Skip to content
Business intelligence software · head to head

Tableau vs Microsoft Power BI

Sebastiaan Smits Editor Sebastiaan Smits · Published October 19, 2026 · Updated October 19, 2026

Power BI is the cheaper choice and the obvious one for a company that lives in Microsoft 365: $14 per user a month for Pro against $75 for a Tableau Creator. Tableau is the pick when you want to run it on your own servers or in the cloud with role-based seats and a separate prep tool, and are willing to pay for that. Price is where the two differ most.

Side by side

TableauMicrosoft Power BI
What it isVisual analytics platform owned by SalesforceMicrosoft's BI suite for reports, models and Fabric
Best forAnalyst teams doing visual explorationCompanies standardised on Microsoft 365
HeadquartersUnited StatesUnited States
Pricing modelPer user / monthPer user / month
PricingRole-based per-user pricing; the Creator licence is listed at around $75 per user per month on annual billing, with cheaper Explorer and Viewer roles.Free Desktop authoring tool; Pro listed at $14 per user per month and Premium Per User higher, with Fabric capacity priced separately.
Free optionFree trialFree plan
List price
as listed on October 19, 2026		Tableau Creator $75, Explorer $42 and Viewer $15 per user per month, billed annually (as listed on Tableau's pricing page); free trialPower BI Pro $14.00 per user per month, paid yearly; Premium Per User $24.00 per user per month, paid yearly; free account with Desktop
Place in our business intelligence software ranking#7 of 11#6 of 11
Websitetableau.commicrosoft.com

Both are reviewed in full in Best Business Intelligence Software in 2026. Position in that ranking can be paid for; the wording of a review or of this comparison cannot. Placement disclosure.

Which one to choose

Choose Tableau if

you want role-based seats, a choice between cloud and on-premises deployment, and visual analysis as the main job, and the Creator price is acceptable.

Tableau, #7 in the ranking · Visit Tableau →

Choose Microsoft Power BI if

your company already pays for Microsoft 365, you want a free authoring tool to start with, and a per-user price in the low teens is the deciding factor.

Microsoft Power BI, #6 in the ranking · Visit Microsoft Power BI →

Where they differ

What it costs to start

Power BI offers a free account with the Desktop authoring tool, and lists Pro at $14 per user a month, paid yearly, with Premium Per User at $24. Tableau's own pricing page lists Creator at $75, Explorer at $42 and Viewer at $15 per user a month, billed annually, and offers a free trial rather than a free plan. For the same person building reports, Power BI costs a fraction of Tableau.

Edge: Microsoft Power BI

Deployment on your own servers

Tableau says it can be deployed on-premises or in the cloud, and its help pages are written for Tableau Cloud, Desktop and Server together. Power BI Report Server is an on-premises option, but Microsoft's documentation says it is licensed per core through Fabric F64 or larger reserved capacity or through SQL Server licences. A company that needs on-premises BI without a large capacity purchase has the simpler route with Tableau.

Edge: Tableau

Sharing with people who only read

Tableau prices the reader separately: Viewer is $15 per user a month. Microsoft's licensing page says free-licence users cannot share or publish, though Pro and Premium Per User holders can share with free users when content sits in Premium or Fabric F64 or larger capacity. Cheap readers are possible on either side, but each needs a purchase decision: a seat for Tableau, a capacity for Power BI.

Edge: even

Fit with the rest of your software

Power BI sits inside Microsoft's stack: its page lists sharing across Teams, PowerPoint and SharePoint, and Pro is included in Microsoft 365 E5. Tableau is owned by Salesforce and its page stresses integration with a Salesforce instance, plus 100 or more pre-built dashboards called Accelerators. Which one fits depends on whether your daily tools come from Microsoft or from Salesforce.

Edge: even

Tally: Tableau 1, Microsoft Power BI 1, even 2.

When neither fits

A small team that wants an open-source tool it can run itself should look at Metabase. A company that wants metrics defined once in code before anyone builds a chart should look at Looker.

See Metabase and Looker among the 11 products in Best Business Intelligence Software in 2026.

Questions and answers

How much does Tableau cost compared with Power BI?

Tableau is much more expensive per creator. Its pricing page lists Creator at $75 per user a month, billed annually, against $14 for Power BI Pro. Tableau's Explorer is $42 and Viewer $15, while Power BI Premium Per User is $24.

Is Power BI free?

Partly. Microsoft offers a free account with Power BI Desktop for authoring, but its pricing page says you need Pro or Premium to share reports. Microsoft's licensing page adds that free-licence users cannot publish to other people's workspaces.

Does Tableau have a free trial?

Yes. Tableau's pricing page says it offers a free trial that can be started on tableau.com. It does not list a permanent free plan on that page, so a team that wants to build for free first will start with Power BI.

Can I run Power BI on my own servers?

Yes, with conditions. Power BI Report Server is an on-premises report server, and Microsoft says it is available through Fabric F64 or larger reserved instances and SQL Server licensing options, so it is not a cheap add-on.

Sources

Prices, plan limits and product facts on this page were checked against the vendors' own pages on October 19, 2026. Vendors change both without notice, so treat the figures as of that date.