What if you could build an elegant and complex visualization dashboard at the touch of a button? Some tools give you the power to do just that. The best visualization dashboard builders allow you to create multiple charts and other graphics to organize your data—often without writing any complicated code.
However, there are hundreds of visualization dashboard builders out there and only a handful of them are generate truly groundbreaking visuals and insights. To find the most innovative and intelligent visualization software, let’s compare five top dashboard builders.
Five Innovative Visualization Dashboard Tools
A visualization dashboard is a tool that helps you organize and display data in a visual format, such as a chart or graph. Most dashboards contain multiple visuals on a single page and can track everything from key performance indicators (KPIs) to project timelines. What makes these dashboards so useful is that they are infinitely customizable; you’re only limited by the visuals and tools each dashboard software supports.
But this is where the dashboard creation process gets a little tricky. Some dashboard builders don’t have as many visualization options as others. Many also place a limit on the size of the data sets you can use or number of visuals you can display on a single page.
This is why it’s important to weigh all of your options and find the tool that offers you the greatest number of benefits and the fewest restrictions. These five popular visualization dashboard building tools are the most robust and have very few flaws.
- Microsoft Power BI
- Available for desktop or mobile users.
- Offers a free license, a Pro license for $9.99 per user per month, or a Premium license for $4,995 or more per month.
- Includes hundreds of detailed visual templates and custom visuals.
- Choose a dashboard template or create your own custom layout.
- Make any dashboard a featured dashboard that automatically opens for every user.
- Link dashboards to Power BI reports to slice and dice data or drill down through the data to identify trends.
- Export multiple small data sets (although there is a data size limit).
- Easy to use, even if you have no experience with data science, visualizations, or dashboards.
- Tableau
- Available for desktop or mobile users.
- Offers a personal desktop license for $35 per month, a professional desktop license for $70 per month, a server license for $35 per month, or an online license for $42 per month.
- Includes a number of visuals that you can add to the dashboard from a dropdown list (however, custom visuals are harder to add).
- Create your own dashboard by dragging and dropping different visuals or objects onto the page.
- Link dashboards to Tableau sheets for more detailed data analysis.
- Make interactive dashboards to share with other Tableau users.
- Export very large data sets.
- Requires some knowledge of dashboard design and data science, but is easy to use once you get over this initial learning curve.
- Sisense
- Available for desktop or mobile users (although mobile users may have fewer dashboard creation options).
- Offers custom pricing models depending on your business’ needs.
- Includes visuals in the form of widgets that you add to the dashboard page.
- Customize the appearance of the widgets using the app’s Widget Designer or adjust the layout of the dashboard’s visuals.
- Make interactive dashboards.
- Export very large data sets.
- Has a slight learning curve at first, but once you learn how to use the visualization dashboard builder, it’s easy to design new dashboards on the fly.
- Zoho Analytics
- Available for desktop. There is a mobile app; however, you may only be able to view dashboards from a mobile device.
- Offers licenses for $25 for two users per month or more expensive plans for as much as $485 per month for 50 users.
- Includes visual widgets that are automatically populated from reports linked to your Zoho Analytics account.
- Resize or change the order of visuals on the dashboard.
- Create custom themes using an HTML editor.
- Export some large data sets, limited to 100 MB or 100,000 rows.
- Not as customizable as some of the other options on this list and may require some knowledge of HTML.
- iDashboards:
- Available for desktop or mobile users.
- Offers custom pricing options that vary by user.
- Includes a list of custom visuals. You can also embed other graphic elements into your dashboards (such as a company logo).
- Make interactive dashboards that drill down through your data to display more detailed information.
- Export small data sets (users may struggle to export large data sets or tables).
- The drag-and-drop feature makes it easy to create dashboards without writing any code.
These are only a few of the visualization dashboard builders available on the market, so there may be other tools that better suit your needs. However, for most businesses, one of these five is usually the best option, as they are well-established in the data analytics industry and are known reliable customer support.
Although all of these tools are advanced, you’ll need to consider the pros and cons of each before you make your decision.
Auto-refresh keeps the data in sync with the connected source. Refresh Now and Scheduled Refresh option keeps all reports updated.
What’s the Best Visualization Dashboard Builder?
What’s your budget?
Power BI is the only software that offers a free license, but if you want to share your dashboards with other Power BI users, then you’ll have to pay for a Pro or Premium license. Still, the Pro license is less expensive than any of the other five software options on this list. Zoho Analytics is the next most affordable option. Tableau is more expensive than either Power BI or Zoho Analytics, but also comes with a number of additional features that may be worth the higher price. Sisense and iDashboards both offer custom pricing options, so it’s wise to ask for an estimate from them before you make a final decision.
Do you need to analyze large data sets?
If you only work with small amounts of data, then Power BI, Zoho Analytics, and iDashboards are all fine options. They cost less than services that support larger data sets. However, if you need to build dashboards from large sets of data, then either Tableau or Sisense are your only out-of-the-box options.
Do you have a data science or graphic design background?
If you don’t have any experience working with data, writing basic code, or designing engaging web pages or infographics, then some of these visualization dashboard builders will be tough to navigate. Tableau, Sisense, and Zoho Analytics have some of the highest learning curves, whereas Power BI and iDashboards are typically very easy for anyone to use.
Keep in mind that these five tools aren’t the only options you have for designing effective visualization dashboards from scratch. You can also hire a third-party data analytics company to create a custom visualization dashboard builder based on your workflow.
How to Build Robust Visualization Dashboards
Although visualization dashboard builders are designed to work straight out of the box, the reality isn’t always as elegant or streamlined. Unexpected costs, steep learning curves, and data limitations make switching to a new piece of software difficult.
If none of these dashboard builder options meet your needs, or you’re looking for alternatives to self-service dashboard builders, consider hiring a third-party data analytics firm. They can take a close look at your business strategy and operations to create the best possible dashboards for every data set you’d like to analyze.
In some cases, hiring a third party is a better option than buying a software license because the third-party system is built specifically for your business. You won’t have to worry whether you’re missing key features or paying for more than you’ll actually use. Another benefit is that the system is inherently simple. It’s built around your workflow and experience level, meaning you won’t waste time learning how to use it. With help from visualization dashboard experts, you’ll create spectacularly-detailed visuals without lifting a finger.
To get a custom visualization dashboard of your own, contact Tek Leaders today. We specialize in creating robust and visually-engaging dashboards that are designed to track all of your most important KPIs and generate insights that have the greatest impact on your bottom line. If you’d like more information about the custom dashboard services we offer, you can reach us by email directly.
Shashank Reddy Tummala.
