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Alation Data Catalog vs Microsoft Purview Information Protection comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Alation Data Catalog
Ranking in Data Governance
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Metadata Management (2nd)
Microsoft Purview Informati...
Ranking in Data Governance
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Data Privacy Management Software (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Data Governance category, the mindshare of Alation Data Catalog is 5.3%, down from 8.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Purview Information Protection is 2.8%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Governance Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Purview Information Protection2.8%
Alation Data Catalog5.3%
Other91.9%
Data Governance
 

Featured Reviews

Brahma Lam - PeerSpot reviewer
Has metadata cataloging features but needs changes in domain model
The tool's metadata cataloging is the most valuable feature.  The tool's domain model needs to be changed.  Alation Data Catalog is stable.  The solution is scalable.  Alation Data Catalog's deployment is easy. I rate it a nine out of ten. Deployment takes only two to three hours to complete.…
Abhi T - PeerSpot reviewer
Achieve comprehensive data protection with reliable performance and room for enhanced discovery accuracy
The product is still in a growing phase. I could see that many use cases in their product are not capable enough in terms of detecting or protecting. Compared to other products, they are in the middle of bringing their solution up to the mark, so it is not a full-grown solution. They have to get more accurate results in terms of data discovery and classification. The second thing is their support; support from Microsoft takes a lot of time to get a response from their support team. The third thing is their OCR capability is not that great in terms of identifying the documents. We would love to see response times of less than 24 hours. Additionally, there is no way to check the policy's current status in terms of whether it got synced or not. You have to wait and test the use cases after 24 hours or after 48 hours, and once it starts working, then it appears the policy got implemented.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable features of Alation Data Catalog are the simplicity in onboarding data sources, the security in securing the data sources, and the way the various users of Alation Data Catalog communicate with each other through a messenger."
"The most valuable feature is cloud integration."
"Alation Data Catalog provides a nice interface for connecting to the database, querying the data, and working on it."
"Alation Data Catalog's best feature is the SQL query publication."
"The solution is used to query MySQL clients and store data and documentation."
"We can customize templates based on our use cases."
"Given the relatively low level of maturity, Alation's most relevant feature at the moment is a user interface that's easy to navigate, which helps us find and understand the data. So while Alation has a lot more functionality, our pain point right now is being able to easily find, understand, and trust the information to use it."
"We had some of our data science engineers, who had built out some cloud-based data and data products for users. They were spending a lot of their time, up to 30 to 35% of their time, answering questions about the data and helping people understand how to use it. Once they were able to document that information within Alation, they were only focusing on around 5% of the high-value questions that really couldn't be solved through the catalog itself. It freed them up to be more productive, it made their end-users more productive, and it made the adoption rate of their data products rise more quickly because people were able to get to using them."
"Microsoft Purview Information Protection integrates with the productivity and security tools that my customers use regularly, allowing them to avoid using multiple information protection solutions."
"Microsoft Purview Information Protection supports data classification, sensitivity labels, and data loss prevention."
"Incorporating data loss prevention capabilities built into the Microsoft platform to endpoints, such as Windows 10 and Windows 11 computers, can also help prevent data loss and is highly advantageous."
"The scalability of Microsoft Purview Information Protection is excellent."
"The features my clients request most are sensitivity labels and data loss prevention. Additionally, I am trying to interest them in risk management and insider risk management, although those features are considered more advanced."
"We can restrict access or specify who can see sensitivity labels, which can be based on the classification level. We can encrypt restricted content and limit who can see that from an internal view, too, so Purview is a powerful tool."
"Purview saves customers time by offering them a quick way to assess a situation and insights into how to improve."
"The user interface is nice and it's very user-friendly on that front."
 

Cons

"Alation Data Catalog does not provide end-to-end data lineage."
"It would be good if the tool could show the output from the records while querying."
"Data observability within Alation would be incredibly helpful for addressing these challenges"
"I know that this has been on their roadmap and they're working on it, but as a whole, there's an untapped reservoir of capabilities within their article features that could be used and built upon."
"The interface is not user-friendly."
"Alation Data Catalog needs to develop a lot in terms of data governance and would be improved with a built-in interactive data quality solution."
"The tool's domain model needs to be changed."
"We have had issues setting up the connectors and getting Alation's support team to resolve issues."
"Microsoft customer service is hit or miss. Sometimes, I get a fast and knowledgeable response, while other times, I've experienced delays and received no resolution."
"Microsoft can improve the affordability of Purview Information Protection by offering it at a lower cost."
"The most concerning thing is that most of the capabilities they mention are not working as expected."
"The communication around Microsoft product names and functionalities can be confusing, like when they combined Office 365 Risk and Compliance with Azure Purview. Then, they added Purview Hub to Fabric, and people thought Purview Hub would do data lineages, but it didn't. It isn't full-fledged Purview. It's just one feature set."
"I wouldn't recommend Microsoft Purview Information Protection for petabytes of documents as performance might be affected."
"Purview could better integrate with third-party tools, but I don't have a specific use case for that because It's currently integrated into the managed services we offer to Microsoft customers using E5 licenses."
"Microsoft Purview Information Protection can improve in terms of scan concurrency and scan processing time."
"There is potential for more integration in the use of AI."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is a little expensive."
"The platform is moderately expensive compared to the other competitors in the market."
"A three-year agreement is better than a one-year rolling 12-month agreement from a price point of view. I'd recommend looking at a three-year deal because you can't stand up a catalog and produce value in 12 months."
"I don't have all the details on the pricing side, but the solution was more expensive than originally expected."
"The tool's pricing is not a problem for customers because they often purchase it as part of a bundle. With an E5 license, for example, users get access to the entire functionality. This is one of the main reasons why many customers are choosing Microsoft."
"The price is determined by the enterprise licensing, either the E3 or E5 licensing or the EMS plus security and other feature licensing."
"The tool's pricing is fairly low, less than 100,000 for a year."
"Initially, Purview's cost seemed quite high because it was for personal use. I was scanning a tiny tenant and thinking, "If I extrapolate this to an enterprise-scale tenant, it will be quite costly." However, I talked to people who had compared it to other products on the market, and they're spending five figures to get started. At least, Purview has a free trial, so you can try some of the features early on."
"The pricing and setup costs are transferred to my clients, who find it affordable and are satisfied with what they receive."
"The product is affordable, and our clients agree. Sensitivity labels come with the MIP license at an additional $2 a month per user, an excellent deal for auto-labeling capabilities."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
13%
Retailer
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Alation Data Catalog?
The platform's most valuable features are workflow automation, automated business metadata tagging, technical metadata tagging, and data integration with data quality tools or platforms.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Alation Data Catalog?
The price difference between Alation Data Catalog and Collibra was not significant. Collibra is a little bit expensive than Alation, but I presented the benefits of having that platform, so that li...
What needs improvement with Alation Data Catalog?
Alation Data Catalog is not user-friendly for business users. Its user experience is comparable to a Wikipedia page, lacking good visualization. In a fast-paced world, we need to grasp information ...
What do you like most about Microsoft Purview Information Protection?
It ensures that sensitive data is automatically safeguarded, even for email attachments, regardless of the user or device.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Purview Information Protection?
Pricing is good because if somebody is looking for an overall cybersecurity solution, Microsoft has one license with many solutions bundled with that license. The E5 license covers most of the solu...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Purview Information Protection?
The product is still in a growing phase. I could see that many use cases in their product are not capable enough in terms of detecting or protecting. Compared to other products, they are in the mid...
 

Also Known As

Alation
Microsoft Information Protection
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Salesforce, Snowflake, Citrix, eBay, TripAdvisor, Albertsons, Nasdaq, Pfizer, LinkedIn, Finnair.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Alation Data Catalog vs. Microsoft Purview Information Protection and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
868,787 professionals have used our research since 2012.