Tableau (Salesforce)

Tableau helps people see, understand, and act on data.

RevOps & Sales Analytics
★★★★☆ 4.4
2003 Founded
1001-5000 Employees
100,000+ Customers
Seattle, WA, USA Headquarters
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Quick Facts

✓ Free Trial
Website
tableau.com →
Starting Price
15
Pricing Model
per-user
Free Trial
14 days
Company Type
acquired
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About Tableau (Salesforce)

Tableau is a leading analytics and business intelligence platform that enables organizations to visualize, explore, and share data at scale. Its core capabilities center on highly interactive dashboards, rich visualizations, and self-service analytics that allow business users to ask questions of their data without needing to write code. Tableau offers both SaaS (Tableau Cloud) and self-managed (Tableau Server) deployment options, along with Tableau Desktop for authoring and Tableau Prep for data preparation.

Founded in 2003 out of Stanford University research, Tableau pioneered the concept of visual, drag-and-drop analytics and quickly became one of the most widely adopted BI tools globally. The company went public in 2013 under the ticker DATA and built a large enterprise customer base across industries, particularly in sales, marketing, finance, and operations analytics. In 2019, Salesforce acquired Tableau in an all-stock deal valued at approximately $15.7 billion, positioning Tableau as the analytics layer of the broader Salesforce ecosystem.

Today, Tableau sits at the heart of Salesforce's data and AI strategy. It integrates deeply with Salesforce CRM and Data Cloud (Data 360), enabling revenue operations, sales, and customer-facing teams to analyze pipeline, forecast accuracy, account health, marketing performance, and customer journeys in a single environment. New capabilities such as Tableau Pulse and agentic analytics leverage Salesforce Einstein AI and the Einstein Trust Layer to deliver personalized, natural-language insights and proactive alerts directly in the flow of work.

Tableau maintains a strong market position as a flexible, enterprise-grade analytics platform with extensive connectivity to cloud data warehouses, databases, SaaS applications, and spreadsheets. It is supported by a large global community, extensive training and certification programs, and a mature partner ecosystem. While newer tools compete on simplified modeling or bundled pricing, Tableau remains a top choice for organizations that need rich visual analytics, governed self-service BI, and integrated Salesforce-centric revenue analytics at scale.

Key Features

Interactive dashboards and visualization - Drag-and-drop interface to build rich charts, maps, and KPI dashboards without coding.

Self-service analytics - Business users can explore data, filter, drill down, and create their own views while IT maintains governance.

Advanced analytics and AI - Built-in forecasting, clustering, trend lines, statistical summaries, and AI-powered Tableau Pulse for automated insights.

Salesforce CRM and Data Cloud integration - Native connectors for Salesforce Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Data Cloud (Data 360) to analyze pipeline, accounts, and customer journeys.

Data modeling and blending - Combine multiple data sources with relationships, joins, and unions to create a governed semantic layer for reporting.

Robust data connectivity - Native connectors to cloud data warehouses, databases, SaaS apps, files, and a Web Data Connector for virtually any HTTP-accessible data.

Collaboration and sharing - Publish dashboards to Tableau Cloud or Server, manage permissions, schedule refreshes, and enable subscriptions and data-driven alerts.

Tableau Prep Builder - Visual data preparation for combining, cleaning, and reshaping data before analysis, with flows that can be scheduled and automated.

Governance and Catalog - Data Management features like Tableau Catalog, lineage, virtual connections, and centralized policies to govern certified data sources.

Embedded analytics - Embedding and REST APIs to integrate Tableau dashboards and insights into web apps, customer portals, and internal tools.

Mobile analytics - Native Tableau Mobile apps for iOS and Android with offline interactive previews and mobile-optimized dashboard layouts.

Natural-language and agentic analytics - Capabilities such as Ask Data and Tableau Pulse deliver conversational insights and guided analyses in plain language.

Row-level security and permissions - Fine-grained access controls that restrict data and content by user, group, role, and attribute for secure, multi-tenant deployments.

Alerting and KPI monitoring - Data-driven alerts, metric tracking, and personalized Pulse feeds to monitor revenue KPIs, pipeline changes, and account health in real time.

Pros & Cons

👍 Pros

  • Powerful, flexible data visualization and interactive dashboards that make complex data easy to understand.
  • Intuitive drag-and-drop interface that enables self-service analytics for business users without extensive coding.
  • Broad connectivity to spreadsheets, cloud data warehouses, databases, and Salesforce CRM/Data Cloud.
  • Advanced analytics features such as forecasting, statistical summaries, and AI-powered Tableau Pulse insights.
  • Robust sharing and collaboration via Tableau Cloud/Server, including subscriptions, alerts, and mobile access.
  • Large, active community and extensive training resources, templates, and best-practice content.

👎 Cons

  • Steep learning curve for new users, especially for advanced calculations, data modeling, and administration.
  • Performance can be slow or resource-intensive when working with very large or poorly optimized data sets and dashboards.
  • Licensing and role-based pricing are relatively expensive for small teams and can be confusing to manage.
  • Built-in data preparation and ETL capabilities are more limited than specialized data engineering tools, often requiring Tableau Prep or external pipelines.
  • Dashboard formatting and pixel-perfect design can be time-consuming, and some visual styles feel dated compared to newer tools.

User Reviews

G2
4.4
★★★★☆
Capterra
4.6
★★★★★
TrustRadius
8.3
★★★★★

Integrations

Salesforce Sales Cloud Salesforce Service Cloud Salesforce Data Cloud Salesforce Marketing Cloud HubSpot CRM Marketo Google Analytics Google BigQuery Google Sheets / Google Drive Snowflake Amazon Redshift Amazon S3 Microsoft Azure SQL Database Microsoft SQL Server MySQL PostgreSQL Oracle Database SAP HANA Databricks ServiceNow QuickBooks Online Box Dropbox

Best For

Company Size

smb mid-market enterprise

Industries

SaaS Technology Financial Services Healthcare & Life Sciences Retail & E-commerce Manufacturing

Use Cases

Sales performance and quota attainment dashboards Pipeline management and forecasting for RevOps and sales leadership Marketing and revenue attribution across campaigns and channels Executive revenue and board reporting Customer health, churn risk, and expansion analytics Territory planning and coverage modeling

FAQ

What is Tableau?

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Tableau is an analytics and business intelligence platform, now part of Salesforce, that helps organizations visualize, explore, and share data. It provides tools for building interactive dashboards, connecting to a wide range of data sources, and enabling self-service analytics for business users while IT maintains governance and security. Tableau is widely used for revenue, sales, marketing, finance, and operational reporting across mid-market and enterprise organizations.

How much does Tableau cost?

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Tableau pricing is role-based and billed annually. As of late 2025, Standard Viewer licenses start at about $15 per user per month, Standard Explorer at $42 per user per month, and Standard Creator at $75 per user per month, all billed annually. An Enterprise Creator tier is priced around $115 per user per month with additional management and governance capabilities. Every deployment requires at least one Creator license, and organizations can contact Salesforce/Tableau for custom enterprise and Tableau+ bundle pricing.

What are the main features of Tableau?

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Key Tableau features include drag-and-drop data visualization, interactive dashboards, and self-service analytics; advanced analytics such as forecasting, trend lines, and clustering; deep integration with Salesforce CRM and Data Cloud; robust connectivity to databases, cloud data warehouses, and SaaS apps; governed sharing through Tableau Cloud or Server; Tableau Prep Builder for data preparation; AI-powered Tableau Pulse insights; and native mobile apps for consuming analytics on iOS and Android devices.

Who are Tableau's main competitors?

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Tableau's primary competitors in business intelligence and analytics include Microsoft Power BI, Looker (Google Cloud), Qlik Sense, Domo, and ThoughtSpot. In RevOps and sales analytics specifically, Tableau is also compared with Salesforce CRM Analytics (formerly Einstein Analytics) and specialized revenue intelligence platforms, though Tableau typically plays a broader enterprise BI role that extends beyond sales into finance, operations, marketing, and product analytics.

Is Tableau good for small businesses?

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Tableau can be a strong option for small businesses that have meaningful data complexity, use Salesforce, or need flexible, visually rich reporting across multiple systems. However, its licensing costs and learning curve may be high for very small teams that just need basic dashboards. In those cases, simpler or lower-cost tools may be more appropriate, while Tableau becomes more compelling as data volumes grow and the organization needs governed, enterprise-grade analytics that can scale.

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