The world is overflowing with data, but it can be hard for many to see the story in that torrent. That’s where the artistry of data visualization can come in. Data visualization is the process of converting data into common graphics like pie charts, line charts and histograms. This makes it easy to communicate data-driven findings and inform business decisions.
To do this, you need a data visualization tool.
Best Data Visualization Tools
- Tableau
- Microsoft Power BI
- Domo
- Qlik
- Datawrapper
- Looker
- Infogram
Below we round up the top data visualization tools that come recommended by data science and business intelligence experts.
What Are Data Visualization Tools?
Data visualization tools are software that generate graphic representations of data. They process data inputs, converting them into visuals that users can tailor to fit their needs.
Users can ensure the effectiveness of a data visualization tool by considering the expertise of their audience and the simplicity of their graphics. The right tool for the right situation provides accessible visuals that display information in a format familiar to the audience.
Best Tools for Data Visualization
Domo
While many data visualization tools are actually platforms with various tools that can be purchased separately, Domo is different, according to Michael Wilson, senior data and analytics manager at Stream.
“It is a data extraction tool, data storage, data modeling, analysis and visualization tool,” Wilson said. “It enables your [organization] to integrate all of your systems into one cohesive ecosystem.”
Wilson’s team can accomplish all of their data needs, including visualization, with one product. The visualization features are also easy to use and collaborative, he noted.
Key features:
- Interactive dashboards for sharing and collaboration.
- Automatic alerts users can set to notify them about relevant data changes or when numbers cross a certain threshold.
- Access to more than 150 charts and 7,000 maps for customizable visualizations.
Qlik
Qlik is an analytics and data integration platform that includes visualization features. The company’s Qlik Cloud comes with Qlik Sense, which allows users to create interactive data dashboards to share graphs, maps and other visual elements with their teams.
The platform uses artificial intelligence to automatically generate analyses and insights that support data scientists in delivering “interactive exploration, what-if analyses, and generative content directly to business users, in-context with their exploration.” It also allows users to set alerts that help them monitor business data and enable automation for routine tasks. Qlik Sense can be accessed on any iOS, Android or desktop device.
Key features:
- Charts, tables and other visual elements designed to be interactive.
- Scheduling reports to be delivered on a routine basis.
- Generating reports in formats like Microsoft Office and PDFs.
- Natural language processing helps the platform understand user intent.
Datawrapper
Datawrapper is an online platform for creating interactive charts and maps, as well as responsive data tables. Users don’t need to know any coding to take advantage of Datawrapper’s capabilities. They can simply copy and paste their data into the website, upload CSV/XLS files or link to the data to begin creating an unlimited number of visualizations, regardless of whether they have a free or paid account.
Datawrapper also has a library of resources available for users to learn about how to get the most out of its tools. That includes more than 100 articles on how to use Datawrapper, workshop slides and exercises, a blog full of best practices and visualization examples.
Key features:
- Responsive visualizations for desktop computers, tablets and smartphones.
- Integration with Slack and Microsoft Teams for collaboration.
- Live updating when the visualization is linked to a changing data set.
Looker
With the integration of Looker and Google Data Studio, the Looker suite allows users to take a more holistic approach toward data analysis. Users can now transfer data from Looker to Google Data Studio, creating convenient graphics with the help of both tools. Even before this pairing, Looker has always boasted an ease of use that characterizes many low- or no-code data viz tools. But it isn’t just for the non-technical user, according to Kevin Mattice, chief product officer at real estate data platform Cherre.
“We leverage Looker at Cherre because it gives our wide range of users the best tool to create the visualizations they need on top of their whole world of connected data,” Mattice said. “Our engineering teams can create highly customized visualizations across many data sets because Looker makes it easy to implement custom code.”
He explained that Looker’s language, LookML, allows both his team and Cherre’s clients to write code to customize visualizations “without changing the underlying data pipeline.”
Key features:
- Exporting to PDF, Excel or various image files.
- Setting custom visualization logo and color scheme combinations.
- Scheduling report generation based on data updates.
- Developing dashboards and reports in Google Data Studio.
IBM Cognos Analytics
IBM Cognos Analytics inputs data from various sources, cleans it and then generates data visualizations for team members to view. The platform stands out with its artificial intelligence capabilities, automatically integrating data from different sources and organizing it into the appropriate format. Users can easily build dashboards that adapt to mobile devices and gather insights by asking the platform’s AI assistant verbal questions.
Another advantage of IBM Cognos Analytics is that it plays well with a diverse range of data sources. Besides spreadsheets and CSV files, IBM’s analytics platform collaborates with Redshift, Amazon, Google BigQuery and other SQL databases. As a result, teams can easily combine data from varying sources and arrange them into compelling reports.
Key features:
- Integrates with a diverse range of sources like Google BigQuery and Redshift.
- Features an AI assistant that can glean insights after receiving verbal commands.
- Makes it easy to create dashboards and reports that can be viewed on mobile devices.
Infogram
Infogram is a website where people can use templates to design infographics, reports and other visuals. Users can access metrics that give them insight into how well their visualizations are performing and which elements viewers interact with most.
Users can sign up for a free basic account that lets them create 10 projects using more than 35 types of interactive charts, but Infogram also offers a range of pricing plans for organizations looking to use more customization and collaboration features.
Key features:
- A library of templates that includes slide shows and designs sized for platforms like YouTube and Facebook.
- Version history that allows users to look back at past changes to a visualization.
- Setting permissions for different roles within a team.
- Custom links provide analytics that track how a particular client shares or interacts with a visualization.
Microsoft Power BI
Power BI by Microsoft is a platform composed of several individual products, including Power BI Desktop, Power BI Pro and Power BI Mobile. These products integrate with each other and other Microsoft products. This connectivity, plus the ability to pull data from dozens of different data sources, can make Power BI very useful.
Katie Dootson, a former data analyst at robotic process automation software company Blue Prism, said she was attracted to Power BI’s low cost and high flexibility. Power BI’s similarity to other Microsoft products like Excel makes it exceptionally user-friendly, she added.
“Power BI is low-code so anyone can work in their system and create powerful insights,” Dootson said. “For the more advanced users, they can do some powerful modeling and calculations in the power query section and data analysis expressions (DAX) calculations.”
Key features:
- Equipped with a library of hundreds of data visualizations.
- Weekly and monthly updates to improve the platform’s features and capabilities based on feedback from users.
- AI insights feature that automatically alerts users of trends, anomalies and other data findings.
Sisense Fusion Analytics
Aimee Leidich, senior director and head of operations at Hint Health, uses Sisense’s AI analytics platform, which maintains code-first options — unique compared to most other data visualization tools that are low- or no-code.
“An analyst with no engineering background could hard code in SQL to create data tables for analyses and run all visualizations,” Leidich said. Having code-first abilities means the small analyst team can address their unique data table structure directly with SQL without difficulty.
Leidrich pointed out that a code-first approach might not work for every team. This makes the Sisense platform’s range of code-first to no-code tools a major advantage for users of various coding skill levels.
Key features:
- Natural language narratives make data analyses accessible and understandable.
- More than 400 data connectors available.
- Conversational chatbot facilitates data exploration and fast insights.
FusionCharts
With FusionCharts, organizations can build visualizations out of more than 100 different interactive charts and 2,000 choropleth maps that can be used for web and mobile projects. The company says there’s a low learning curve for understanding how to use its tools along with live chat support.
Users have the ability to incorporate annotations, which could offer additional details about a specific data point on a graph or merge custom images into the visualization that are relevant to the data. In addition to traditional graph and chart formats, there are widgets that help illustrate data with speedometers, thermometers, the fill level on a cylinder and more.
Key features:
- Customizing visualizations with brand colors and logos.
- Exporting charts as an image or PDF or turning the underlying data into a spreadsheet.
- Writing your own messages that display as visualization loads.
- Formatting for dollar amounts that allows users to switch between denominations for different countries.
Dundas BI
Dundas BI is a business intelligence platform that provides mid-to-large enterprises and software vendors with dashboards, reports and visual data analytics created from raw data. The platform is designed to be easy to adapt to different users’ needs for an intuitive user experience.
The platform’s dashboards are optimized for web and mobile display and users can save customized styles and dashboard templates for uniformity across their visualizations. Dundas BI also has a notes feature that allows team members to post feedback, such as comments or questions, in direct response to particular data points.
Key features:
- Drag-and-drop design tools.
- Notes that can be organized into comment threads along with permissions to control who sees them and email alerts for replies.
- Scheduling reports to be sent regularly.
Tableau
Tableau offers a number of different products, including Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Cloud and more. It integrates natively with a wide range of data sources, including Excel, Google Sheets, SQL Server, Google BigQuery, Amazon Redshift and Salesforce.
“It can connect to anything, pull data from anywhere and create powerful visualizations quickly and easily,” said Camden Daily, vice president of data at coding bootcamp General Assembly. Daily has also found Tableau to be great for exploratory analysis — namely, finding patterns in the data — as well as for explaining what the data says through robust visualizations. Marcin Bartoszek, head of business intelligence at Spacelift.io, an infrastructure-as-code management platform, said he is a fan of the various Tableau products, including Public, in part because of how easy they are to learn.
“The shallow learning curve that allows everyone to learn using Tableau has to be one of the main competitive advantages of the tool,” Bartoszek said.
Key features:
- Integrates with a range of data sources.
- A library of resources available, including video tutorials and webinars, to learn about the platform’s capabilities.
- Tableau Public offers a free option for users to create data visualizations that are publicly available online.
Zoho Analytics
Zoho Analytics is a business intelligence and analytics platform that is self-service and allows users to connect and blend their data from a variety of sources, prepare it for analysis, analyze it and develop a wide range of visualizations from it.
Trevor Larson, CEO and founder of employee recognition software company Nectar, named Zoho Analytics his favorite data visualization tool because “it strikes a good balance between customization and user-friendliness that makes it really easy to use, even for complex data sets.”
This balance stems from the robust customization options and intuitive user interface Zoho Analytics offers, according to Larson. One detail he especially likes about the user interface is that it is responsive, adjusting to the size of any screen.
Key features:
- Comes with an AI-powered analytical assistant called Zia.
- Interface has a drag-and-drop feature to simplify building reports.
- Comment threads allow teams to collaborate and offer feedback.
D3.js
D3.js is a JavaScript data visualization library that is free and open-source and designed to be low-code. The tool builds the foundation of visuals, employing shapes, layouts, geographic maps and other components. Users can further customize their data visualizations with behaviors like zooming and dragging to focus on specific data points.
It’s best to pair D3.js with Observable Plot, which can quickly create charts on top of the visual components of D3.js. Using what are called “marks” instead of chart types, users can further refine their data visualizations through the combination of D3.js and Plot.
Key features:
- Free and open-source data visualization library.
- Provides data visualization basics like shapes and maps.
- Works with Observable Plot to produce quick visualizations.
ChartBlocks
ChartBlocks specializes in helping users convert data into convenient chart graphics. Users can import data from databases and spreadsheets or choose to manually enter the data. From there, ChartBlocks provides hundreds ways to customize data visualizations, which include column, pie and line graphs.
In addition, ChartBlocks ensures sharing charts is a simple task, allowing users to export charts as editable vector graphics. Users can also embed their visualizations into websites and share them directly to social media through ChartBlocks’ social media sharing tools.
Key features:
- Option to import data from databases and spreadsheets or enter it manually.
- Dozens of graph options, including pie and line graphs.
- Users can share data visualizations on websites and social media.
Klipfolio
Klipfolio’s PowerMetrics crafts dashboards that allow users to explore and visualize trends in multiple metrics. The platform features a natural language interface powered by generative AI, so it can understand user questions and intentions to build personalized dashboards. Users can then track trends, forecast performance and more using intuitive variables.
PowerMetrics also simplifies importing data, thanks to its many integrations with databases like Databricks, Snowflake and Amazon Redshift. Once data is stored, users on teams can control who views visualizations with role assignment and permissions features.
Key features:
- Natural language interface for building customized dashboards.
- Ability to depict multiple metrics and swap metrics as needed for data visualizations.
- Features that establish roles and permissions to control who can access visualizations.
Databox
Databox is an analytics platform designed for tracking and visualizing business metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs). The platform provides dashboards that let users adjust details like the color and background and deliver quick insights through AI summaries.
Databox users can also generate reports, which can be further enhanced with dashboards, images and other visual elements. Users can even convert reports into PDFs to share via email or Slack — a process that Databox can automate.
Key features:
- Dashboards with customizable components and AI-powered summaries.
- Reports that let users add components like images and dashboards.
- Option to automatically share PDFs of reports through email or Slack.
