8 top self-service analytics tools

1. Microsoft Power BI

Power BI is Microsoft's core BI platform. It's a self-service analytics tool that connects to and visualizes any data across the organization. Power BI includes several features:

• Import data from a variety of sources.
• Build reports using drag-and-drop functionality.
• Generate insights on interactive dashboards.
• Share insights with others directly in apps they already use.
• Explore pre-existing reports and data across the organization.

One of the major benefits of Power BI is its seamless integration with Microsoft 365 software, such as Excel. This makes it easy to infuse Power BI capabilities with the tools employees already use daily, supporting interoperability. Power BI includes AI features such as Microsoft Copilot, but integrating it with Azure unlocks more advanced capabilities like machine learning models and cognitive services, which can enhance the platform's analytic capabilities. Below are some of the key recognitions for the platform:

• 4.5-star rating on G2 (based on 1,200+ reviews).
• Featured in five Capterra Shortlist rankings, including data visualization, reporting and business intelligence.
• Named a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms."

Power BI offers a free trial and a variety of free training resources to help users of all skill levels get started easily. The pricing plans start at $10 per user and scale up from there, including enterprise-level support.

2. Oracle Analytics

Oracle Analytics is an analytics platform available through Oracle Analytics Cloud, Oracle's cloud-native service, or Oracle Analytics Server, Oracle's on-premises option. The platform is designed for self-service analytics and supports many types of analytics users. It also integrates AI and machine learning (ML) to support self-service capabilities further.

Oracle Analytics allows users to create and share data visualizations through a code-free, drag-and-drop interface, requiring no specialized data skills. Users can create data sets for reports from various sources (e.g., spreadsheets, CSV files, different databases) and explore data to find correlations, patterns and trends. Oracle Analytics helps users in various tasks:

• Prepare, transform and cleanse data.
• Develop semantic models.
• Explore data through natural language queries.
• Embed reports in apps like Slack.
• Create governed, centralized dashboards.

Oracle Analytics has more than 45 visualization types to help users get started and supports custom visualizations if they need specialized visuals. Oracle Analytics has earned recognition for its advanced AI capabilities and comprehensive analytics platforms:

• Named a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms."
• Recognized as a leader in "Forrester Wave: Augmented Business Intelligence Platforms, Q2 2023."

Oracle offers a free trial, live demo and a hands-on workshop for Oracle Analytics to showcase how it works and what it looks like in action. Pricing for Oracle Analytics Cloud is based on consumption per hour or by user per month. Oracle Analytics Server provides perpetual named user licenses or charges by CPU license deployed into the chosen data center. However, small and midsize businesses might find the platform expensive and difficult to use.

3. Qlik Analytics

Qlik Analytics comes in two forms: Qlik Cloud Analytics, a cloud-based SaaS deployment that includes all Qlik analytics offerings, and Qlik Sense, a client-managed, on-premises option designed for highly regulated industries that need full data oversight.

Qlik's engine is purpose-built for analytics, making it ideal for business users who need to quickly automate data insights through natural language interaction. Users can explore insights in greater depth and act quickly thanks to automated alerts embedded in desktop and mobile applications. Qlik Analytics offers several features:

• Cloud and on-premises options for flexible deployment.
• Natural language interaction and automated data analysis.
• AI- and ML-driven augmented analytics for predictive modeling.
• Automated alerts and dashboards for scaling insights.
• Cloud and application agnostic approach for multi-cloud environments.

Qlik Analytics has also been recognized for its data-to-decision workflow and its flexibility in cloud environments:

• Named a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Earned recognition in six Capterra Shortlist rankings, with high ratings in data analysis, data visualization, reporting and statistical analysis.

Qlik offers a free trial and a Qlik Sense demo. Qlik Analytics pricing is divided into three categories: Standard, built for small organizations starting with 20 full users; Premium, supporting up to 100,000 basic users; and Enterprise, which scales even higher.

4. Salesforce and Tableau

The Salesforce platform comes prebuilt with some self-service analytics capabilities, such as reports and dashboards that anyone in the organization can access and use. For deeper data exploration, Salesforce offers two primary analytics tools: Tableau, which the company acquired in 2019, and CRM Analytics.

Tableau is an end-to-end analytics and BI platform that provides actionable self-service analytics and insights across the organization. The platform provides a variety of visualizations that are easy to create with a drag-and-drop interface:

• Comprehensive business intelligence platform for data visualization and reporting.
• Active community support for advanced features.
• Intuitive drag-and-drop interface for easy report creation.
• Advanced analytics capabilities for more complex data analysis.
• Automated insights powered by AI to provide actionable insight.
• Seamless integration with various platforms and multiple data sources.

CRM Analytics is a native Salesforce Cloud tool that can integrate directly into an organization's Salesforce CRM deployment. CRM Analytics can augment CRM workflows with native, actionable insights, so users can find and analyze the needed data without disrupting their workflow. Salesforce and Tableau are highly regarded for their innovation and performance in the analytics market:

• Named Salesforce a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Acknowledged in Forrester Wave for stability, security and compliance capabilities.

Tableau and CRM Analytics can be used together to create a comprehensive self-service analytics environment. Free trials are available for both tools and full pricing plans can be found on Salesforce's website.

5. Sisense

Sisense is a global analytics platform that provides users with actionable insights from data in minutes. Its intuitive and accessible self-service functionality makes it easy for users to access data. Sisense stands out for its embedded analytics, allowing app creators to integrate interactive analytics directly into their products and applications. App builders don't need any data science experience; Sisense's flexible framework simplifies embedding analytics, making it easier to build data-rich products with a host of features:

• Embedded analytics that allow app creators to integrate interactive analytics.
• Data modeling and connectivity without requiring specialized data engineering skills.
• Flexible APIs to embed analytics within applications.
• AI-driven analytics features that assist users with conversational analytics.
• Customizable reporting and dashboards tailored to specific needs.

Sisense has been widely recognized for its strong analytics capabilities and flexibility. The platform's ability to integrate with a variety of systems and its scalability for large data sets have earned it recognition across key industry reports:

• Named a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Holds a 4.2-star rating on G2 based on over 1,000 reviews.
• Holds a 4.5 star rating on Capterra based on almost 400 reviews, with recognition in a Capterra Shortlist ranking for dashboard.

At the time of writing, Sisense does not offer a free trial. However, interested buyers can book a demo to see how the platform works. They also offer customized quotes after filling out a pricing request form on their website.

6. Yellowfin

Yellowfin is an analytics and BI platform with strong self-service features. Its guided natural language query and quick charts allow users of all skill levels to query data in plain language, ask hard questions about their data and create a wide range of charts within a dashboard. Yellowfin emphasizes data storytelling, providing tools to craft clear, engaging data presentations even for nontechnical audiences. They offer a range of features designed to enhance data analysis and decision-making:

• Data storytelling capabilities to create data-driven narratives.
• Collaborative analytics for team-based insights and faster decision-making.
• Customizable dashboards tailored for specific business needs.
• Automated reporting to keep teams updated with real-time data.
• AI-powered features to uncover trends and generate actionable insights.

Yellowfin is recognized for its innovation in data storytelling and collaborative analytics. It has received significant praise for its ability to help organizations communicate insights clearly and engage stakeholders in the decision-making process:

• Named an honorable mention in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Featured in Forrester Wave for its strong performance in data storytelling and collaboration.
• Holds a 4.3-star rating on G2 based on over 275 reviews.
• Recognized in Gartner Magic Quadrant reports for nine consecutive years.

Yellowfin offers a free 30-day trial and a free live demo. Pricing plans require a quote, but Yellowfin claims its pricing is "simple, predictable, scalable." Yellowfin also provides numerous free resources to help users get started and learn more complex functionalities.

7. Zoho Analytics

Zoho Analytics is an AI-powered self-service BI and analytics platform with a user-friendly interface designed to be approachable for business users, data scientists and engineers. Zoho offers over 500 out-of-the-box integrations to easily connect with various data sources. The key features include the following:

• Visual pipeline builder for organizing and preparing data.
• Drag-and-drop visualization builder with 50+ visualization options.
• AI-driven conversational assistance that delivers contextual and actionable insights.
• Predictive and forecasting models to identify trends and anomalies.
• A code studio for developing custom models and functions.
• Self-service analytics portal for creating customized micro-sites.

Zoho Analytics has earned recognition for its strong performance in the BI space. The platform has been praised for its ease of use, affordability, and ability to meet the needs of small to medium-sized businesses. Several industry analysts have acknowledged its comprehensive feature set and its ability to integrate seamlessly with other business tools:

• Identified as a niche player in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Holds a 4.3-star ratings on G2 based on over 300 reviews.
• Featured in five Capterra Shortlist rankings for data analysis, data visualization, business intelligence, reporting and dashboard.

Zoho Analytics offers a free 15-day trial for its cloud deployment and a free 30-day trial for its on-premises deployment. It also offers a free plan that supports two users, 10,000 rows and unlimited reports and dashboards. Paid plans scale with users and can be billed monthly or annually.

8. Domo

Domo is a data experience platform that combines data integration, app creation and self-service analytics tools. Its data foundation capabilities centralize all data for unified reporting, allowing users to access self-service reporting and analytics from every source in one unified view.

• Over 150 chart types for creative live visualizations without advanced skills.
• Interactive dashboards that can be shared with mobile devices .
• AI and ML tools that provide predictive intelligence and actionable insights.
• Automatic alerts and notifications to track data changes in real time.
• AI-driven features for automating report writing, summarizing long feedback, and exploring data through a chat-style support system.
• Instant insights into live data, allowing users to react quickly to emerging trends.

Domo has earned recognition for its cloud-based business intelligence capabilities and its ability to scale with organizations of all sizes. Analysts highlight Domo's strength in providing real-time data and its user-friendly interface that supports collaboration and data-driven decision-making across the business:

• Named a leader in Gartner's "Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms" (June 2024).
• Recognized for its real-time reporting and ease of use in Forrester Wave.
• Holds a 4.5-star rating on G2 based on over 1,300 reviews.
• Featured in five Capterra Shortlist rankings, including data visualization, business intelligence and reporting.

Domo offers a 30-day free trial that includes free self-serve education, 30 days of onboarding support and one free training session to get started. From there, pricing plans include a standard, enterprise and business-critical tier, each of which is usage-based using a "credits" system. All Domo features are available to unlimited users, with the pool of credits purchased drawn down as the features are used.

Jacob Roundy is a freelance writer and editor specializing in a variety of technology topics, including data centers and sustainability.