Tableau is Salesforce's proprietary business intelligence platform for building dashboards and visualizations, sold on a per-user subscription. Being closed source means your dashboards and semantic models are tied to Tableau's desktop and server tooling.
Metabase is the open-source alternative for teams that want dashboards and self-serve analytics without SQL, self-hosted on your own infrastructure.
FAQ
Is there a free, open-source alternative to Tableau?
Yes. Metabase is open source (AGPL-3.0) and free to self-host, letting you build dashboards without a per-user Tableau subscription.
What's the best open-source alternative to Tableau?
Metabase is the strongest match for self-serve dashboards and ad hoc analytics without writing SQL, though it doesn't aim to replicate every one of Tableau's advanced visualization types.
What are the top open-source alternatives to Tableau?
Browse all open-source alternatives to Tableau above, or explore the full Data & Analytics category for more options.