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SAS Visual Analytics vs Tableau Enterprise comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 4, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.3
Organizations saw varied ROI from SAS Visual Analytics, noting improved efficiency and financial tracking despite initial cost challenges.
Sentiment score
7.0
Tableau Enterprise delivers rapid returns through efficiency, cost reduction, quick insights, and enhanced decision-making within six to twelve months.
The enterprise subscription offers more benefits, ensuring valuable outcomes.
This saves a significant amount of time, particularly for reports that would have needed around fifty people.
The ROI of using Tableau extends to its seamless integration across various platforms, as it's from Salesforce and thus not limited to any specific cloud provider.
Tableau is saving me time, money, and resources, which I would rate as ten.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.8
SAS Visual Analytics customer service is mixed, with praise for technical support but noted gaps in business needs and regional availability.
Sentiment score
6.1
Tableau Enterprise support is praised for professionalism and multilingual assistance but needs improvement in response times and technical expertise.
They provide callbacks to ensure clarity and resolution of any queries.
They provide quick email and phone responses and have Thai-speaking personnel.
There should be consistent standards for all users.
The technical support for Tableau is quite good.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
SAS Visual Analytics effectively scales for large datasets and users, though high resource demands and expenses may concern some.
Sentiment score
6.7
Tableau Enterprise's scalability varies, effective with design and configuration, but big data performance concerns and costs remain.
Tableau is easy to use across various dimensions, whether on-premises or on the cloud.
The solution is fully scalable and performs well even with large datasets, provided there is proper supporting hardware.
Tableau is easy to scale.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.1
SAS Visual Analytics is generally reliable but can face performance issues with large data, often due to user practices.
Sentiment score
7.4
Tableau Enterprise is generally stable and reliable, with occasional issues mainly related to large datasets or server configurations.
SAS Visual Analytics is stable and manages data effectively without crashing.
The application hangs after continuous use due to the buildup of cache.
I rate the stability a five or six because Tableau updates very often with new versions or patches.
 

Room For Improvement

SAS Visual Analytics is complex and costly, with challenges in integration, performance, user-friendliness, and external language support.
Tableau Enterprise users seek better data integration, improved performance, cost-effective pricing, and enhanced analytics and collaboration features.
In terms of configuration, I would like to see AI capabilities since many applications are now integrating AI.
We cannot send the entire Excel file reports via email within Tableau.
The product owner should enhance its benefits or clarify its role.
It sometimes requires extensive investigation to determine why the data does not appear correctly.
 

Setup Cost

SAS Visual Analytics is costly for small enterprises, but offers strong analytics and simplicity, though consulting and scaling add expenses.
Tableau's pricing is high yet competitive, with increased costs for added features, posing challenges for small organizations.
Power BI as a much cheaper alternative.
A license for 150 users costs around $17,000 USD per year.
Looker is known to be quite expensive.
 

Valuable Features

SAS Visual Analytics excels in data visualization, advanced analytics, and user-friendly interface with rapid processing and seamless integration.
Tableau Enterprise excels in data integration, visualization, and analytics, offering customization, real-time processing, and advanced capabilities for decision-making.
The ability to query information from our Excel data into SAS to view specific data is invaluable.
A significant feature for me is the real-time connection to data sources because it effectively manages large data sets.
Tableau serves as a stable dashboarding tool for higher management, aiding in quick decision-making.
Building hyper extracts and visualization capabilities make Tableau a robust tool for data analysis.
 

Categories and Ranking

SAS Visual Analytics
Ranking in Data Visualization
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Tableau Enterprise
Ranking in Data Visualization
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
307
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (2nd), Reporting (2nd), Embedded BI (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Data Visualization category, the mindshare of SAS Visual Analytics is 3.4%, down from 5.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tableau Enterprise is 21.4%, down from 30.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Visualization
 

Q&A Highlights

KN
Aug 07, 2020
 

Featured Reviews

Danna Nemeth - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides ease of use and has advanced data visualization capabilities
The initial setup can be complex and depends on the specific environment and licensing. It typically requires some time and effort to configure properly. It can be deployed as a SaaS solution or on-premises. It typically requires an installer and someone knowledgeable in business analytics and data management. Generally, it does not require extensive maintenance, though occasional upkeep might be necessary.
Uzair Faruqi - PeerSpot reviewer
Ease of developing dashboards and receiving strong technical support have enabled efficient data visualization
Introducing custom features, such as NLP-based reports, is not very good in Tableau. My MD has been asking us for a way to write in natural language to request reports that the system should generate, but that isn't very effective with Tableau. As a developer, I can develop an on-demand report in Python quite easily, but exposing a REST API on the Tableau platform is not a very easy task. AI enablement is an area for improvement for Tableau, and that is something they might have to work upon. I have heard that ThoughtSpot is quite better in this regard, but the cost of ThoughtSpot is much higher. ThoughtSpot has lots of natural language-based report generation features that Tableau lacks.
report
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Comparison Review

it_user6330 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 2, 2013
MicroStrategy vs. Tableau
After a recent presentation, several attendees asked me about the applications of Visual Insights and Tableau. Many companies are investing in both tools and are trying to figure out the right tool for specific applications Tableau has found its sweet-spot as an agile discovery tool that analysts…
 

Answers from the Community

KN
Aug 7, 2020
Aug 7, 2020
There are platforms available that enable bridge between technologies. Tableau/Qlik is great visualization from performance and user interface as compared to SAS - #askginie.ai
2 out of 4 answers
RL
Apr 20, 2020
Tableau is a great tool for visual analytics but when it comes to statistical analysis, it has limited features. You can find basic descriptive statistics like mean, median, mode, SD, Skewness, Kurtosis, etc but for advanced statistical analysis, you can have machine learning models too along with advanced forecasting. If your work does not involve advanced statistical analysis then Tableau is a great tool for basic statistical analysis. In case you have further doubts, please feel free to ask.
reviewer1268517 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 20, 2020
These products all do more or less the same things but often in a very different way. The differences that I am able to report are mainly: -Look and feel and here Tableau is definitely superior. -Usability, both on the user and developer side and here the products are not very far apart, I would say Tableau a little better. -Managed data volumes and here SAS is unmatched (in Unicredit I have seen an installation that serves about 11000 users).
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Government
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
University
8%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SAS Visual Analytics?
The most solution's notable aspect, in my view, is the ability to integrate various data sources and harness advanced technologies such as machine learning and artificial intelligence. This helps w...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAS Visual Analytics?
It's about an average of five. It's easy to scale, but it comes with cost.
What needs improvement with SAS Visual Analytics?
In terms of configuration, I would like to see AI capabilities since many applications are now integrating AI. It may be that our current subscription does not include AI-enabled features, but I wo...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
Tableau vs. Business Objects - Which is a better solution for visualization and analysis?
Both tools have their positives and negatives. First, I should mention that I am relatively new to Tableau. I have been working on and off Tableau for about a year, but getting to work on it consta...
Which would you choose - Tableau or SAP Analytics Cloud?
Tableau is easy to set up and maintain. In about a day it is possible for the entire platform to be deployed for use. This relatively short amount of time can make all the difference for companies ...
 

Also Known As

SAS BI
Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Online
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Staples, Ausgrid, Scotiabank, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, Oklahoma Gas & Electric, Xcel Energy, and Triad Analytics Solutions.
Accenture, Adobe, Amazon.com, Bank of America, Charles Schwab Corp, Citigroup, Coca-Cola Company, Cornell University, Dell, Deloitte, Duke University, eBay, Exxon Mobil, Fannie Mae, Ferrari, French Red Cross, Goldman Sachs, Google, Government of Canada, HP, Intel, Johns Hopkins Hospital, Macy's, Merck, The New York Times, PayPal, Pfizer, US Army, US Air Force, Skype, and Walmart.
Find out what your peers are saying about SAS Visual Analytics vs. Tableau Enterprise and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
864,574 professionals have used our research since 2012.