TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

Save this comparison

Save this comparison

Add Product

Recommended Comparisons

    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Spotfire

    Score7.8 out of 10
    N/ASpotfire, formerly known as TIBCO Spotfire, is a visual data science platform that combines visual analytics, data science, and data wrangling, so users can analyze data at-rest and at-scale to solve complex industry-specific problems.N/A

    Tableau Server

    Score7.5 out of 10
    N/ATableau Server allows Tableau Desktop users to publish dashboards to a central server to be shared across their organizations. The product is designed to facilitate collaboration across the organization. It can be deployed on a server in the data center, or it can be deployed on a public cloud.

    $12

    Per User Per Month

    Pricing
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    Viewer
    $12.00
    Per User Per Month
    Explorer
    $35.00
    Per User Per Month
    Creator
    $70.00
    Per User Per Month
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesYes
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsFor Enterprise engagements, contact Spotfire directly for a custom price quote.—
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Considered Both Products
    Cloud Software Group
    Chose Spotfire
    They are similar but don't offer some of the specific client login portal capabilities. We needed a centralized platform that allows customization and sign-ins from multiple clients. Additionally, they did not quite have the diverse data source support capabilities that we get …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Well, Spotfire was the only tool which could handle our data, we had over 100 Mio rows of data and with Spotfire you could navigate through the dashboard very fast. This was our killer feature. It also makes very nice and modern charts.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Within our use cases Spotfire is preferred due to the ability to manage live data as well as big data in an appropriate time. It is also much better in statistics and advanced analytics.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Spotfire is a hardcode data science tool which caters to true data statistical analysis very well. It suits science-based industries and offers powerful functionality. Tableau is the number one data visualization tool and Spotfire is not as robust in this area.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    less costly than Tableau and much more capabilities of analysis visualization.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Way less intuitive to use, slower to deploy reports, more expensive
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    • Evaluation was several years ago but we continually evaluate against cloud and on-prem solutions.
    • For data discovery, interactive visualizations, statistical charting, Lasso, heat maps, CPK control carts still all hold up as strong points.
    • Limitations in user self-scheduling are …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    The API, support for JavaScript, HTML, and control of Web Player. All of these are essential to provide visuals to clients. Other software requires special treatments that Spotfire can achieve right out of the box.
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Tableau rich in visuals and customization but easily breaks with large volume and complex drill downs. Spotfire being an enterprise level tool, handles it better. QlikView is great at handling large volumes of data but the visuals are not intuitive enough. Comparatively, …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire

    Spotfire is a leader among visually driven BI software tools. It is easy to learn, creating dashboards is intuitive, and has very powerful elements. It can do the job if you commit the time and resources upfront to make sure implementation and adoption is effective.

    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    We evaluated on Mobility, Dashboarding, Web Based User Interface and Analytical capability. At the forefront was the user experience which accounted for just over half of our evaluation criteria. No platform was a 10/10 in all four categories - SAS Visual Analytics excelled in …
    Incentivized
    Chose Spotfire
    Tableau is pretty but very shallow. Alteryx is very nice, but doesn't have the proximity to the data through visual exploration. Alteryx is more like a drag'n'drop analogy to programming, where you are placing icons in a workflow instead of writing code lines in a program. So …
    Incentivized
    Tableau
    Chose Tableau Server
    The interface of Tableau Server is good.
    Incentivized
    Chose Tableau Server
    Tableau is extremely self intuitive to use and has a large supporting community
    Incentivized
    Chose Tableau Server
    QlikView, Tibco Spotfire, SAS, and SAP. At the time, all cost more than Tableau for our (small) needs, SAS and SAP were in some ways overqualified in terms of breadth, and none of them had the ease of use of Tableau.
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    92%
    Would buy again
    46 Answers
    75%
    Would buy again
    6 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    98%
    Delivers good value for the price
    39 Answers
    75%
    Delivers good value for the price
    6 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    48 Answers
    88%
    Happy with the feature set
    7 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    32 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    94%
    Implementation went as expected
    33 Answers
    71%
    Implementation went as expected
    5 Answers
    Features
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Platform Connectivity
    Comparison of Platform Connectivity features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    7.2
    8 Ratings
    15% below category average
    Tableau Server
    -
    Ratings
    Connect to Multiple Data Sources7.88 Ratings00 Ratings
    Extend Existing Data Sources7.48 Ratings00 Ratings
    Automatic Data Format Detection7.88 Ratings00 Ratings
    MDM Integration6.05 Ratings00 Ratings
    Data Exploration
    Comparison of Data Exploration features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    9.1
    8 Ratings
    8% above category average
    Tableau Server
    -
    Ratings
    Visualization9.08 Ratings00 Ratings
    Interactive Data Analysis9.28 Ratings00 Ratings
    Data Preparation
    Comparison of Data Preparation features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    7.4
    8 Ratings
    10% below category average
    Tableau Server
    -
    Ratings
    Interactive Data Cleaning and Enrichment7.28 Ratings00 Ratings
    Data Transformations8.08 Ratings00 Ratings
    Data Encryption7.05 Ratings00 Ratings
    Built-in Processors7.55 Ratings00 Ratings
    Platform Data Modeling
    Comparison of Platform Data Modeling features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    7.6
    8 Ratings
    11% below category average
    Tableau Server
    -
    Ratings
    Multiple Model Development Languages and Tools7.57 Ratings00 Ratings
    Automated Machine Learning8.55 Ratings00 Ratings
    Single platform for multiple model development7.68 Ratings00 Ratings
    Self-Service Model Delivery6.76 Ratings00 Ratings
    Model Deployment
    Comparison of Model Deployment features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    7.4
    7 Ratings
    14% below category average
    Tableau Server
    -
    Ratings
    Flexible Model Publishing Options7.87 Ratings00 Ratings
    Security, Governance, and Cost Controls7.07 Ratings00 Ratings
    BI Standard Reporting
    Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    8.4
    95 Ratings
    3% above category average
    Pixel Perfect reports00 Ratings9.129 Ratings
    Customizable dashboards00 Ratings7.094 Ratings
    Report Formatting Templates00 Ratings9.081 Ratings
    Ad-hoc Reporting
    Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    7.8
    95 Ratings
    3% below category average
    Drill-down analysis00 Ratings8.095 Ratings
    Formatting capabilities00 Ratings8.093 Ratings
    Integration with R or other statistical packages00 Ratings8.059 Ratings
    Report sharing and collaboration00 Ratings7.089 Ratings
    Report Output and Scheduling
    Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    7.2
    91 Ratings
    13% below category average
    Publish to Web00 Ratings8.085 Ratings
    Publish to PDF00 Ratings7.084 Ratings
    Report Versioning00 Ratings8.070 Ratings
    Report Delivery Scheduling00 Ratings8.077 Ratings
    Delivery to Remote Servers00 Ratings5.19 Ratings
    Data Discovery and Visualization
    Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    8.3
    90 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)00 Ratings9.086 Ratings
    Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization00 Ratings8.085 Ratings
    Predictive Analytics00 Ratings8.064 Ratings
    Pattern Recognition and Data Mining00 Ratings8.01 Ratings
    Access Control and Security
    Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    10.0
    95 Ratings
    16% above category average
    Multi-User Support (named login)00 Ratings10.093 Ratings
    Role-Based Security Model00 Ratings10.090 Ratings
    Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)00 Ratings10.092 Ratings
    Report-Level Access Control00 Ratings10.01 Ratings
    Single Sign-On (SSO)00 Ratings10.062 Ratings
    Mobile Capabilities
    Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    8.1
    79 Ratings
    4% above category average
    Responsive Design for Web Access00 Ratings10.077 Ratings
    Mobile Application00 Ratings7.061 Ratings
    Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile00 Ratings7.068 Ratings
    Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding
    Comparison of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding features of Spotfire and Tableau Server
    Feature
    Spotfire
    -
    Ratings
    Tableau Server
    6.4
    46 Ratings
    19% below category average
    REST API00 Ratings8.040 Ratings
    Javascript API00 Ratings8.037 Ratings
    iFrames00 Ratings6.040 Ratings
    Java API00 Ratings5.57 Ratings
    Themeable User Interface (UI)00 Ratings6.19 Ratings
    Customizable Platform (Open Source)00 Ratings4.67 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Small Businesses
    RapidMiner
    Score8.9 out of 10
    Cyfe
    Score4 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Anaconda
    Score8.8 out of 10
    Qlik Cloud Analytics (Qlik Sense)
    Score8.1 out of 10
    Enterprises
    IBM Watson Studio
    Score10 out of 10
    Sisense
    Score6.9 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.4
    (351 ratings)
    8.0
    (111 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.6
    (30 ratings)
    10.0
    (20 ratings)
    Usability
    8.0
    (27 ratings)
    8.0
    (17 ratings)
    Availability
    9.0
    (14 ratings)
    9.0
    (9 ratings)
    Performance
    7.1
    (14 ratings)
    8.1
    (8 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.7
    (27 ratings)
    3.0
    (18 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    8.3
    (52 ratings)
    8.0
    (4 ratings)
    Online Training
    9.0
    (55 ratings)
    9.0
    (9 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    8.4
    (17 ratings)
    9.1
    (13 ratings)
    Configurability
    7.1
    (3 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Data Sharing and Collaboration
    8.5
    (36 ratings)
    5.1
    (79 ratings)
    Data Sources
    9.3
    (36 ratings)
    6.6
    (82 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    7.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    7.0
    (4 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    SpotfireTableau Server
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Cloud Software Group
    A high level of data integration is available here it supports various data sources and so on. Collaborating features allow users to give access to the dashboard and merge data analytics with other team members. It can meet the demands of both small and large size business enterprises. A customized dashboard and reports are provided to meet the specific needs and get support of extensibility through APIs and customized scripts.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    Whole funnel and specific channel performance from upper to lower funnel metrics. The ability to view full channel performance for some time, such as weekly, monthly, or quarterly, has truly been monumental in how my team optimizes specific channels and campaigns. Daily performance tracking is a bit overwhelming, with load times and having to refresh specific live views over time. It can be challenging to do so at times, as extensive dashboards take much longer to load.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Cloud Software Group
    • It has the best coding integration (python, R) of any BI product
    • The ability to work with very large datasets (10 mil+) is better than competitors
    • Export options are more complete and have better functionality
    • The data canvas is the best tool to join and transform data vs. competitors
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    • It's good at doing what it is designed for: accessing visualizations without having to download and open a workbook in Tableau Desktop. The latter would be a very inefficient method for sharing our metrics, so I am glad that we have Tableau Server to serve this function.
    • Publishing to Tableau Server is quick and easy. Just a few clicks from Tableau Desktop and a few seconds of publishing through an average speed network, and the new visualizations are live!
    • Seeing details on who has viewed the visualization and when. This is something particularly useful to me for trying to drive adoption of some new pages, so I really appreciate the granularity provided in Tableau Server
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Cloud Software Group
    • The donut chart is I guess a powerful illustrations but I hope it should be done quite simple in Spotfire. But in Spotfire there are lots of steps involve just to build a simple donut chart.
    • Table calculation (like Row or Column Differences) should be made simple or there should be drag and drop function for Table Calculation. No need for scripting.
    • Information Link should be changed. If new columns are added to the table just refreshing the data should be able to capture the new column. No need extra step to add column
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    • Tableau Server has had some issue handling some of our larger data sets. Our extract refreshes fail intermittently with no obvious error that we can fix
    • Tableau Server has been hard to work with before they launched their new Rest API, which is also a little tricky to work with
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Cloud Software Group
    -Easy to distribute information throughout the enterprise using the webplayer. -Ad hoc analysis is possible throughout the enterprise using business author in the webplayer or the thick client. -Low level of support needed by IT team. Access interfaces with LDAP and numerous other authentication methods. -Possible to continually extend the platform with JavaScript, R scripts, HTML, and custom extensions. -Ability to standardize data logic through pre-built queries in the Information Designer. Everyone in the enterprise is using the same logic -Tagging and bookmarking data allows for quick sharing of insights. -Integration with numerous data sources... flat files, data bases, big data, images, etc. -Much improved mapping capability. Also includes the ability to apply data points over any image.
    Read full review
    Tableau
    It simply is used all the time by more and more people. Migrating to something else would involve lots of work and lots of training. The renewal fee being fair, it simply isn't worth migrating to a different tool for now.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Cloud Software Group
    Basic tasks like generating meaningful information from large sets of raw data are very easy. The next step of linking to multiple live data sources and linking those tables and performing on the fly analysis of the imported data is understandably more difficult.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    Tableau Server takes training and experience in order to unlock the application's full potential. This is best handled by a qualified data scientist or data analytics manager. Tableau user interface layout, nomenclature, and command structure take time and training to become proficient with. Integration and connectivity require proper IT developer support.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Cloud Software Group
    Even though, it's a rather stable and predictable tool that's also fast, it does have some bugs and inconsistencies that shut down the system. Depending on the details, it could happen as often as 2-3 times a week, especially during the development period.
    Read full review
    Tableau
    Our instance of Tableau Server was hosted on premises (I believe all instances are) so if there were any outages it was normally due to scheduled maintenance on our end. If the Tableau server ever went down, a quick restart solved most issues
    Read full review
    Performance
    Cloud Software Group
    Generally, the Spotfire client runs with very good performance. There are factors that could affect performance, but normally has to do with loading large analysis files from the library if the database is located some distance away and your global network is not optimal. Once you have your data table(s) loaded in the client application, usually the application is quite good performance-wise.
    Read full review
    Tableau
    While there are definitely cases where a user can do things that will make a particular worksheet or dashboard run slowly, overall the performance is extremely fast. The user experience of exploratory analysis particularly shines, there's nothing out there with the polish of Tableau.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Cloud Software Group
    Support has been helpful with issues. Support seems to know their product and its capabilities. It would also seem that they have a good sense of the context of the problem; where we are going with this issue and what we want the end outcome to be.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    We have consistently had highly satisfactory results every time we've reached out for help. Our contractor, used for Tableau server maintenance and dashboard development is very technically skilled. When he hits a roadblock on how to do something with Tableau, the support staff have provided timely and useful guidance. He frequently compares it to Cognos and says that while Cognos has capabilities Tableau doesn't, the bottom line value for us is a no-brainer
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    In-Person Training
    Cloud Software Group
    The instructor was very in depth and provided relevant training to business users on how to create visualizations. They showed us how to alter settings and filter views, and provided resources for future questions. However, the instructor failed to cover data sources, connecting to data, etc. While it was helpful to see how users can use the data to create reports, they failed to properly instruct us on how to get the dataset in to begin with. We are still trying to figure out connections to certain databases (we have multiple different types).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    In our case, they hired a private third party consultant to train our dept. It was extremely boring and felt like it dragged on. Everything I learned was self taught so I was not really paying attention. But I do think that you can easily spend a week on the tool and go over every nook and cranny. We only had the consultant in for a day or two.
    Read full review
    Online Training
    Cloud Software Group
    The online training is good, provides a good base of knowledge. The video demonstrations were well-done and easy to follow along. Provided exercises are good as well, but I think there could be more challenging exercises. The training has also gone up in price significantly in the last 3 years (in USD, which hurts us even more in Canada), and I'm not sure it is worth the money it now costs (it is worth how much it cost 3 years ago, but not double that.)
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    The Tableau website is full of videos that you can follow at your own pace. As a very small company with a Tableau install, access to these free resources was incredibly useful to allowing me to implement Tableau to its potential in a reasonable and proportionate manner.
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Cloud Software Group
    The original architecture I created for our implementation had only a particular set of internal business units in mind. Over the years, Spotfire gained in popularity in our company and was being utilized across many more business units. Soon, its usage went beyond what the original architectural implementation could provide. We've since learned about how the product is used by the different teams and are currently in the middle of rolling out a new architecture. I suggest:
    • Have clearly defined service level agreements with all the teams that will use Spotfire. Your business intelligence group might only need availability during normal working hours, but your production support group might need 24/7 availability. If these groups share one Spotfire server, maintenance of that server might be a problem.
    • Know the different types of data you will be working with. One group might be working with "public" data while another group might work with sensitive data. Design your Library accordingly and with the proper permissions.
    • Know the roles of the users of Spotfire. Will there only be a small set of report writers or does everyone have write access to the Library?
    • ALWAYS add a timestamp prompt to your reports. You don't want multiple users opening a report that will try and pull down millions of rows of data to their local workstations. Another option, of course, is to just hard code a time range in the backing database view (i.e. where activity_date >= sysdate - 90, etc.), but I'd rather educate/train the user base if possible.
    • This probably goes without saying, but if possible, point to a separate reporting database or a logical standby database. You don't want the company pounding on your primaries and take down your order system.
    Read full review
    Tableau
    Implementation was over the phone with the vendor, and did not go particularly well. Again, think this was our fault as our integration and IT oversight was poor, and we made errors. Would they have happened had a vendor been onsite? Not sure, probably not, but we probably wouldn't have paid for that either
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Cloud Software Group
    Spotfire is significantly ahead of both products from an ETL and data ingestion capability. Spotfire also has substantially better visualizations than Power BI, and although the native visualizations aren't as flexible in Tableau, Spotfire enables users to create completely custom javascript visaualizations, which neither Tableau or Power BI has. Tableau and Power BI are likely only superior to Spotfire with respect to embedded analysis on a website.
    Read full review
    Tableau
    Today, if my shop is largely Microsoft-centric, I would be hard pressed to choose a product other than Power BI. Tableau was the visualization leader for years, but Microsoft has caught up with them in many areas, and surpassed them in some. Its ability to source, transform, and model data is superior to Tableau. Tableau still has the lead in some visualizations, but Power BI's rise is evidenced by its ever-increasing position in the leadership section of the Gartner Magic Quadrant.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Cloud Software Group
    In an enterprise architecture, if Spotfire Advanced Data services(Composite Studio),data marts can be managed optimally and scalability in a data perspective is great. As the web player/consumer is directly proportional to RAM, if the enterprise can handle RAM requirement accomodating fail over mechanisms appropraitely, it is definitely scalable,
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    No answers on this topic
    Return on Investment
    Cloud Software Group
    • It is costly, so not suitable for small scale implementations.
    • Dashboards are as good as the developer, so need experience to get most out of it
    • You need to be on Spotfire 11 at least to implement out of the box visualizations
    • Integration with Python and R is a game changer, it comes very handy to onboard data scientists without much hassle
    • performance is exceptionally well.
    • Secure
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Tableau
    • Tableau does take dedicated FTE to create and analyze the data. It's too complex (and powerful) a product not to have someone dedicated to developing with it.
    • There are some significant setup for the server product.
    • Once sever setup is complete, it's largely "fire and forget" until an update is necessary. The server update process is cumbersome.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Spotfire Screenshots

    Screenshot of Smart Visual AnalyticsScreenshot of Geospatial AnalyticsScreenshot of Intelligent Data WranglingScreenshot of Point-and-click Data ScienceScreenshot of Real-time Streaming Analytics

    Tableau Server Screenshots

    Screenshot of Tableau Server interface and administration view 1.Screenshot of Tableau Server interface and administration view 2.Screenshot of Tableau Server permissions view.Screenshot of Tableau Services Manager (TSM) view 1.Screenshot of Tableau Services Manager (TSM) view 2.