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Databricks vs Microsoft Fabric comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Databricks
Ranking in Data Management Platforms (DMP)
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
95
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (3rd), Data Science Platforms (1st), Streaming Analytics (1st)
Microsoft Fabric
Ranking in Data Management Platforms (DMP)
9th
Average Rating
7.6
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

SimonRobinson - PeerSpot reviewer
Governance And Engagement Lead
Improved data governance has enabled sensitive data tracking but cost management still needs work
I believe we could improve Databricks integration with cloud service providers. The impact of our current integration has not been particularly good, and it's becoming very expensive for us. The inefficiencies in our implementation, such as not shutting down warehouses when they're not in use or reserving the right number of credits, have led to increased costs. We made several beginner mistakes, such as not taking advantage of incremental loading and running overly complicated queries all the time. We should be using ETL tools to help us instead of doing it directly in Databricks. We need more experienced professionals to manage Databricks effectively, as it's not as forgiving as other platforms such as Snowflake. I think introducing customer repositories would facilitate easier implementation with Databricks.
Ankush-Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Software Engineer at Momentus
Unified analytics platform has simplified complex dashboards and supported secure data pipelines
One thing about Microsoft Fabric that I think could be improved is the potential confusion when working with real-time data versus normal batch loading. If you are dealing with real-time databases or data, you need to work with Event Hub and event streaming, but for normal batch processing, you can usually go ahead with the SQL warehouse or the data lakehouse. I recommend that Microsoft unify these processes, so using one source can meet both requirements. If I am working with real-time data and batched data, I should not have to manage two separate systems; instead of creating an Event Hub and a lakehouse, users could simply manage one house to handle both real-time analysis and batch processing, making it simpler and more user-friendly from both business and development perspectives.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is fast, it's scalable, and it does the job it needs to do."
"Databricks makes it really easy to use a number of technologies to do data analysis. In terms of languages, we can use Scala, Python, and SQL. Databricks enables you to run very large queries, at a massive scale, within really good timeframes."
"Databricks is also user-friendly, providing customizable codes and models that allow people to experiment quickly."
"Databricks allows me to automate the creation of a cluster, optimized for machine learning and construct AI machine learning models for the client."
"The most valuable aspect of the solution is its notebook. It's quite convenient to use, both terms of the research and the development and also the final deployment, I can just declare the spark jobs by the load tables. It's quite convenient."
"<p>Databricks is definitely a very stable product and reliable.</p>"
"The solution's features are fantastic and include interactive clusters that perform at top speed when compared to other solutions."
"When we have a huge volume of data that we want to process with speed, velocity, and volume, we go through Databricks."
"The best feature Microsoft Fabric offers in my experience is the Dataflow."
"The most valuable and useful feature I have found in Microsoft Fabric is data consistency, which is the top thing."
"The features and capabilities of Microsoft Fabric that I have found most useful include it being a uniform platform."
 

Cons

"The initial setup is difficult."
"The product could be improved by offering an expansion of their visualization capabilities, which currently assists in development in their notebook environment."
"It would be very helpful if Databricks could integrate with platforms in addition to Azure."
"Pricing is one of the things that could be improved. Also, there could be improvement in the visual analytics space there and on the machine learning functions."
"The interface of Databricks could be easier to use when compared to other solutions. It is not easy for non-data scientists. The user interface is important before we had to write code manually and as solutions move to "No code AI" it is critical that the interface is very good."
"The connectivity with various BI tools could be improved, specifically the performance and real time integration."
"One area of improvement is the Databricks File System (DBFS), where command-line challenges arise when accessing files. Standardization of file paths on the system could help, as engineers sometimes struggle."
"The first deployment is difficult. It is not straightforward and you have to think about a lot of stuff."
"One thing about Microsoft Fabric that I think could be improved is the potential confusion when working with real-time data versus normal batch loading."
"In my experience, Microsoft Fabric is not stable."
"I think the Copilot usage in Microsoft Fabric can be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Databricks are not costly when compared with other solutions' prices."
"Licensing on site I would counsel against, as on-site hardware issues tend to really delay and slow down delivery."
"We find Databricks to be very expensive, although this improved when we found out how to shut it down at night."
"The basic version of this solution is now open-source, so there are no license costs involved. However, there is a charge for any advanced functionality and this can be quite expensive."
"The solution requires a subscription."
"Whenever we want to find the actual costing, we have to send an email to Databricks, so having the information available on the internet would be helpful."
"I am based in South Africa, where it is expensive adapting to the cloud, and then there is the price for the tool itself."
"I would rate the tool’s pricing an eight out of ten."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Healthcare Company
6%
Healthcare Company
15%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise60
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which do you prefer - Databricks or Azure Machine Learning Studio?
Databricks gives you the option of working with several different languages, such as SQL, R, Scala, Apache Spark, or Python. It offers many different cluster choices and excellent integration with ...
How would you compare Databricks vs Amazon SageMaker?
We researched AWS SageMaker, but in the end, we chose Databricks. Databricks is a Unified Analytics Platform designed to accelerate innovation projects. It is based on Spark so it is very fast. It...
Which would you choose - Databricks or Azure Stream Analytics?
Databricks is an easy-to-set-up and versatile tool for data management, analysis, and business analytics. For analytics teams that have to interpret data to further the business goals of their orga...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Fabric?
I think Microsoft Fabric can be improved, but I feel that everything is adequate. Everything is acceptable regarding the needed improvements.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Fabric?
My main use case for Microsoft Fabric is data engineering. A specific example of something my team has used Microsoft Fabric for is to collect information from many sources and put it in the data w...
What advice do you have for others considering Microsoft Fabric?
My advice to others looking into using Microsoft Fabric is that it is a good solution. I heard from the cloud infrastructure team about this product. I do not have any additional thoughts about Mic...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Elsevier, MyFitnessPal, Sharethrough, Automatic Labs, Celtra, Radius Intelligence, Yesware
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Databricks vs. Microsoft Fabric and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.