Metabase review: A data-backed look

Explore Metabase’s adoption trends, market share, category benchmarks, and use cases to determine if it’s the right platform for your business.

Metabase logo
Metabase
4.4/5

Category

Data Visualization

Pricing

Free version available

Best for

Small & medium businesses

89% lower
cost than category average
+11%
QoQ adoption growth
81%
of customers are micro or SMB
19%
of customers are mid-market or enterprise

Metabase overview

Metabase is an open-source analytics and business intelligence platform that enables teams to explore, visualize, and share data with minimal technical expertise. Its intuitive interface, interactive dashboards, and simple setup make it accessible for business users and data analysts alike.

Metabase is well-suited for organizations looking for affordable, self-service analytics, with quick deployments and broad data connector support.

How much do businesses spend on Metabase?

The chart below illustrates average spending on Metabase across different business sizes.


Mid-market and enterprise businesses demonstrate the highest spending on Microsoft, with quarterly expenditure showing steady growth that accelerates significantly in the final quarter.

Small and medium-sized businesses maintain relatively stable spending levels with minimal variation throughout the measured period. Micro businesses show consistent spending patterns with slight fluctuations, maintaining the lowest investment levels across all quarters.

Who is Metabase best for?

The chart below breaks down Metabase’s user base by industry and company size.


Small and medium-sized businesses represent the largest portion of Microsoft's user base, making up the dominant segment of platform adoption.

Micro businesses constitute a significant portion of users, while mid-market and enterprise businesses represent the smallest segment.

Metabase key features

Interactive dashboards

  • What it does: Enables users to build and share live dashboards with customizable widgets.
  • Key benefit: Centralizes team metrics for real-time visibility and collaboration.

Self-service analytics

  • What it does: Allows business users to run queries and visualize results without SQL knowledge.
  • Key benefit: Empowers non-technical users to answer their own data questions.

Broad data source integration

  • What it does: Connects to popular databases, warehouses, and cloud data platforms.
  • Key benefit: Centralizes analytics from multiple business systems.

Embedded analytics

  • What it does: Lets organizations embed dashboards and charts in internal or customer-facing apps.
  • Key benefit: Extends data access and insight sharing beyond Metabase itself.

Alerts and sharing

  • What it does: Automates report delivery and sets up custom alerts based on data thresholds.
  • Key benefit: Keeps teams informed and proactive with timely insights.

Metabase pricing

Plan

Price

Key Features

Ideal for

Open Source

$0/mo

Core BI functionality, Unlimited queries, charts, dashboards, Basic embedding (with badge), Self-managed

Micro and small teams with own infrastructure

Starter

$85/mo

Managed cloud hosting, Automatic upgrades/backups, Unlimited dashboards, Basic support, Easy setup

Small teams needing managed BI

Pro

$500/mo

Advanced permissions, SSO & SCIM, White-labeling, Advanced caching, Priority support

Mid to large teams, embedded analytics

Enterprise

Custom pricing

All Pro features, Multi-tenant embedding, Dedicated success engineer, Enhanced compliance, Custom SLAs

Large organizations, complex compliance needs

Metabase pros & cons

Metabase is a good fit if:

  • Your team needs easy, self-service analytics and dashboards.
  • Your team needs to centralize data from multiple sources.
  • Your team needs affordable, scalable BI with fast setup.
  • Your team needs open-source flexibility and transparency.

Consider alternatives if:

  • Your team needs complex data modeling or advanced analytics.
  • Your team needs a fully managed enterprise solution with extensive SLAs.
  • Your team needs highly customized, embedded BI workflows.
  • Your team needs heavy-duty ETL or data preparation features.

Time is money. Save both.