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Looker

Looker

Overview

What is Looker?

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…

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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

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Pricing

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What is Looker?

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.

Entry-level set up fee?

  • Setup fee required
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://cloud.google.com/resources/look…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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What is SAP Crystal?

SAP Crystal is an analytics and reporting software solution for SMBs. SAP Crystal comprises Crystal Reports for pixel-perfect reporting, and SAP Crystal Server for automated distribution and self-service access to reports, dashboards and data exploration.

What is SAP Lumira Discovery?

SAP Lumira Discovery is SAP’s data visualization and discovery application. It facilitates data discovery, visualization, and analysis by assisting users with creation of dashboards, infographics, presentations, data facets, tag clouds, and more.

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Product Demos

How To Use Looker as a Business User

YouTube
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Features

BI Standard Reporting

Standard reporting means pre-built or canned reports available to users without having to create them.

8
Avg 8.2

Ad-hoc Reporting

Ad-Hoc Reports are reports built by the user to meet highly specific requirements.

8.1
Avg 8.0

Report Output and Scheduling

Ability to schedule and manager report output.

8.5
Avg 8.3

Data Discovery and Visualization

Data Discovery and Visualization is the analysis of multiple data sources in a search for patterns and outliers and the ability to represent the data visually.

6.7
Avg 7.9

Access Control and Security

Access control means being able to determine who has access to which data.

8.3
Avg 8.5

Mobile Capabilities

Support for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.

5.8
Avg 7.9
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Product Details

What is Looker?

Looker, Google Cloud’s business intelligence platform, enables users to chat with data. Organizations are given self-service and governed BI to build custom applications with trusted metrics, or to bring Looker modeling to their existing environment.


Looker vs. Looker Studio


Looker Studio is a part of Google's Looker Suite for business intelligence. Looker Studio is a self-serve BI solution where less technical users can create charts and reports, while Looker is a complete, enterprise BI platform, where technical users can build complex models that consider every aspect of the business. Looker Studio offers both free and pro versions, while Looker is not available for free. Looker and Looker Studio integrate with each other to support both types of analysis at businesses.

Looker Features

BI Platform Features

  • Supported: Administration via Web Interface
  • Supported: Live Connection to External Data
  • Supported: In-memory data model
  • Supported: Multi-Data Source Reporting (Blending)
  • Supported: Data warehouse / dictionary layer

Supported Data Sources Features

  • Supported: Oracle
  • Supported: MS SQL Server
  • Supported: IBM DB2
  • Supported: Postgres
  • Supported: MySQL
  • Supported: Cloudera Hadoop
  • Supported: Hortonworks Hadoop
  • Supported: EMC Greenplum
  • Supported: IBM Netezza
  • Supported: HP Vertica
  • Supported: ParAccel
  • Supported: SAP Hana
  • Supported: Teradata
  • Supported: Sage 500
  • Supported: SAP

BI Standard Reporting Features

  • Supported: Pixel Perfect reports
  • Supported: Customizable dashboards
  • Supported: Report Formatting Templates

Ad-hoc Reporting Features

  • Supported: Drill-down analysis
  • Supported: Formatting capabilities
  • Supported: Integration with R or other statistical packages
  • Supported: Report sharing and collaboration

Report Output and Scheduling Features

  • Supported: Publish to Web
  • Supported: Publish to PDF
  • Supported: Output Raw Supporting Data
  • Supported: Report Versioning
  • Supported: Report Delivery Scheduling

Data Discovery and Visualization Features

  • Supported: Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)
  • Supported: Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization
  • Supported: Support for Machine Learning models
  • Supported: Integration with R or other statistical packages

Access Control and Security Features

  • Supported: Multi-User Support (named login)
  • Supported: Role-Based Security Model
  • Supported: Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)
  • Supported: Report-Level Access Control
  • Supported: Table-Level Access Control (BI-layer)
  • Supported: Field-Level Access Control (BI-layer)

Mobile Capabilities Features

  • Supported: Responsive Design for Web Access
  • Supported: Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile

Looker Screenshots

Screenshot of a Looker dashboard with a geo chart.

Looker Video

The future of Looker is powered by generative AI—Google's vision for what's next in business intelligence

Looker Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise, Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsWindows, Linux, Mac
Mobile ApplicationNo
Supported CountriesUnited States, Canada, United Kingdom, Mexico, Germany, France, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Brazil
Supported LanguagesEnglish

Frequently Asked Questions

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.

Domo, MicroStrategy Analytics, and Tableau Server are common alternatives for Looker.

Reviewers rate Report Delivery Scheduling highest, with a score of 8.9.

The most common users of Looker are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews From Top Reviewers

(1-5 of 19)

A very good BI software with a soft learning curve

Rating: 10 out of 10
August 14, 2024
Vetted Review
Verified User
Looker
2 years of experience
Looker is a powerful data analytics tool that in our company is both used internally - for tasks like workforce performance management, specific profitability of a contract and financial audit in general - and "sold" to our customer. "Sold" is quoted because it's not just a matter of licensing: selling this product means also teaching how to use it because of its almost infinite customization capabilities.
  • Real time data aggregation
  • Very large data source connection pool
  • Querying data can be as simple as a filter, up to LookML
Cons
  • The default user interface is very spartan
  • If you don't use BigQuery, some queries can be slow
  • LookML can be daunting
Internally we mainly use Looker to monitor KPI related to development processes and contract profitability: we collect data from other platform (Jira, ERP) and match them in order to see the status of economics and delivery KPIs. This allows us to see if and where there are areas of intervention in our group.

Great tool for advanced users.

Rating: 9 out of 10
March 12, 2024
Vetted Review
Verified User
Looker
4 years of experience
We use Looker to create dashboards and calculations for other tools, such as our CRM platforms. Looker imports our analytics tools from Google and other sources to flawlessly visualize them and later embed them into shareable dashboards that can then be accessed by clients, internal staff, and partners.
  • Perfect integration into other dashboarding platforms.
  • Pulls data from multiple sources.
  • Integrates with our Hubspot CRM.
Cons
  • Finicky user interface.
  • Pretty extensive learning curve.
  • Would love to see a seamless integration of UA and GA4 together.
If your company wants to create advanced dashboards from Google Analytics and other integrated sources available through Looker’s API, then this is the right tool. I wouldn’t recommend this if you’re only using Google Analytics as your source, as they’re more than enough to report on web traffic.

Looker Review

Rating: 7 out of 10
August 21, 2015
Vetted Review
Verified User
Looker
1 year of experience
We use Looker to create canned reporting and dashboards across multiple departments. What is nice is that it helps sync up departments to be using the same data. It also empowers end users to develop their own dashboards. There is a little bit of a learning curve that we're still trying to work through.
  • Unified data across the company
  • Quick simple visualizations
Cons
  • Can't do advanced visualization like density plots, histograms, box plots
It's well suited for automating and scheduling simple reports that involve counts or time series graphs.

A fantastic solution for small and medium businesses to quickly get reporting up and customized to your liking

Rating: 10 out of 10
September 18, 2024
BH
Vetted Review
Verified User
Looker
7 years of experience
Verified on LinkedIn
I use Looker as a way to analyze web performance over time as well as quickly and easily compare performance monthly across various channels. Every website i manage is setup with Looker with the data coming in automatically and then the insights included for each major call out for easy client viewing.
  • Automation
  • API coverage
  • Integration of many different data sources
  • Customization
  • Ease of use
Cons
  • Data uptime (portions go out frequently)
  • Help articles and resources are lacking
  • Learning curve is steep
Looker is well suited for any user who would like up their reporting game from what you have situated in Google Analytics. The best part is being able to have everything in one simple to use dashboard vs clicking around multiple sites and pages to get all the data you would like to see at a glance. If you only use GA, then it's probably not necessary

A comprehensive review of Looker Studio for my digital marketing agency.

Rating: 10 out of 10
September 22, 2024
ci
Vetted Review
Verified User
Looker
4 years of experience
We use Looker Studio with connectors for Google Analytics 4, Google Ads, Meta Ads, and other advertising platforms to create dashboards featuring key performance indicators (KPIs) for our digital marketing agency clients. The tool provides us with real-time insights and assists in planning future actions. It also facilitates dashboard sharing and offers customization and flexibility for any report we wish to generate.
  • google analytics connector.
  • Customizable interface.
  • Collaboration and sharing.
Cons
  • Initial setup.
  • Learning curve.
  • Performance with large data sets.
As a free product, Looker Studio is recommended for creating dashboards for digital marketing campaigns. By learning the interface a bit, dashboards can be developed that can be analyzed and improved thanks to the customization options Looker Studio offers. One advantage is the ability to connect Google Analytics with just one click, and the pre-designed templates save us time.
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