Microsoft Power BI vs. pandas

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Microsoft Power BI
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft Power BI is a visualization and data discovery tool from Microsoft. It allows users to convert data into visuals and graphics, visually explore and analyze data, collaborate on interactive dashboards and reports, and scale across their organization with built-in governance and security.
$168
per year per user
pandas
Score 10.0 out of 10
N/A
pandas is an open source, BSD-licensed library providing high-performance data structures and data analysis tools for the Python programming language. pandas is a Python package providing expressive data structures designed to make working with “relational” or “labeled” data both easier. It aims to be the fundamental high-level building block for doing practical, real-world data analysis in Python.N/A
Pricing
Microsoft Power BIpandas
Editions & Modules
Power BI Pro
$14
per month (billed annually) per user
Power BI Premium
$24
per month (billed annually) per user
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Microsoft Power BIpandas
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsPower BI Desktop is the data exploration and report authoring experience for Power BI, and is available as a free download.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Microsoft Power BIpandas
Features
Microsoft Power BIpandas
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
8.2
198 Ratings
0% above category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Pixel Perfect reports8.2169 Ratings00 Ratings
Customizable dashboards8.7197 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates7.8180 Ratings00 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
7.9
196 Ratings
2% below category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Drill-down analysis8.3193 Ratings00 Ratings
Formatting capabilities7.7193 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with R or other statistical packages7.4143 Ratings00 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration8.3191 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
8.0
189 Ratings
3% below category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Publish to Web8.1179 Ratings00 Ratings
Publish to PDF7.9174 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Versioning7.7145 Ratings00 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling8.3148 Ratings00 Ratings
Delivery to Remote Servers7.9111 Ratings00 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
7.7
189 Ratings
4% below category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)8.3183 Ratings00 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization8.1168 Ratings00 Ratings
Predictive Analytics7.3138 Ratings00 Ratings
Pattern Recognition and Data Mining7.339 Ratings00 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
8.4
180 Ratings
1% below category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Multi-User Support (named login)8.7169 Ratings00 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model8.2148 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)8.2160 Ratings00 Ratings
Report-Level Access Control8.249 Ratings00 Ratings
Single Sign-On (SSO)8.6141 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
7.9
162 Ratings
2% above category average
pandas
-
Ratings
Responsive Design for Web Access7.6152 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile Application7.5133 Ratings00 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile7.9155 Ratings00 Ratings
Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
7.6
116 Ratings
2% below category average
pandas
-
Ratings
REST API7.9104 Ratings00 Ratings
Javascript API7.585 Ratings00 Ratings
iFrames8.055 Ratings00 Ratings
Java API6.869 Ratings00 Ratings
Themeable User Interface (UI)7.491 Ratings00 Ratings
Customizable Platform (Open Source)8.444 Ratings00 Ratings
Platform Connectivity
Comparison of Platform Connectivity features of Product A and Product B
Microsoft Power BI
-
Ratings
pandas
8.5
1 Ratings
2% above category average
Connect to Multiple Data Sources00 Ratings8.01 Ratings
Extend Existing Data Sources00 Ratings8.01 Ratings
Automatic Data Format Detection00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
MDM Integration00 Ratings8.01 Ratings
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Microsoft Power BIpandas
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Medium-sized Companies
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Score 10.0 out of 10
Posit
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Score 10.0 out of 10
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User Ratings
Microsoft Power BIpandas
Likelihood to Recommend
8.5
(197 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.5
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.3
(113 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
10.0
(52 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Microsoft Power BIpandas
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft
Has significantly improved collation of data and visualisation especially with business across Europe. Has given me the ability to see the Site availability at the click of a button to see which Site is in the "money" and seize opportunities based on Market data
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Open Source
Pandas are great for quick and relatively simple analytics and visualizations
Pandas work well for exploratory ad-hoc analytic work
But , We had little success in implementing complicated predictive analytics. And large data sizes can be a problem.
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Pros
Microsoft
  • Options for data source connections are immense. Not just which sources, but your options for *how* the data is brought in.
  • Constant updates (this is both good and bad at times).
  • User friendliness. I can get the data connections set up and draft some quick visuals, then release to the target audience and let them expand on it how they want to.
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Open Source
  • It is easy to do statistical analysis
  • It is easy to clean the data
  • It is easy to produce graphs and charts to visualize
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Cons
Microsoft
  • It would be easier for users could Microsoft Power BI and Excel used the same programming languages.
  • Would like to see the online version of Microsoft Power BI be as powerful as the desktop version.
  • Publishing a Microsoft Power BI file online and then having to save the file is somewhat redundant.
  • Would like to export each page or chart as an image.
Read full review
Open Source
  • There are a lot of libraries and ways to do visualization. Sometimes it is very confusing.
  • Error handling can be a challenge. Sometimes the error messages do not provide valuable clues for the debugging.
  • In our case, there are a bunch of different frameworks and libraries working together. I would rather work with one framework, well tuned for my use case
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
Microsoft
Microsoft Power BI is an excellent and scalable tool. It has a learning curve, but once you get past that, the sky is the limit and you can build from the most simple to the most complex dashboards. I have built everything from simple reports with only a few data points to complex reports with many pages and advanced filtering.
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Open Source
No answers on this topic
Usability
Microsoft
Automating reporting has reduced manual data processing by 50-70%, freeing up analysts for higher-value tasks. A finance team that previously spent 20+ hours per week on Excel-based reports now does it in minutes with Microsoft Power BI's automated Real-time dashboards have shortened decision cycles by 30-40%, enabling leadership to react quickly to sales trends, operational bottlenecks, and customer behavior.
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Open Source
Over the years, we tried a lot of different frameworks and tools, homegrown and commercial. Pandas provide the best results.
It is lightweight, flexible and easy to implement.
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Support Rating
Microsoft
It is a fantastic tool, you can do almost everything related with data and reports, it is a perfect substitutive of Power Point and Excel with a high evolution and flexibility, and also it is very friendly and easy to share. I think all companies should have Power BI (or other BI tool) in their software package and if they are in the MS Suite, for sure Power BI should be the one due to all the benefits of the MS ecosystem.
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Open Source
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Microsoft
It was integrated with our erp easily and was accessible on cloud.
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Open Source
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Microsoft
Microsoft Power BI is free. If I didn't want to create a custom platform (i.e. my organization insisted on an existing platform that I *had* to use), I'd use Microsoft Power BI. For any start-up or SMB, I'd just use Claude & Grok to build it quickly, also for free. Would not pay for Tableau or Sigma anymore. Not worth it at all.
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Open Source
All these frameworks are great for gathering data and providing some initial analysis. But for real performance debugging work one needs more than tools provided by this tools. That's where the pandas excel.
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Return on Investment
Microsoft
  • Power BI usage reduced the effort of analytical reports creation by about 80%
  • Empowered all the level of employee to be more vigilant of the data and business insights, gained the profit of 8% overall.
  • AI-powered predictive analytics improved forecasting accuracy by 17%, that topped the overall sales.
Read full review
Open Source
  • Performance debugging was time consuming and mostly poorly automated exploratory process. Once we started use pandas for these tasks, it really moved the needle. Pandas are instrumental to provide actionable insights. As a result we were able to improve notably cloud software resource utilization and performance
  • Analytics implemented with pandas allow us to detect and. address problems in our APIs before they are notable to our customers
Read full review
ScreenShots

Microsoft Power BI Screenshots

Screenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Turns insights into impact for business usersScreenshot of Power BI integrates easily with Microsoft 365Screenshot of Microsoft Power BI - AI-Powered CapabilitiesScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Copilot can be used to create reportsScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Data HubScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Scales as organizational needs grow