Tableau Reviews

We just created the data visualization and analytics models and the complete setup file was sent to the client for deployment in their own premise as that was their client policy. We just created the solution and the solution was transferred to them.

We were trying to create a dashboard for the contractors in an oil and gas plant. It's for a million-dollar company. That was the level one priority. The use case involved a pilot project meant to drill down the visualization of each contractor and the sub-KPIs at a sub contracting level, plus the geographies involved. Tableau is a data visualization tool with analytics involved in it. The art was to create a set of dashboards that were geography-specific plus contractor-specific. Along with that, there were some common KPIs against which the visualization was supposed to cover as well.

The best part about Tableau is the visualization. 

Tableau has some amazing features. We can have some additional UI features that act like a skin. You can get it to really customize to your needs and then you can incorporate items as a plugin in your Tableau version and the user interface.

The graphics are quite good.

The solution can scale.

Technical support was helpful.

We found the solution to be quite stable.

Tableau is good, however, it lacks a bit on the integration side if you compare it to Power BI, for example. Power BI has quite a good amount of connectors. Even though Tableau does have some, Power BI works well with the Microsoft environment and most of the firms are in granular detail. That's where Microsoft shines. Maybe Tableau can collaborate with other bigger, well-recognized solutions in order to get an edge in the market the way Power BI does with Microsoft. 

The pricing is a bit expensive.

There's a bit of a learning curve for those new to implementing the solution.

We've been using the solution for less than a year so far. In the last eight months, we've developed and deployed the solution. We haven't been using it as long as, for example, Power BI.

It's a reliable solution. There's no doubt about it. The solution is stable. It does not crash or freeze. There are no bugs or glitches.

For deployment, the capacity was increased. It required really strong contractors also. That was easily manageable. It is quite scalable.

We had a team of around 20 developers who are working on the solution.

We only dealt with technical support once or twice. There wasn't a lot of interaction in the time we used Tableau. That said, they were always helpful and responsive. We were happy with their amount of assistance. 

We are also using Power BI. We use both products currently.

For us the solution's initial setup was complex as we were just aware of how to use Power BI previously. It was a completely new solution. We had to get an instructor to get the things in place.

I'd say it was about an eight-month installation process for the particular software. In-app work was one month and then seven months of development everything and all over the board.

We had an instructor assist us in the implementation process. and show us how to use the product.

We bought a monthly license as we were not able to continue with it long-term. It was simply a specific client requirement that was not needed forever.

The pricing of Tableau is a bit on a higher side compared to Power BI, however, for us, it didn't matter much as we were charging it to the client. That said, for a normal end-user, it would be considered a bit pricey compared to Power BI.

For Tableau we have been using only for a specific team within that also was for the external clients. That experience was only around eight months. However, it was a pretty good experience. Up to that point, we had been strictly using Power BI. Adding Tableau was for a specific client who just wanted the Tableau licenses created and developed for them.

We were using the latest version. It was not a cloud version. It was the desktop on-prem version we were using.

The solution would work well for small, medium, or large enterprises. It caters to all different sizes of companies.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten overall. We've mostly been quite happy with it.

Tableau is an analytics tool so we use it to feed the data. I get the raw data. We use it for business problems. If I want to see what is happening in the market I have Tableau's raw data. I'll make sure that I take all that data and feed it into Tableau.

It's very user-friendly. It's not like Power BI, Tableau is very user-friendly. Anybody can use Tableau. It's very easy to adopt things. I can visualize the stats.

It's one of the fastest-growing data visualization and data analytics tools. It aims to help people see the data. You can simplify and convert raw data into a very understandable format. That's the good thing about Tableau. 

I've been using Tableau for two years. 

The stability is good. It's easy to use. It's user-friendly. 

Scalability is quite flexible. It designed to give a more flexible scaling experience. It's quite easy to add users. The Tableau server can support 200 users.

I get good support from the Tableau team. If I have any issues, they're able to solve my issue within 24 to 48 hours. If I create an issue, they resolve it between 24 to 48 hours. If I have an issue, I'll just send in a form in the Tableau portal. 

The initial setup was easy. My IT team took care of setting up the licensing part. 

The pricing is expensive. 

We also evaluated Power BI and Qlikview. I'm more comfortable with Tableau, it's user-friendly.

I would rate Tableau a nine out of ten. 

It's a good thing that I'm able to visualize my raw data. In the next release, I would like to be able to have the option to see more raw data that I'm converting on the dashboard.

We use Tableau for BI reporting.

The most valuable feature is the interface, which is user-friendly and intuitive. Even for somebody new, who has no idea of how a BI tool is supposed to function from a technical standpoint, it is very intuitive. You simply import the data and then use the drag-and-drop capabilities.

Data cleansing and data transformation functionality need to be improved. Tableau is not a full-stack BI tool, like Sisense. Including this type of functionality would add flavor to the tool.

The main point is that Tableau requires the data to be in a certain format for the end-user, in order for them to create charts. If it's not in a certain format, or in a certain structure, then the user will have to manipulate it.

The charts in Tableau are quite limited.

I have been using Tableau for a few years.

Tableau caters to a lot of databases and flat files, which means that you can connect to multiple data sources. In this regard, I would say that it is quite scalable.

We have between 40 and 50 users in the company.

We are quite satisfied with community support. It is always there if you need any help and I am pretty happy with it.

I have worked with other BI tools including Spotfire and Power BI. There are not as visually appealing as Tableau and I would stay that purely from the UI perspective, Tableau definitely has the upper hand.

Conversely, Power BI has some capabilities that are missing in Tableau. Examples of this are charts and graphs. If you want to create something that's customizable, it's a very difficult and tedious task in Tableau. This is unlike Power BI or Sisense. 

The initial setup is very easy. Once you download it, it is a typical setup with a series of screens where you just press the Next button. Anybody can install it in a few minutes.

I am currently researching Sisense to get an idea of what the pros and cons of the different BI tools are. Sisense is a more complete tool that includes data cleaning, data transformation, and ETL capabilities right in the tool.

Tableau, on the other hand, is used for visualizations, dashboards, and storytelling. Their data has been cleaned or preprocessed in an SQL database beforehand.

Tableau is a product that I recommend.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We have used it for our program correspondence, basically, so how to program report to satisfaction of different programs. It helps us obtain information. We also use it for visualization.

It allows us to basically understand and evaluate our numbers in an expedient manner. It doesn't require us to need a huge number of data bases that we need to manage. This solution sets everything up for us. It has a good ease-of-use.

In the past, we were using several different solutions, and the packages were insufficient for our needs. We used a lot of different software solutions, and extreme Excel, but it wasn't enough for our needs. We were also looking for something that was a bit more user-friendly. 

One of the most valuable features are the different visualizations. It makes it much easier for us to represent what the data is showing. The dashboard is great, and the visualizations are really what we focus on. 

It's as powerful if you know how to use it, so it's made as much as we know how to use it. It's enough, but there's much more of a need to understand what you do to operate the solution. To be able to do more, we need to set it up to do different things. It is fine, but we have not really invested time or people into doing this much.

I would like to be able to set the parameters in a more specific manner. I feel as if it's not a questions of whether the solution is sufficient, it's whether we understand how to use it to the best of its productivity.

It is a stable solution. I think we can use it for a while for a lot of different things. Again, we do not know the full scope of the capabilities. I think we are using it the best we can, but we could find better ways for it to best suit our needs. So, we just need to learn how to use it more efficiently.

The technical support is good. They give solutions to our questions. 

We previously used Microsoft BI.

I was not involved in the initial setup of the solution.

Most people buy software because they know that it will help them do one thing, but they use it a tenth of the potential of what it could be used for. So, if you don't know what that is, you're stuck at ten percent. Be sure to explore the full capabilities of the solution.

The price is competitive. We always consider pricing when considering a new solution. We are a non-profit, and pricing is a huge concern.

We always like to evaluate other products in tandem with what we are using.

When reviewing a possible solution, we always consider:

• Price
• Functionality

There are many and various use cases. Some use it internally for inter-department analytics, sales analytics, campaign management, and sentiment analysis.

The most valuable feature is the richness of its visualization and from a self-service standpoint, the ease of use.

The interface is fine. The functionality in the UI front is good as well.

It integrates easily.

From a UI visualization standpoint, I think it's pretty robust.

The data processing in Tableau is pathetic compared to Qlik.

In Qlik, I can replace my ELD layer for an application. This can't be done in Tableau.

The initial processing of data in Tableau takes a lot of effort.

If there could be a feature that a particular visual can be exported or just the data behind the particular visual can be exported in one single click, just one button on a visual and it exports the relevant data out to Excel or a CSV output, that would be good.

I have been using Tableau since 2014, maybe even before that.

It's pretty stable.

It's decently scalable. I have been able to scale it pretty easily.

Technical support is good. On a scale of five, I would say four.

The initial setup is neither straightforward nor complex.

Pricing is not bad. It's competitive.

I'm a BI Architect.

My recommendation for this solution would depend on the use cases.

I would rate Tableau and eight out of ten.

We use this business intelligence tool to build dashboards to display some of the statistical and analytical information that our company gathers. We develop a precision medicine software platform that enables academic and community healthcare providers to implement and scale precision medicine programming. We capture clinical data, genomic and other molecular data, biomedical knowledge, and the relationships among them. We also provide integrated complex genomic and clinical data to clinicians with actionable insights. 

Previously, we built the dashboards manually but this practice proved to be inefficient and ineffective since it meant we spent a lot of time debugging. It's was hard to find developers capable of doing that kind of work at scale. Since the Tableau community user base is so big and a lot of people can use it; the widespread support is one of the biggest benefits. Besides that, it's a fantastic framework to build dashboards and innovative visualizations.

One of the most valuable features is that the solution allows users to build interactive dashboards. This allows the end user to modify the criteria or the filtering if need be.

As far as for my personal use as a QA Engineer, I really value how extensive their API document support has been.

Improvements can be made in template support. The workbook file structure is really hard to version control. If there was some sort of version control support offered particularly for workbooks, that would help big time.

Another note is that the interactions within the UI are not fast enough and in certain instances, there have been issues with the intuitiveness of the tool. Such as delays in configuring and achieving some specific effects. 

I have to say Tableau does have excellent and extensive online support.

The solution is stable. I've never had any problems.

My impressions of the scalability of this solution are that there are ways to make it as scalable as you want. There have been some issues with the amount of the data that we had to use on the platform. We ended up using the extracts. It works fine now. I would say it is scalable.

I haven't contacted their live support or emailed them. Their documentation is fairly extensive and we also had a training session conducted by one of their partner companies. It was the Tableau Accelerated Course and that helped a lot.

The initial setup was straightforward with respect to the deployment. 

Tableau provides a UI which can be used to build a clear graphical visualization that allows quick and easy data comprehension. This functionality really helps turn data into scalable insights. This makes things a lot easier for people who don't have coding experience and with dedicated people focused on managing the visualizations, not requiring them all to be developers or to have any coding experience is a real plus.

If I was to give this solution a rating from one-to-ten, ten is the best, I'd rate it a 9 because it does all that we require of it and more. I would recommend this solution to my colleagues from another company. It's a nice tool to work with.  

• Data Interpreter: Which can identify issues or potential errors with your imported data.
• Split: When you need to split columns.
• Pivot: Good for changing date columns.
• Metadata: This selection can clean up field names, especially after a pivot.

• Data Interpreter: Can rid your data of null value fields.
• Split: Click on the column you want to split, identify how you want to split it, and where you want to split the data.
• Pivot: Great when you have many columns of dates. Just highlight your date columns, then right click and select Pivot. That's it. Now, your totals and region data will be based on any particular year.
• Metadata: You can select the second icon above your previewed data source. You can select the dropdown arrow for each Field Name you would like to change and you can split the names here as well, or double click on the Pivot name and correct the name where it makes more sense for the type of data you are using. You can create alias names as well.

Tableau is always good at improving, but I typically get so busy with utilizing what is there, I have not had any needs yet for improvement.

More recently in the past few months.

No deployment issues.

No stability issues.

No scalability issues.

I have not had to use customer service for Tableau. I just go online and google my needs typically.

I have not had to use technical support for Tableau yet. As with customer service, I just go online and google my needs typically.

I really like the user-friendly (usability, user experience) layout of Tableau. The visual layout for me is very appealing.

It is really straightforward, but I can see if someone has issues with the download and setup, you may want to contact technical support.

Implementation was in-house on my own. It was easy.

I have not measured this, but the time saved by allowing the tool to make the necessary changes instead of going back to the spreadsheet is definitely worth my time and the company's money.

Not sure about this, except that Tableau can be costly (but this can be indefinable, such as user experience vs. cheaper etc.)

Again, this was more based on learning curve and user experience for me. I've worked with MicroStrategy and BusinessObjects (learning curve is higher for me for these, then Tableau). Big thing here is the user experience for less savvy or non-technical people (from my experience). I'm sure MSTR and BO are good tools, just not my preference.

As I had mentioned above in regards to improvements, I believe every tool or application or databases for that matter can always use improvement. That's why we work in the field of data and/or IT, it's ever changing and improving, so we need to change and improve as well. Keep abreast of new things in the market and the improvements of the tools or apps you use on a daily basis. The last thing we want in our industry is to become complacent. Then again, we should never become complacent in any facets of our lives.

Geo Spatial maps and Time Series animation with Storyboarding. The easy to use interface has really accelerated adoption. 

It lets power users like engineers create visuals on their data without waiting on a longer IT project timeline. The downside is you really need some SQL skills to take full advantage of it.

For Tableau, R is just a script interface. It is missing the R-style Plot area the data scientists want to use. They really want to overlay pieces on the plot and derive new graphs.

They need to provide a Folder hierarchy for organizing content and setting security. Creating 900 sites takes way too much work and limiting. As a result, we have hundreds of Worksheets in one long list—not good.

We had no issues with the deployment.

Performance has issues when you get too many users. The latest upgrade made it worse and had to be backed off.

The above issues brings into question how scalable it really is.

I am most familiar with SAP Business Objects Web Intelligence, but have been to classes on Tableau, Power BI, and Qlikview as part of our internal efforts to help the business choose which is right for their needs.

R and SAS are under our heading of Advanced Analytic tools in the BI space and will be evaluated in phase 2.

Plan how you need to organize and secure content up front. It’s too much work later when it becomes popular. Be sure to plan and budget for more client license bundle purchases as user growth approaches critical mass. Otherwise, you’ll be putting them on a wait list and waiting for management to approve more spending. Managing a lack of licenses is not fun.