Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Azure Data Factory vs dbt comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Azure Data Factory
Ranking in Data Integration
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
91
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (2nd)
dbt
Ranking in Data Integration
37th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of Azure Data Factory is 8.4%, down from 12.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of dbt is 1.8%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Integration
 

Featured Reviews

Joy Maitra - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates seamless data pipeline creation with good analytics and and thorough monitoring
Azure Data Factory is a low code, no code platform, which is helpful. It provides many prebuilt functionalities that assist in building data pipelines. Also, it facilitates easy transformation with all required functionalities for analytics. Furthermore, it connects to different sources out-of-the-box, making integration much easier. The monitoring is very thorough, though a more readable version would be appreciable.
Ninad Magdum - PeerSpot reviewer
Developer-friendly and easy to use, but doesn't have many optimization options
We also use stored procedures and Talend. They are not replaced by dbt completely. We use dbt only for the transformation process. My recommendations would depend on an organization’s requirements and problems. I will recommend the tool to others. The product is developer-friendly. However, it is still dependent on the data warehouse for big data and optimization. It's just a SQL transformation tool. It doesn't have a lot of optimization options like Spark. It's a good tool for Snowflake. If it were only for Snowflake, I would have rated it an eight out of ten. However, there are other data platforms. Overall, I rate the tool a six and a half out of ten.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We haven't had any issues connecting it to other products."
"It is easy to integrate."
"The platform excels in data transformation with its user-friendly interface and robust monitoring capabilities, making ETL processes seamless."
"I can do everything I want with SSIS and Azure Data Factory."
"I like the basic features like the data-based pipelines."
"Powerful but easy-to-use and intuitive."
"Data Factory's best features are connectivity with different tools and focusing data ingestion using pipeline copy data."
"ADF is another ETL tool similar to Informatica that can transform data or copy it from on-prem to the cloud or vice versa. Once we have the data, we can apply various transformations to it and schedule our pipeline according to our business needs. ADF integrates with Databricks. We can call our Databricks notebooks and schedule them via ADF."
"The product is developer-friendly."
 

Cons

"I would like to be informed about the changes ahead of time, so we are aware of what's coming."
"The solution needs to integrate more with other providers and should have a closer integration with Oracle BI."
"The deployment should be easier."
"I have encountered a problem with the integration with third-party solutions, particularly with SAP."
"Sometimes, the compute fails to process data if there is a heavy load suddenly, and it doesn't scale up automatically."
"Data Factory's cost is too high."
"Data Factory would be improved if it were a little more configuration-oriented and not so code-oriented and if it had more automated features."
"It would be better if it had machine learning capabilities."
"The solution must add more Python-based implementations."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's pricing is competitive."
"Azure products generally offer competitive pricing, suitable for diverse budget considerations."
"Pricing appears to be reasonable in my opinion."
"The cost is based on the amount of data sets that we are ingesting."
"While I can't specify the actual cost, I believe it is reasonably priced and comparable to similar products."
"It's not particularly expensive."
"I am aware of the pricing of Azure Data Factory, but I prefer not to disclose specific details."
"My company is on a monthly subscription for Azure Data Factory, but it's more of a pay-as-you-go model where your monthly invoice depends on how many resources you use. On a scale of one to five, pricing for Azure Data Factory is a four. It's just the usage fees my company pays monthly."
"The solution’s pricing is affordable."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Integration solutions are best for your needs.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Insurance Company
12%
Healthcare Company
7%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How do you select the right cloud ETL tool?
AWS Glue and Azure Data factory for ELT best performance cloud services.
How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica PowerCenter?
Azure Data Factory is flexible, modular, and works well. In terms of cost, it is not too pricey. It offers the stability and reliability I am looking for, good scalability, and is easy to set up an...
How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica Cloud Data Integration?
Azure Data Factory is a solid product offering many transformation functions; It has pre-load and post-load transformations, allowing users to apply transformations either in code by using Power Q...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for dbt?
It is cheap because dbt is open source. If you compare the pay-per-service of Dbt with the open source option you can manage. We are managing the solution, when we were acquiring service from them....
What needs improvement with dbt?
SQL statements that beyond DML, are not possible. Currently, they are not possible in Dbt. Having more features in SQL statements will support us. Another issue is the terms of data ingestion becau...
What is your primary use case for dbt?
We use the solution to deal with data transformations inside different organizations.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. Adobe 2. BMW 3. Coca-Cola 4. General Electric 5. Johnson & Johnson 6. LinkedIn 7. Mastercard 8. Nestle 9. Pfizer 10. Samsung 11. Siemens 12. Toyota 13. Unilever 14. Verizon 15. Walmart 16. Accenture 17. American Express 18. AT&T 19. Bank of America 20. Cisco 21. Deloitte 22. ExxonMobil 23. Ford 24. General Motors 25. IBM 26. JPMorgan Chase 27. Microsoft (Azure Data Factory is developed by Microsoft) 28. Oracle 29. Procter & Gamble 30. Salesforce 31. Shell 32. Visa
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Data Factory vs. dbt and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.