Looker Studio is free and handles Google data well. Two kinds of people outgrow it. Agencies and freelancers need client portals, white-label and sources Google doesn't connect. Data teams need their own database, real SQL and alerts. This list is split the same way, with prices checked in October 2026.
The short answer: for client reports, AgencyAnalytics or Swydo if you want a white-label portal, DashThis for branded dashboards on a budget, and Porter Metrics if you'd rather keep Looker Studio and just add sources. For team dashboards, Power BI in a Microsoft shop, Metabase or Superset if you have your own database, and Grafana for live monitoring. Fastero is the pick when a client's report has to come from their own systems, built by AI.
First: Looker Studio is now called Data Studio
Google rebranded Looker Studio as Data Studio on 16 April 2026 — the name it had before 2022. It's the same product: still free, with a Pro tier at $9 per user per project a month, and people who only view reports need no licence. Since July 2026 it can also answer questions about your data in plain English (Conversational Analytics). Everyone still searches for "Looker Studio", so this guide uses both names.
Why do people leave Looker Studio?
It usually starts well. GA4 dashboards, then Google Ads, maybe a Google Sheet. Then a request lands that it can't meet:
- Sources outside Google cost extra. It connects natively to Google Ads, GA4, Search Console, Sheets and BigQuery, and to Postgres and MySQL. Meta Ads, HubSpot and most other platforms need a paid partner connector, often $30–200 a month each — so the free tool now has a connector bill.
- No client portal or white-label. Clients open reports through a Google account or a link, with Google's look. There's no documented white-label option.
- Alerts need Pro, and never reach a client. Threshold alerts on a chart are a Pro feature, and only people in your own organisation can receive them — not a client's address, not a Slack channel. Scheduled emails have recipient quotas, and "Send now" is Pro too.
- Calculated fields aren't SQL. No window functions or joins you control; complex questions get pre-computed in a spreadsheet and imported.
- Slow at scale, fragile connectors. Large datasets crawl through the connector layer, and third-party connectors break or change price without warning.
If two or more of those apply, here's where to go.
Fastero
Connect your database. Ask questions. Get dashboards.
Postgres, BigQuery, Snowflake, and 10+ sources — live-connected, AI-powered, no dashboard builder learning curve.
Try free →For client reports: agencies and freelancers
Prices checked 6 October 2026, from each vendor's pricing page. "Yearly" means billed annually.
| Tool | 10 clients cost about | How clients see reports | Scheduled reports | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data Studio (the baseline) | Free; Pro $9 per user per project | Google account or link | Free, PDF by email | Google-only data on no budget |
| AgencyAnalytics | $200/mo yearly, $250 monthly | White-label portal, unlimited client users | Yes | Everything in one client portal |
| Swydo | From €62/mo yearly (10 data sources) | Client portal, unlimited users | Included | A like-for-like swap at 10–20 clients |
| DashThis | $139/mo yearly, $164 monthly (10 dashboards) | Link, optional PIN | All plans | Branded dashboards on a budget |
| Databox | About $199/mo yearly, plus $80 for white-label | Shared dashboards | Agency plan | KPIs from ad platforms and databases |
| Whatagraph | From $812/mo, yearly only | Link, optional password | Included | Large agencies |
| Porter Metrics | About $150/mo yearly (40 accounts) | Through Data Studio or Sheets | Through Data Studio | Keeping Data Studio, adding Meta and more |
| Fastero | Free to start, paid plans from $20/mo | Each client logs in to their own workspace; PDF by email | Any schedule, PDF attached | Reports from the client's own systems, built by AI |
AgencyAnalytics
The default for agencies: one plan at $20 per client a month billed yearly ($25 monthly). Every client gets unlimited sources, dashboards and users in a white-label portal with your logo, colours and custom domain, plus 85+ marketing integrations, scheduled reports and AI summaries. Database connectors cost extra above 25 clients. We compared it with nine alternatives in the AgencyAnalytics alternatives guide.
Best for: agencies that want reporting, the client portal and white-label in one product.
Swydo
One plan with everything in it, priced by the number of data sources: from €62 a month billed yearly for ten. Client portals with unlimited users, white-label, a custom domain and scheduled reports are all included.
Best for: agencies with 10–20 clients who want AgencyAnalytics' shape at a lower price.
DashThis
Priced by dashboard: $44 a month billed yearly for three, $139 for ten. White-label, a custom domain and automated email reports come on every plan, and clients open dashboards by link with an optional PIN.
Best for: freelancers and small agencies who need branded dashboards without a portal.
Databox
The Agency plan starts at $79 a month billed yearly for four clients; ten clients come to about $199, and white-label is an $80 add-on. Besides the ad platforms it connects to BigQuery, Snowflake, MySQL and Postgres, which matters when a client's KPIs live in their own systems.
Best for: agencies whose KPIs mix ad-platform data with a client's database.
Whatagraph
The lower of its two plans starts at about $812 a month, billed yearly and sold through a demo. It connects to the main ad platforms plus BigQuery and Snowflake, and shares reports by link with an optional password.
Best for: large agencies that want managed, polished reporting and have the budget.
Porter Metrics
Not a replacement but a repair: Porter Metrics feeds Google Ads, GA4, Meta and Search Console into Data Studio and Google Sheets, at $12.50 per connected account a month billed yearly, with a free plan. If the only thing wrong with Looker Studio is the sources it can't reach, this keeps everything else as it is.
Best for: agencies that like Data Studio but need Meta and other sources Google doesn't connect natively.
Fastero
Fastero comes at client reporting from the other side. Instead of templates over marketing connectors, an AI analyst builds the dashboard from wherever the client's numbers live — their own database or warehouse, Google Sheets, Stripe or HubSpot, and Google Ads, GA4 and Meta through its integrations — and you deliver it in a workspace the client logs in to.
A client report in Fastero. Sample data.
- Built by asking. Describe the report — "leads, cost per lead and booked jobs by month, with the change since last month" — and the AI builds it. You can edit any chart yourself.
- Each client gets their own login and lands on their report.
- The report goes to their inbox weekly or monthly, as a PDF run fresh that morning, with a short written summary of what changed.
- It reaches beyond marketing. When the client asks how ad spend relates to revenue in their own system, the answer is a query against their data, not an export.
Best for: freelancers and agencies whose client reporting goes beyond marketing channels.
For team dashboards: your own database, SQL and alerts
Prices checked 8 October 2026, in US dollars, from each vendor's pricing page.
| Tool | Best for | Free option | Paid from | Sharing with someone without a licence | GA4 / Google Ads |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Power BI | Microsoft 365 teams | Desktop, personal use only | Pro $14/user/mo, yearly | Only "Publish to web" (public) or a capacity licence | GA4 yes; Ads through a partner |
| Tableau | Large analyst teams | Tableau Public (everything public) | Viewer $15, Creator $75 /user/mo, yearly | No — a Viewer licence each | GA4 yes; Ads not built in |
| Metabase | Teams with their own database | Open source, self-hosted | Cloud Starter $100/mo with 5 users | Public links on every plan | Neither (via BigQuery) |
| Superset / Preset | SQL-first teams | Superset open source; Preset free up to 5 users | Preset $20/user/mo, yearly | Superset: a public role you configure; Preset: login required | Neither |
| Grafana | Live monitoring and alerts | Open source; Cloud Free, 3 users | Cloud Pro $19/mo + $8 per user beyond 3 | Public "share externally" links | GA4 via a community plugin |
| Zoho Analytics | Marketing data with BI depth | Free, 2 users | $24/mo yearly ($30 monthly), 2 users | No-login links on Premium; white-label client portal from $25 a portal | Both, natively |
Power BI
The most common switch for Microsoft shops. It connects to almost anything, handles millions of rows, and its data model — table relationships, reusable measures, drill-through — is far beyond calculated fields.
What to know. Pro costs $14 per user a month and Premium Per User $24, billed yearly (they were $10 and $20 until April 2025). Every person who opens a shared report needs Pro unless the content sits on a capacity licence; the only free route to an outsider is "Publish to web", which is public, has no row-level security and must be enabled by an admin. GA4 has a native connector; Google Ads needs a partner one. The desktop app is Windows-only, and DAX takes a few weeks to learn.
Best for: Microsoft 365 organisations with analysts who already think in Excel.
Tableau
The deepest visual analysis on this list, now sold as editions. On Tableau Cloud Standard, a Creator costs $75 a user a month, an Explorer $42 and a Viewer $15, on an annual contract with at least one Creator. Tableau Public is free, but everything you publish there is public; the free Desktop edition can't publish at all. GA4 connects natively (as extracts); Google Ads isn't in Tableau's own connector list. Each client who views a dashboard needs a Viewer licence.
Best for: large analyst teams that can license their audience.
Metabase
The closest thing to "Looker Studio, but for your own database". It connects directly to Postgres, MySQL, BigQuery and Snowflake with no connector fees, and its visual query builder lets non-technical people build charts without SQL.
What to know. The open-source edition is free to self-host with unlimited users. Metabase Cloud now starts at $100 a month with five users (then $6 a user), and Pro at $575 a month with ten. Public links work on every plan, and email or Slack subscriptions with a PDF come on every plan too. It has no native GA4 or Google Ads connector — marketing data comes through BigQuery. Complex multi-table questions still end up in SQL.
Best for: startups and mid-size teams with a relational database who want polished self-serve BI.
Apache Superset and Preset
Superset is the most powerful free option here: SQL Lab, 40+ chart types, role-based access and Jinja-templated queries that turn an analyst's SQL into a dropdown anyone can use. It also has alerts and scheduled reports by email, Slack or webhook, with PDF or CSV attached — but they're off by default and need a task queue and a headless browser to run, so plan a weekend for setup.
Preset is managed Superset from its original creators: free for up to five users, then $20 a user a month billed yearly ($25 monthly). Shared links need a Preset login; embedding for outside viewers is an add-on at $500 a month per 50 viewers.
Best for: data teams that write SQL daily and want a BI layer they control.
Grafana
Grafana started in infrastructure monitoring and is still the best tool here for "alert me when this number crosses that line": thresholds, routing to email, Slack, PagerDuty or webhooks, and dashboards that refresh every few seconds. Its plugins reach Postgres, MySQL, BigQuery and dozens more.
What to know. Grafana Cloud is free for three active users; Pro is $19 a month plus $8 per active user beyond three. Any dashboard can be shared externally by public link. PDF reports need Cloud Pro or Enterprise. GA4 comes only through a community plugin, and pivot-style business reporting feels awkward in its time-series UI.
Best for: teams that need live monitoring and alerts on business metrics.
Zoho Analytics
The one BI tool here with native GA4 and Google Ads connectors (on paid plans), which makes it a natural step up for marketing teams. Basic costs $24 a month billed yearly ($30 monthly) for two users; there's a free plan for two users and 10,000 rows. It emails dashboards as PDFs on a schedule (four schedules on Basic), and sells a white-label client portal from $25 a portal a month.
Best for: marketing teams and agencies that want a real BI tool without leaving Google's data behind.
How do I pick the right one?
Start with one question: are you sending reports to clients, or building dashboards for your own team?
Leaving Looker Studio (now Data Studio)?
|
+-- Sending reports to clients?
| +-- One portal, white-label ------------> AgencyAnalytics or Swydo
| +-- Branded dashboards, small budget ---> DashThis
| +-- Client KPIs in their own systems ---> Databox or Fastero
| +-- Keep Data Studio, add sources ------> Porter Metrics
|
+-- Building dashboards for your team?
| +-- Microsoft 365 shop -----------------> Power BI
| +-- Own database, self-hosted, free ----> Metabase or Superset
| +-- Live monitoring and alerts ---------> Grafana
| +-- GA4 and Google Ads with BI depth ---> Zoho Analytics
| +-- Large analyst team -----------------> Tableau
|
+-- Want answers without building charts?
+-- Yes --------------------------------> FasteroIf you're still between two, the deciding factor is usually who maintains it. Self-hosted tools cost nothing in licences but need someone to run upgrades and backups; managed tools cost per seat and need no infrastructure. And if what you want is answers rather than dashboards to build, Fastero connects to your database and answers questions in plain English, with alerts when a number moves.
FAQ
Is Looker Studio still free?
Yes. It's called Data Studio again since April 2026, and the core product is free. Data Studio Pro costs $9 per user per project a month and adds team features and alerts; people who only view reports need no licence.
Can I migrate my Looker Studio dashboards to another tool?
No tool offers a one-click migration. Data connections, calculated fields and layout all have to be rebuilt. Treat it as a fresh start: list your five to ten most-used reports, rebuild those first and retire the rest — many Looker Studio dashboards haven't been opened in months.
Which alternatives can I share with a client who has no licence?
Data Studio itself (viewers need no licence), Metabase (public links on every plan), Grafana (public "share externally" links), and the agency tools — AgencyAnalytics, Swydo and DashThis — which are built for client access. Power BI and Tableau expect a paid licence for every viewer, apart from public publishing.
Which ones do white-label?
DashThis includes white-label on every plan, Swydo in its single plan, and AgencyAnalytics in its portal. Databox sells it as an $80-a-month add-on, and Zoho Analytics sells a white-label client portal from $25 a portal. Data Studio documents no white-label option.
Do any of these include AI?
Data Studio's Conversational Analytics answers plain-English questions since July 2026. Power BI has Copilot with the right licence, and AgencyAnalytics writes AI summaries. If you want AI to build the dashboard from your own data and write the monthly summary, that's what Fastero is built for.
What about Sigma, Mode and Redash?
Sigma and Mode no longer publish prices — both sell through a sales call, and Mode has been part of ThoughtSpot since 2023. Redash is still maintained as a community project, with releases in March and September 2026, but it's self-hosted only and has threshold alerts rather than scheduled reports.
Sources
Client-reporting tools, checked on 6 October 2026: AgencyAnalytics pricing · Swydo pricing · DashThis pricing · Databox pricing · Whatagraph pricing · Porter Metrics pricing.
Data Studio and team tools, checked on 8 October 2026:
- Data Studio release notes (rename on 16 April 2026; Conversational Analytics on 30 July 2026), Data Studio, Pro subscription and alerts on a chart
- Power BI pricing, licences, Publish to web and the 2025 price change
- Tableau Cloud pricing and Tableau Public
- Metabase pricing and plan comparison
- Superset alerts and reports · Preset pricing
- Grafana pricing and shared dashboards
- Zoho Analytics pricing and white-label options
- Mode plans · Redash releases
Related reading:
- AgencyAnalytics Alternatives (2026)
- Power BI vs Looker Studio: Which "Free" BI Tool?
- Metabase vs Superset: Open-Source BI Compared
- Best Free Alternatives to Looker (2026)
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