Comparison · Structured data · Sourced
Power BI vs Looker: Two Approaches to Governance
Both of these are governance tools at heart, which makes the comparison more interesting than a feature list suggests. They disagree about where the semantic layer should live and who should maintain it.
Last reviewed 7 November 2026
The products
Microsoft Power BI
Microsoft
Microsoft's BI platform, combining desktop authoring with a cloud service and an on-premises report server option.
Full profileGoogle Looker
A governed BI platform built around LookML, a version-controlled modelling language that centralises metric definitions.
Full profileThe main differences
Where the model lives. Power BI holds its model inside the platform, authored in DAX, frequently with imported data. Looker holds its model as LookML in version control and compiles it to SQL that runs in your warehouse. Looker keeps no copy of the data.
Who maintains it. Power BI models are usually owned by analysts. LookML is owned by people comfortable with code review and pull requests. That is an organisational difference more than a technical one, and it is the usual deciding factor.
Where cost appears. Power BI costs land in licences and capacity. Looker costs land in licences plus warehouse compute, which rises with interactive use and is easy to underestimate.
Deployment. Power BI can be self-hosted via Report Server. Looker cannot: it is a cloud service, which removes it from consideration under strict residency rules.
Side by side
| Attribute | Microsoft Power BI | Google Looker |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Microsoft | |
| Primary use | Enterprise BI | Enterprise BI |
| Deployment | Cloud, On-premises, Hybrid | Cloud |
| Organisation size | Small, Medium, Enterprise | Medium, Enterprise |
| Licensing model | Commercial | Commercial |
| Free version | Yes | No |
| Trial | Yes | Yes |
| Published price | USD 14 per user per month (Power BI Pro, billed annually) | Contact vendor for pricing |
| Product status | Active | Active |
| Capabilities | ||
| Interactive dashboards | Yes source | Yes source |
| Data visualisation | Yes source | Yes source |
| Self-service analytics | Yes source | Yes source |
| Scheduled reporting | Yes source | Yes source |
| Embedded analytics | Yes source | Yes source |
| Data modelling | Yes source | Yes source |
| Data connectivity | Yes source | Yes source |
| AI-assisted analytics | Yes source | Not verified |
| Role-based access control | Yes source | Yes source |
| Mobile access | Yes source | Yes source |
| Free self-hosted edition | No source | No source |
| Vendor-managed cloud | Yes source | Yes source |
| Paginated and pixel-perfect reporting | Yes source | Not verified |
| Usage or session-based reader licensing | No source | No source |
| Planning and budgeting | No source | No source |
| Native dbt metric integration | No source | No source |
| Associative exploration engine | No source | No source |
| Last reviewed | 7 November 2026 | 7 November 2026 |
| Profile | View profile | View profile |
Not verified means the capability has not been checked for that product. It does not mean the product lacks it. Blank cells and unverified rows are never counted as a "no".
Strengths and limitations
Drawn from each product's own profile, where every item is labelled a verified fact or an editorial judgement.
Microsoft Power BI
Read the full assessmentGoogle Looker
Read the full assessmentWhich to choose
Choose Looker if inconsistent metric definitions are your actual problem, you already run a cloud warehouse, and you have an engineering culture that will maintain a modelling layer in version control. It is the strongest governance story here.
Choose Power BI if you need breadth of audience at low cost, want self-hosting available, or do not have the engineering practice Looker assumes.
A blunt test: if your team does not already use version control for anything, Looker will be an uphill adoption regardless of its merits.
Frequently asked questions
No. Looker is a cloud service, which rules it out where data or the analytics layer must remain on your own infrastructure. Power BI Report Server covers that case.
No. Looker works against Snowflake, Redshift, Databricks and other SQL warehouses. BigQuery is a common pairing because both are Google Cloud products, not a requirement.
Related comparisons
- Power BI vs Tableau
- Power BI vs Qlik
- Looker vs Looker Studio
- Power BI vs Metabase
- Amazon QuickSight vs Power BI
Sources and review basis
Attribute values come from each product's structured profile rather than being written into this page, so a correction made once appears everywhere. This comparison was last reviewed on 7 November 2026. Assessment of this category is documentation-based, not hands-on testing of every product.
- Microsoft Power BI product site accessed 7 November 2026
- Google Looker product site accessed 7 November 2026
Disclosure
Alongside advisory work I also build a CMMS and CAFM platform, so I have a commercial interest in enterprise software generally. No vendor here has paid for inclusion, placement or wording, and there are no reseller or affiliate arrangements.
Deciding between these?
Independent help scoring them against your actual requirement rather than a feature list, and designing the integration work that follows. No reseller arrangements.
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