Metabase is an Open-source business intelligence tool by Metabase, Inc. This profile pulls together Metabase's ratings across the major review sites, its company and funding details, leadership, features, pricing, and the latest news, with every external source cited at the bottom.
About Metabase, Inc.
Metabase is a San Francisco-based open-source business intelligence tool founded in 2014 by Sameer Al-Sakran and Jason Liu. Designed to make data analytics accessible to non-technical business users, Metabase lets anyone ask data questions in plain English or using its visual query builder without writing SQL. The platform is particularly popular with startups and SMBs that want a simple BI tool their whole team can use without data analyst intervention. Metabase can be self-hosted for free or used as a managed cloud service. The company raised $30M in Series B funding in 2019 and has over 50,000 companies using the platform globally.
| Category | Open-source business intelligence tool |
| Company | Metabase, Inc. |
| Founded | 2014 |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, California, US |
| Industry | Software Development · Business Intelligence |
| Team size | ~200-400 |
| Ownership | Private, Series B ($30M, 2019) |
| Founder / CEO | Sameer Al-Sakran (CEO) and Jason Liu |
| Specialties | Self-service BI, open source, embedded analytics, SQL-free querying |
| Website | metabase.com |
Find Metabase on: Crunchbase · LinkedIn · G2 · Capterra
Metabase ratings across the web
Aggregated from the major review platforms. Each links to the source.
Rating breakdown
Per-category scores from G2 and Capterra, ~700 reviews, 2025-2026.
Who uses Metabase
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What people say about Metabase
Our synthesis across ~700 G2 and Capterra reviews, 2025-2026. No fabricated quotes, this is the consistent pattern across reviews and third-party analyses.
Most praised
- Non-technical team members can query data without SQL or analyst help
- Self-hosted option is genuinely free with full features for smaller teams
- Question builder is one of the most intuitive visual query interfaces available
- Embedding Metabase dashboards in your product is straightforward
Most cited complaints
- Complex analysis requiring advanced SQL still needs a technical user
- Dashboard performance degrades with large datasets without optimization
- Cloud pricing is less competitive than self-hosting for budget-sensitive teams
What we found testing it
What's great
- Free self-hosted tier with unlimited users and 20+ database connectors; the only tool in this guide that a three-person startup can deploy at $0 and ship actual dashboards by end of week
- Visual query builder lets non-technical teammates answer data questions without SQL; the UX is the cleanest no-code exploration layer in the open-source BI segment
- AI Copilot for SQL accelerates analyst work meaningfully and ships in the $100/mo Starter cloud plan, not as a $50/user add-on
Watch-outs
- No semantic layer; metric definitions live inside individual questions and dashboards, which means metric drift is a constant maintenance problem past 15-20 active users
- Performance degrades with large datasets and complex multi-join queries; teams on 100M+ row tables will hit slowdowns that push them toward a proper warehouse-native tool
- Limited pivot tables and frozen-column table functionality versus Tableau; analysts who need Excel-style reporting in a browser will hit walls
Metabase funding & ownership
| Round | Amount | Date | Lead investor |
|---|---|---|---|
| Series A | $15M | 2018 | Index Ventures |
| Series B | $30M | 2019 | Benchmark |
Stable with strong open-source community. 50K+ companies provides solid revenue base. Self-hosted option adds enterprise stickiness. Good long-term choice for data-curious teams.
Metabase features & integrations
Security & compliance
| Standard | Availability |
|---|---|
| GDPR | Yes |
| HIPAA | Yes (Pro with BAA) |
| SOC 2 Type II | Yes (Pro+) |
| SSO / SAML | Yes (Pro+) |
Integrations: PostgreSQL, MySQL, BigQuery, Snowflake, Redshift, MongoDB, SQLite, Druid, Presto, Athena, Databricks, and Google Analytics.
Metabase leadership
Metabase pricing
| Plan | Price | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Open Source (self-hosted) | Free | Teams that can manage infrastructure |
| Starter (Cloud) | Free | Small teams, no SLA needed |
| Pro (Cloud) | $500/mo | Larger cloud deployments with support |
| Business | Custom | Enterprise needs, SLAs, advanced permissions |
The catch: Metabase OSS (self-hosted) is always free. Metabase Cloud: Starter free (no SLA). Pro: $500/month (up to 5 destinations). Business: custom. A self-hosted deployment for 20 users can run on a $10/month VPS with zero licensing cost.
Metabase alternatives & where it appears
Featured in our guides
Metabase product changelog
What Metabase has actually shipped, summarized from its own release notes and dated. Not auto-generated, updated as part of our freshness checks.
- February 1, 2026
- October 1, 2025
- February 1, 2025
Latest Metabase news
Auto-pulled from Google News, refreshed on each deploy. Headlines link to the source.
- Metabase zero-day exploited to access Framework customer data - Help Net SecurityMon, 10 Aug 2026
- Metabase hacked in major breach affecting more than 100,000 companies - Escudo DigitalFri, 14 Aug 2026
- Framework loses customer data in Metabase zero-day attack - The RegisterMon, 10 Aug 2026
- Endor Patches | CVE-2026-59826, Metabase: Arbitrary Code Execution via Database Connection Detail Bypass - Endor LabsSun, 12 Jul 2026
- Ticket Resale Platform Tixel Warns Users Of Data Breach In Metabase Zero-Day Attack - smbtech.auSun, 30 Aug 2026
- Five Sigma Upgrades Its Claims Analytics With Native Embedded Reporting, Eliminating the Need for External BI Tools - CoveragerTue, 14 Apr 2026
Metabase FAQs
Is Metabase really free?
Yes, the open-source self-hosted version is free with full features. You pay only for the cloud-hosted version or for Enterprise features like SSO, advanced permissions, and HIPAA compliance.
Can non-technical users use Metabase?
Yes, that's Metabase's core design goal. The visual question builder lets business users ask data questions like 'Show me sales by region last month' without touching SQL. Power users can also write custom SQL.
Sources
Every external figure on this page traces to a public source, last collected on the dates shown.
- Metabase website — Product and pricing (accessed 2026-09-02)
- G2 Metabase reviews — User reviews (accessed 2026-09-02)