Google Data Studio reviews

The most impactful features of DataStudio are the wide range of visualizations you have access to in order to present your data in the most engaging and insightful way. Coupled with the wide range of data connectors that are available natively and also third-party connectors, which expands the scope widely.
Once you have understood the overall way of working, the tool is very easy to use. There are lots of training videos available and lots of support available over the internet, in case you get stuck.
Integration into my business practises was easy because of the flexibility in data input sources. If a specific connector does not exist, then you can always fall back on file imports.

The most important missing feature for me personally is a native (free) data connector to Facebook Ads. One has free access to all the Google platforms and I have a constant struggle to get a decent data connector to Facebook ad platform data.
One improvement that I suggest is to add the functionality to do processing on calculated fields to do for instance 7-day moving average calculations on the platform itself. Now I have to do those calculations on a Google Sheet first and then import the results into the DataStudo reports. Or even make that a built-in function?

It is free. It connects natively with all Google products (Google Analytics, Google BigQuery, Optimize, Google Ads, Google Sheets). It has connectors for most data sources (some are for free, others come at a reasonable price). It lets you develop and draw your own data visualization simply using Javascript. Being a Google free product, you can find a lot of documentation, both proprietary and from end users.

It is slow (especially when sourcing data from Google Analytics: then you add the slowness of data studio to the slowness of Analytics, Merchant Center, ...). You can create nifty dashboards, but it is not as flexible as other commercial tools (Tableau has many more features and data viz templates, and an analytical & data preparation engine that have nothing to do with the simple architecture of Data Studio)

Data Studio is an extremely powerful tool for reporting and has allowed our team to share out extremely in-depth reports with our clients. It's suite of features is vast and allows our teams to provide highly valued insights into data we previously never had access to. The software is extremely flexible when it comes to customization to fit the needs of our client on a case-by-case basis, which is extremely important since each client has different preferences, nuances, and objectives and Data Studio makes that customization super simple.

Since Data Studio has so many in-depth reporting features, the software itself can be confusing to adapt to and the learning curve for reporting is quite steep if you have no prior experience. It took our team a long time to learn and adapt the software and collaboration on one report was often difficult, which resulted in one member being delegated to handle reporting responsibilities. It would be nice if the Data Studio was able to incorporate task management and campaign tracking alongside its powerful reporting abilities; I think that would really push Data Studio above the competition from software such as Domo and Tableau.

I see that it is a tool that fulfills what it proposes to do, it allows very easy integrations, it is easy to manage and organize data, it allows the visualization of dashboards and the management of sharing is easy.

In terms of building dashboards, it could have more features that would allow customizing dashboards for a more visual build. I feel that there are still few resources for this front.

Once it's build your data sources, it's easy to build your dashboards even they don't have the best data viz options. It's in the Google tech stack, that makes easy to your team keep running. Would like to have Microsoft Power BI? It was my concerto too! But yes, Google Data Studio will deliver all info you need in a beautiful interface - don't worry. Good price, clear and light interface, access from any device. Your data project will meet the needs.

Different from Microsoft Power BI for example, you don't have a on screen calculation, easy to work on. Many times you need to create new fields, build cases with calculations to have the field to use on. You need an administrator/builder with more tech skills. But any doubt that I found, I had case or example in the web to search and use. But once it's build the base, it's easy to build dashboards, deploy, upgrade and so one.

I love Google Data Studio... it's quite hard to select one feature, cause all the program is great, from the easy to use tables, the charts tables, graphics, the custimizable layout, the connection with your database...

Sometimes it gets a little bit slow and the tables or charts bugs... but it's understandable

I would recommend every business used this, from small to large. The ability to combine and view google analytics, google ads and search console data is fantastic and gives you great insights into your business performance. There are also lots of templates available online to get you started for no cost.

The customisation has to come from someone with a fair bit of knowledge of the product when sharing with others. In the majority of times people will have to only have a view of the report and they won't really be able to amend or see other data within it. It is also a little slow when doing lots of data and changing the views.

It's ease to use, free to use, integrates easily with all Google ads / reporting tools, 3rd party data connectors to other platforms, easy to setup and configure, easy to learn.

You may have to pay for several connectors for it to work with other platforms like Facebook ads etc

We can collate all our data sources into one automated report for our clients.

Third-party connectors can be quite expensive.

Simple to use as and end user and (mostly) simple to set up.

If you dont have the proper knowledge it might be a difficult task.

To have a tool that give to you the opportunity to develop a complete dashboard is amazing, and the fact that that tool is free, is awesome.
I really enjoy that GDS is really easy to use, I learn by myself and seeking videos on the internet. It is a very intuitive application, so you might not know anything about data visualization and you could still use it without problem.
I really like that the Google apps have very similar edit pages, so if you have ever used Google Forms, you are going to find GDS very familiar.

I find this software very useful, but there is one thing that I want they to improve, if there is the possibility. The connection with Microsoft Office, for example: Microsoft Excel. If you want to make a dashboard on GDS, you have to pass your data to google sheets, and you lost a lot of features that Excel gives to you. There is a way to do it by using python, but, if you want to preserve the fact that this software is really easy to use, so, it is not a solution to this problem.

Extremely user friendly. Setting up the dashboards was simple. You have control over almost every detail, including the layout and design. This is unlike many data platforms I've used in the past. ALMOST everything is totally customizable. This brings in all your Google/Youtube data automatically (including Google Sheets/docs). It also lets your bring in images, links, and other assets. You can change the data range filter easily for all metrics. The dashboard also is easily shareable to all team members and you can export the dashboard to a PDF.

The connectivity to other platforms is disappointing. In order to automatically bring in your social media data or data from other sources (such as digital advertising or 1st party ecommerce data) you need to purchase a "connector". However, there are ways around this if you export your data from your other sources and just put this in a Google Sheet and connect that sheet to your Google Data Studio.

Easy to use: Google Data Studio has a user-friendly interface that makes it easy for even non-technical users to create professional-looking reports and dashboards.Integrations: Google Data Studio integrates seamlessly with other Google products, such as Google Sheets, Google Analytics, and Google Ads, making it easy to pull in data from multiple sources.Customization: Google Data Studio allows users to customize their reports and dashboards with a wide range of visualizations, such as charts, maps, and tables.Collaboration: Google Data Studio has built-in collaboration tools, allowing multiple users to work on the same report or dashboard at the same time.Sharing: Google Data Studio allows users to easily share their reports and dashboards with others, either by embedding them in a website or sharing a link.

Limited data sources: While Google Data Studio integrates with many popular data sources, it doesn't have as many integrations as some other business intelligence tools.Limited customizability: While Google Data Studio allows users to customize their reports and dashboards to a certain extent, it doesn't offer as much customization as some other tools.Lack of advanced features: Google Data Studio doesn't have as many advanced features as some other business intelligence tools, such as predictive analytics or machine learning capabilities.Dependence on Google products: To fully utilize Google Data Studio, users may need to rely on other Google products, such as Google Sheets or Google Analytics, which may not be suitable for all organizations.Limited support: While Google Data Studio has a large user community and extensive documentation, it may not offer as much support as some other business intelligence tools.

What I like most about Google Data Studio is that it's free. Honestly, that's the main reason I use it, because I consult as a part-time gig with one-off projects and I simply cannot afford to buy into anyone else's "business analytics," "business intelligence," or "reporting" software tools. The fact that it works, is customizable, and is fairly easy to figure out if you've ever worked with web-based, data-driven visualizations are just icing on the cake.

Getting started with it can be a challenge, especially if you've never worked with "connectors" for database-driven projects before. The initial walk-through provided by Google is just enough to get you completely lost. I think more companies would use this tool if they provided a better introduction to how to properly set up your projects.

- Easy to use along with Live Updates of the Metrics from multiple marketing channels which makes the only BI tool to do so. There are other Paid Tools available but they don't provide live updates in metrics.
- Their Easy to Add Custom Calculated Dimensions & Metrics with easy formulas make it easier to work on for a Newbie

- Their UI/UX is not that responsive and users faces issues when using Data Studio which sometime leads to unwanted changes in the Reporting.
- Free Connectors are only available for Google Products only and if you want to use or capture other channel data you need to make purchase of the Connectors.
- You can only make One Sided relationships between multiple data sets which is a major disadvantage.

Google Data Studio's greatest asset is the fact that it is completely free to use. It's a no-brainer to use Google Data Studio if you only need to aggregate and visualize data from numerous Google products and platforms (such as Google Ads, Analytics, Search Console, etc.). You don't have to pay per connection or result for any of these products because they can all connect to Google Data Studio for free.

As a result of Data Studio's extensive reporting capabilities, the program itself can be difficult for new users to grasp, and the learning curve for reporting is rather high. With the new program, we had to spend a lot of time learning it before we could start using it, which meant that we had one person of our team responsible for reporting.

Part of doing good quality agency work in the digital marketing realm is taking your clients on a journey and keeping them up to date with their campaigns and digital performance. Data Studio helps integrate data from their search and social accounts in really visual dashboards. We cannot imagine our agency to function without these dashboards that take data in from Search Console, Facebook, Moz, Analytics, Google Ads, SEM Rush - you name it!

Sometimes third part integration with Supermetrics etc. can cause connectors to break randomly. Data fields being deprecated without notice also causes reports to break which is less than ideal. Finally, when you duplicate a report, the data sources are copied over which is a HUGE issue! So be careful there!

Besides the FREE price point, it's fairly easy to get started using pre-made data templates. Templates are customizable or you can build your own dashboards to filter and see the exact information you'd like. It connects natively with all of Google's products (Analytics, BigQuery, Optimize, Ads, Sheets) making it easy to get data from multiple sources.

Dashboards can sometimes be slow to load since data is pulled in real-time. If you're new to DS, it can take some searching to get the data into the dashboard that you want. Once you understand where and how to find things, it's fairly simple to build off of that.

It has almost all the data and we can create dashboard using all that data, by just drag and drop, which makes it super easy and convenient. For static data like targets, we can connect to google sheets, which results in one stop solution for many employees to track their performance. We also get rich demographic info using GA, which can be visualized here on maps also. After giving access to business users, they are self creating dashboards which is offloading my work.

It does sampling with users when data points are less, which results in different value for every user when using direct GA connector, we have to use Big Query connector to overcome this problem but it incurs cost. Sometimes it does wrong aggregation like while calculating distinct users, sometimes it will give distinct in total for which sum of table will by greater than total, but sometimes it just adds up the values which is wrong.

GDS is free to use, which is a huge perk. There are many connector options, the google ones are free and third-party ones can be added via companies like Supermetrics or TapClicks. I like the visuals in GDS and how user friendly it is. It's also nice you can have shareable URLs for reports/dashboards and can grant editor access to specific data sources.

There are limitations on the number of pivot tables you can have per page and i wish there was a customer support option. Even if we had to pay for it/

Some data sources are really easy to integrate. The pre-existing data format templates are extremely useful.

Had a nightmare trying to integrate with a standard SQL database due to the sheer number of IP addresses used to connect to your data. The system we used had no easy way to wildcard multiple IPs

I like this tool very much because of few advanced feature like- data add on from multiple resources like google analytics, adwords, search console, Google Sheet, Big Query, MySql, Google Survey, Youtube Analytics, Custom File Upload and etc. Few more other to create custom dashboard as per requirement. Do automation share report on email. It's very useful to create advance data visualization report. Also the filtration of record as per date we select is a global feature to add in report always on a same URL.

there's nothing to dislike or less like. There's possibility to add more add on related to example worksheet for marketing templates, sales and project analysis.

An easy to use application. You can edit your KPIs and visualizations as you wish. Very effective and price performance product

There isn't any feature that I don't like. Users will see it when they start using it.

I like the many possibilities of integrations with the data studio. It helps when you have multiple advertising campaigns to report on

It is a little difficult to create your own custom reporting charts.

You can integrate it with most advertising platforms (e.g. Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Facebook, etc) and create dashboards which update automatically.

Sometimes the bar charts do not scale correctly. Integrations are free with other Google products however you need to buy third party data connectors to integrate with other advertising platforms. Not as advanced as Tableau.