic chart types, no built-in maps (it is possible to have maps with custom visuals in dashboards). |
| Holistics.io | $ | Most must-have features for embedding are present. | Cloud-only (no self-hosted version). Pivot tables are basic (no expand/collapse). |
| Metabase | $$ | Most must-have features for embedding are present. | No PDF exports. No Excel export for pivot tables. Embedding requires "Enterprise" plan (starts from $15,000/year). |
| Mode | $$ | Most must-have features for embedding are present. | No PDF exports. Pivot tables are basic. |
| PowerBI Embedded | $$$ | Huge gallery of visual types. Enterprise features. | On-premise subscription is rather expensive (PBI Premium = $4990/month). Direct-query mode is not supported for many data sources (like MySql). No Excel export for pivot tables. No expland/collapse for pivot table columns. No diffs under text-based version control (PBIX is binary format). |
| Sisense | $$$ | All must-have features for embedding are present. | Rather expensive. Custom CSS styling is not allowed. |
| Redash | $ | Redash is simply wrong tool for embedded analytics. Many must-have capabilities are not supported: no secure embeds, no UI for non-SQL users, no control over filters in embeds, no row-level security. |
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| Apache Superset | (free) | No secure embeds (!). Many must-have capabilities are not supported. | |
| Google Data Studio | (free) | Easy to use with Google data sources (BigQuery, Analytics, Ads, Sheets), interactive features. | Cloud-only. Embedded reports always contain the Google Data Studio watermark (which cannot be removed for any $$$). Viewers needs to have Google Account (and be logged-in) for secure embedding. No Excel exports. No custom visuals. |