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Post By Admin Last Updated At 2021-03-06
Explain the difference between Power BI Vs SSRS

Power BI and SSRS are the most popular business intelligence tools and both are Microsoft products. These Microsoft tools under BI are designed for data analysis and reporting purposes. There are many key differences between Power Vs SSRS, the popular BI tools in the current market. We will discuss them in detail and this will provide you various insights about using these tools. Also, we will discuss the basic idea of these tools in brief along with their usage benefits and features.

What is Power BI?

In the battle of Power BI Vs SSRS, the MS Power BI is a modern BI cum new-age technology. Being a Microsoft product it is a data analysis and reporting software with many user-friendly and smart features. This modern age Business Intelligence tool comes with various additional features such as data building, preparation, data connectivity, reporting, and many more. These features lead the current business reporting market with agile methods. Using this platform, any business can express the latest reports and can make a good presentation. 

What is SSRS?

SSRS refers to SQL Server Reporting Service, a Microsoft product, and a server-based report-producing platform. It much traditional reporting system comparing to Power BI that has features like enterprise report generation and data visualization, report sharing, etc. Moreover, it is less graphical with less drag-drop facility. Also, it includes many coding-based tools used for producing various reports.

Power BI vs SSRS

Hence, the above content is a brief idea of these business intelligence tools. There are more things to know further. Let us move into the main picture to know the actual difference between Power BI Vs SSRS tools. 

Difference between Power BI Vs SSRS

Now, we are going to see the major and key points for the difference between Power BI Vs SSRS. The following are-

MS Power BI is a cloud-based platform where SSRS is a server-based platform.

Power BI is an open-source, free-to-use platform but requires a license for using premium services. On the other side, SSRS needs an SQL Server license to use the software.

SQL Server Reporting Service (SSRS) is more traditional and includes manual effort in building reports and conducting the analysis. But Power BI is modern-day technology with lots of new smart features.

Power BI allows using data on-cloud where SSRS uses on-premise data only.

Moreover, Power BI includes the latest feature Report Server (PBIRS) and is the next generation of  SSRS. Here, in Power BI Vs SSRS, the PBI tool includes the PBIX, an interactive platform for analytical report building, but SSRS doesn’t have such.

Further, Power BI includes the Cortana app, a virtual assistant from Microsoft. This includes the features of AI-based NLP, Q&A, etc. relating to users’ data and reports. On the other side, SSRS (SQL Reporting Service) doesn’t have such features. 

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To get started with SSRS, a user needs to have the license, specify the needs and scope of work, customize the software according to needs, etc. Also, it needs to deploy and build various reports in an interface with the coding environment. But Power BI on the other side includes a GUI (graphical interface) to build reports and with drag-drop capability. It helps to integrate with different platforms to work with any unstructured data. Also, it helps in building reports, publish, integrate, and mix up with modern rendering platforms. 

Thus, these are the key differences between Power BI Vs SSRS platforms. Now we will go to the other aspects in comparison like advantages, features, usage, etc. 

Power BI Vs SSRS- Comparison Factors

There are many general and important factors that are useful to compare both Power BI and SSRS in one place. Let us go through the following factors that differentiate Power BI Vs SSRS in a broadway.

History 

In Power BI vs SSRS, both are Microsoft products with much popularity in the IT market with many major differences. The product SSRS of Microsoft commercially launched in the year 2004. Where MS Power BI report server was launched in the year 2017 with advanced features.

Technology

Power BI is a new age modern technology with cloud-based features to deal with report sharing and building with data. Moreover, it is more user-friendly to use for sharing, publishing various reports. On the other side, SQL Server reporting service is a traditional server-based MS product for report production and report sharing.

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Report Types

SSRS produces different types of reports that include drill-through reports, drill-down reports, cached reports, linked reports, ad-hoc reports, subreports, click-through reports, etc.

Similarly, Power BI develops reports in the form of chart visualizations. Such as area charts, line charts, bar charts, gauge charts, doughnut charts, pie charts, etc. 

Application

In Power BI vs SSRS, the Power BI report server feature has the ability to produce, share, and publish various reports and dashboards. It provides such for both on-premise like server-based and cloud-based platforms. Also, it has a very simple and easy implementation process.

But SQL Server Reporting Service (SSRS) only can produce, and share reports and dashboards based on the server platform. It is difficult in the implementation process.

Accessibility of applications

In the Power BI Vs SSRS comparison, Power BI software offers accessibility through different types of platforms. Such as web, desktop, and also through mobile applications.

Where SSRS software only allows accessing through web and desktop mode.

Usage

Power BI is much user-friendly software in comparison to SSRS in building rich GUI-based reports. Also, has a good drag-drop feature for performing quick work.

SSRS on the other hand is less user-friendly and mainly concentrates on a coding interface than a Graphical user interface.

Data dependency

In the Power BI vs SSRS comparison, SSRS can work with only structured and semi-structured data. Where Power BI can deal with both structured & unstructured data in the operations. 

Components

SSRS or SQL Server Reporting Service is an enterprise report visualization tool based on old age technologies. But Power BI includes an open-source HTML5, SaaS-enabled platform useful in analyzing data. 

Limitations in data size

SSRS doesn’t have any limitations in handling data sets. But in the Power BI platform, there is a limit of 1GB of data in the free version. Here, users can build and develop different data sets within Power BI.

Occurrence

Power BI has more presence than SSRS as it is an emerging platform and a good replacement for SSRS.

Moreover, Power BI has the latest features of Reporting Server through which it can dominate the Business Intelligence market. SSRS only uses old and primitive technology but also has a good use. 

Thus, we have the different factors of comparison between Power BI vs SSRS platforms. Now let us see a few advantages of using Power BI over SSRS.

Innovative User experience

With effective data visualization and analytics using rich GUI features, it provides innovative Ux to its users. SSRS uses some outdated interface so that it doesn’t have much control over the appearance of reports.

Also, there is a reduction in many printable reports from earlier days. Today, most people use mobile views and dynamic charts and reports for their ease. This makes less usage of paperwork and also saves the printing costs and its accessories. 

The learning curve also tends towards Power BI in Power BI vs SSRS as it has more adaptive tools for visualization. With easy accessibility and supporting richer data services, PBI has more users.

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Advantages of using Power BI over SSRS

There are a number of benefits held with this BI tool. The following points reveal the benefits of using Power BI over SSRS in this battle of Power BI vs SSRS.

  • Power BI platform offers much smarter solutions to enterprises and users. There is no huge capital expenditure involved in it as it is a cloud-based platform. It also doesn’t require much infrastructure support irrespective of the size of the business. 
  • It is embedded with rapid speed and a trouble-free ecosystem that gives a better user experience.
  • The tool is capable of integration with different environments existing within any business. Thus, it’s user-friendly for enterprise implementation and usage in reporting and analytics.
  • Brings rich customized dashboards and reports for the smooth understanding and functioning of business operations.
  • In this Power BI vs SSRS battle, Power BI offers to publish various reports much securely. It helps in publishing the different types of reports and allows automatic data refresh facility. Also, it helps users to avail the all latest information they need accordingly.
  • MS Power BI eliminates the speed and memory constraints generally held while shifting from existing BI systems to more powerful Cloud-based ecosystems. Moreover, it ensures that whole data is retrieved fastly and also analyzed perfectly.
  • Within Power BI vs SSRS, the platform Power BI doesn’t require any special technical support in rendering services. The tool includes agile inquiry and analysis performance. Moreover, it supports the NLP interface and innovative GUI features well.
  • Power BI platform is excellent in extracting data for BI reporting with high accuracy. It well transforms enterprise-level data into rich visuals for making enhanced business decisions on a move.
  • By using the DAX coding language and the in-memory technology, Power BI helps to balance performance and simplicity well.

Hence, these are advanced services and supporting benefits of the Power BI platform in Power BI vs SSRS.

Final words

I hope you have gone through all the points in this Power BI Vs SSRS comparison. I tried to explain the things that contrast both BI tools and of course the Microsoft products. Most people vote for the Power BI reporting server in this regard as it is the latest and rapidly growing technology feature in the current IT market. The latter one has become less useful nowadays as it has no such advanced level features. Using Power BI, businesses can improve their reporting services much richer. Hence, to learn more innovative things in real-time, get into the Power BI Online Training with the IT Guru platform. This learning can bring some fruits into your existing career search with better options.