Apache Spark vs. Looker

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Apache Spark
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Apache Spark is a multi-language engine for executing data engineering, data science, and machine learning on single-node machines or clusters.N/A
Looker
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Looker is a BI application with an analytics-oriented application server that sits on top of relational data stores. It includes an end-user interface for exploring data, a reusable development paradigm for data discovery, and an API for supporting data in other systems.N/A
Pricing
Apache SparkLooker
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Apache SparkLooker
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeRequired
Additional DetailsMust contact sales team for pricing.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Apache SparkLooker
Considered Both Products
Apache Spark
Chose Apache Spark
There are a few newer frameworks for general processing like Flink, Beam, frameworks for streaming like Samza and Storm, and traditional Map-Reduce. I think Spark is at a sweet spot where its clearly better than Map-Reduce for many workflows yet has gotten a good amount of …
Looker

No answer on this topic

Features
Apache SparkLooker
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
7.5
133 Ratings
9% below category average
Pixel Perfect reports00 Ratings6.6109 Ratings
Customizable dashboards00 Ratings8.4132 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates00 Ratings7.6114 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
7.1
131 Ratings
12% below category average
Drill-down analysis00 Ratings6.6127 Ratings
Formatting capabilities00 Ratings6.8129 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages00 Ratings5.955 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration00 Ratings8.8130 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
8.0
127 Ratings
3% below category average
Publish to Web00 Ratings7.7105 Ratings
Publish to PDF00 Ratings8.1112 Ratings
Report Versioning00 Ratings7.983 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling00 Ratings8.5109 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
6.6
127 Ratings
19% below category average
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)00 Ratings7.7123 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization00 Ratings7.5109 Ratings
Predictive Analytics00 Ratings4.66 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
7.4
127 Ratings
14% below category average
Multi-User Support (named login)00 Ratings7.8119 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model00 Ratings7.3104 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)00 Ratings7.3121 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control00 Ratings7.459 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
Apache Spark
-
Ratings
Looker
5.4
94 Ratings
36% below category average
Responsive Design for Web Access00 Ratings5.490 Ratings
Mobile Application00 Ratings5.01 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile00 Ratings6.084 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Apache SparkLooker
Small Businesses

No answers on this topic

Yellowfin
Yellowfin
Score 8.7 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Cloudera Manager
Cloudera Manager
Score 9.9 out of 10
Reveal
Reveal
Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
IBM Analytics Engine
IBM Analytics Engine
Score 7.1 out of 10
Kyvos Semantic Layer
Kyvos Semantic Layer
Score 9.5 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Apache SparkLooker
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(24 ratings)
8.2
(132 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(1 ratings)
9.2
(8 ratings)
Usability
8.0
(4 ratings)
8.8
(12 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
6.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
8.7
(4 ratings)
8.8
(14 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Professional Services
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Apache SparkLooker
Likelihood to Recommend
Apache
Well suited: To most of the local run of datasets and non-prod systems - scalability is not a problem at all. Including data from multiple types of data sources is an added advantage. MLlib is a decently nice built-in library that can be used for most of the ML tasks. Less appropriate: We had to work on a RecSys where the music dataset that we used was around 300+Gb in size. We faced memory-based issues. Few times we also got memory errors. Also the MLlib library does not have support for advanced analytics and deep-learning frameworks support. Understanding the internals of the working of Apache Spark for beginners is highly not possible.
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Google
When data drives potential for new orders, Looker earns its place in our tech stack. If, on the other hand, we are hoping for pipeline generation, Looker is useful if you are willing to repeatedly go check customer utilizations .... it is not appropriate if you are hoping to automate data analysis for this purpose.
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Pros
Apache
  • Rich APIs for data transformation making for very each to transform and prepare data in a distributed environment without worrying about memory issues
  • Faster in execution times compare to Hadoop and PIG Latin
  • Easy SQL interface to the same data set for people who are comfortable to explore data in a declarative manner
  • Interoperability between SQL and Scala / Python style of munging data
Read full review
Google
  • Show visited pages - sessions, pageviews - which programs are viewed the most.
  • Displays session source/medium views to see where users are coming from.
  • It shows the video titles, URLs, and event counts so we can monitor the performance of our videos.
  • It gives a graphic face to the numbers, such as using bar charts, pie graphs, and other charts to show user trends or which channels are driving engagement.
  • Our clients like to see the top pages visited for a month.
  • I like the drop-and-drag approach, and building charts is a little easier than it was before.
Read full review
Cons
Apache
  • Memory management. Very weak on that.
  • PySpark not as robust as scala with spark.
  • spark master HA is needed. Not as HA as it should be.
  • Locality should not be a necessity, but does help improvement. But would prefer no locality
Read full review
Google
  • Documentation is scarce, and very difficult to find when you need it.
  • Pricing is unclear, particularly as you look to scale your reports across the business.
  • Data from other sources is not represented in the system as well as first party Google services.
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Likelihood to Renew
Apache
Capacity of computing data in cluster and fast speed.
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Google
I give it this rating because it deems as effective, I am able to complete majority of my tasks using this app. It is very helpful when analyzing the data provided and shown in the app and it's just overall a great app for Operational use, despite the small hiccups it has (live data).
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Usability
Apache
If the team looking to use Apache Spark is not used to debug and tweak settings for jobs to ensure maximum optimizations, it can be frustrating. However, the documentation and the support of the community on the internet can help resolve most issues. Moreover, it is highly configurable and it integrates with different tools (eg: it can be used by dbt core), which increase the scenarios where it can be used
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Google
Looker is relatively easy to use, even as it is set up. The customers for the front-end only have issues with the initial setup for looker ml creations. Other "looks" are relatively easy to set up, depending on the ETL and the data which is coming into Looker on a regular basis.
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Reliability and Availability
Apache
No answers on this topic
Google
No objections
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Performance
Apache
No answers on this topic
Google
Somehow resources heavy, both on server and client. I recommned at least 50Mbs data rate and high performance desktop comouter to be abke to run comolex tasks and configure larger amount of data. On the other hand, the client does not need to worry when viewing, the performance is usually ok
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Support Rating
Apache
1. It integrates very well with scala or python. 2. It's very easy to understand SQL interoperability. 3. Apache is way faster than the other competitive technologies. 4. The support from the Apache community is very huge for Spark. 5. Execution times are faster as compared to others. 6. There are a large number of forums available for Apache Spark. 7. The code availability for Apache Spark is simpler and easy to gain access to. 8. Many organizations use Apache Spark, so many solutions are available for existing applications.
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Google
Never had to work with support for issues. Any questions we had, they would respond promptly and clearly. The one-time setup was easy, by reading documentation. If the feature is not supported, they will add a feature request. In this case, LDAP support was requested over OKTA. They are looking into it.
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Implementation Rating
Apache
No answers on this topic
Google
Very satisfied, easy to implement
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Apache
Spark in comparison to similar technologies ends up being a one stop shop. You can achieve so much with this one framework instead of having to stitch and weave multiple technologies from the Hadoop stack, all while getting incredibility performance, minimal boilerplate, and getting the ability to write your application in the language of your choosing.
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Google
Looker Studio, you can easily report on data from various sources without programming. Looker Studio is available at no charge for creators and report viewers. Enterprise customers who upgrade to Looker Studio Pro will receive support and expanded administrative features, including team content management. So it's good.
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Apache
No answers on this topic
Google
Perfect price to performance
Read full review
Return on Investment
Apache
  • Business leaders are able to take data driven decisions
  • Business users are able access to data in near real time now . Before using spark, they had to wait for at least 24 hours for data to be available
  • Business is able come up with new product ideas
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Google
  • Looker has a poignant impact on our business's ROI objectives. As an advertising exchange we have specific goals for daily requests and fill, and having premade Looks to monitor this is an integral piece of our operational capability
  • To facilitate an efficient monthly billing cycle in our organization, Looker is essential to track estimated revenue and impression delivery by publisher. Without the Looks we have set up, we would spend considerably more time and effort segmenting revenue by vertical.
  • Looker's unique value proposition is making analytical tools more digestible to people without conventional analytical experience. Other competing tools like Tableau require considerably more training and context to successfully use, and the ability to easily plot different visualizations is one of its greatest selling points.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Looker Screenshots

Screenshot of a Looker dashboard with a geo chart.