10 Best Data Extraction Tools for 2024

As a data professional, you’re no stranger to the challenge of managing large volumes of data from diverse sources. The old-school method of copy-pasting data is not only time-consuming but also a breeding ground for errors, making it challenging to maintain the accuracy and consistency of your data.

This is where data extraction tools come into play. These powerful applications are designed to automate the process of extracting data from various sources, transforming it into a standardized format, and loading it into a target system. By leveraging data extraction tools, you can streamline your data workflows, reduce the risk of errors, and gain valuable insights from your data more efficiently.

This blog post will discuss data extraction tools’ types, working, and benefits. Let’s get started.   

What is Data Extraction?

Data extraction is collecting various types of data scattered and drawn from numerous sources, some of which may need to be better arranged or completely unstructured. It enables data collection, processing, and refinement before storing it in a central place for further manipulation. Such websites are typically on-premise, in the cloud, or combined. 

Types of Data Extraction

Data extraction automates the process of extracting data from sources and eliminates the manual work required. It can be categorized into the following types-

Logical Extraction

It involves extracting data from a database or other structured data source to preserve the relationships and integrity of the data. It is further of three types-

• Full Extraction for pulling data in its entirety from the source system.
• Incremental Extraction pulls updated or changed data from the source system.
• Source-driven Extraction (or CDC) captures and records any changes made to a source at regular intervals.

Physical Extraction

It involves copying raw data files from a storage device without regard for the relationships between the data elements. It can be of two types: 

• Online Extraction: extracting data directly from a live system while it still operates (real-time data replication). 
• Offline extraction: extracting data from a system that is not running (may not provide real-time data replication).

What are Data Extraction Tools?

Let us understand this with an example: you need to extract customer information from a series of PDF invoices. Instead of manually copying and pasting the data, you can use a data extraction tool to automatically parse the invoices, identify the relevant customer details (like name, address, and order details), and export the information into a structured format, such as a spreadsheet or database. This saves you time and effort and ensures the extracted data’s accuracy and consistency.

Therefore, to explain in simple terms, a data extraction tool (or data extraction software) uses automation to pull data from forms, websites, emails, and other online sources.

Why do we need Data Extraction tools?

The actual question is why do we need to perform data extraction. The need for data extraction tools originates from the need for data extraction. 

• Improved Data Quality: Imagine how important it is for a marketing executive to obtain customer information trapped in different files and PDFs. If they start extracting this information individually, it will be time-consuming and error-prone. Data extraction tools guarantee valuable business insights and ensure data quality. 
• Better scalability: Businesses regularly deal with large volumes of data that must be analyzed and processed frequently. Data Extraction tools can easily handle this scaling and evolve with the business needs. 
• Web Scraping: Data extraction tools are crucial in streamlining the collection process from websites, databases, and other digital platforms. 
• Ease of use: No code data extraction tools like Hevo Data make it easy to set up data automation workflows without requiring any technical knowledge

How do Data Extraction Tools work? 

The tools used in extracting data help collect and gather data from various sources, such as websites, databases, and files. Such tools use various technologies depending on the use case, the type of data source, and the data being extracted.

For example, let’s say you want to collect the prices of some available products from various online stores. Instead of doing this manually for every purchase case, web scraping tools can be utilized to do this work for you within no time. These tools will go through the websites, scrape the price details, and present you with an elaborate compilation in spreadsheet or database format.

Another case is the extraction of data from PDF documents: suppose you have a large number of invoices and need only to extract the date, amount, and customer name. A data extraction tool would have to read through the PDFs before extraction.

These are achieved with the aid of technologies, including web scraping, APIs, OCRs, etc., that assist in extracting data faster and more efficiently. Based on the organization’s needs, you can choose from a variety of extraction tools.

List of Top 10 Data Extraction Tools

1. Hevo

G2 Rating: 4.3/ 5

Hevo Data is a top-rated ELT platform. It enables teams to make data-driven decisions with timely analytics. You can replicate streaming data from over 150 sources and transfer it to your chosen destination without coding. The platform processes 450 billion records and scales workloads based on user needs. Hevo’s architecture optimizes system resource usage, ensuring a great return on investment. With an intuitive user interface, Hevo serves over 2000 customers in 45 countries.

Features

• No-code Platform
• Real-time data streaming
• Pre-Built 150+ connectors
• Great Customer Support
• Automated Schema Mapping. 
• Allows complex transformations on extracted data.

Pricing

Hevo provides the following pricing plan:

1. Free
2. Starter- $239/per month
3. Professional- $679/per month
4. Business Critical- Contact sales

2. Nanonets

G2 Rating: 4.8/5

Nanonets is an automated AI for data extraction from all types of documents, such as PDFs, documents, images, emails, scanned documents, and unstructured datasets. Their software uses ML and optical character recognition (OCR) to extract data from these documents. 

Key Features:

• AI and ML integrated.
• A wide range of data sources supported
• In-built OCR software
• Accuracy and Validation

Pricing

Provides three pricing models:

1. Starter- Pay-as-you-go
2. Pro- $999/mo/workflow
3. Enterprise- Contact sales 

3. Import.io

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Import.io is a versatile custom web data extraction tool designed to modify web data into a structured, usable form without writing code. It provides a user-friendly interface for building extractors to target specific data points on a webpage. 

Key Features

• No-code web scraper
• Training using point-and-click
• Advanced extraction options
• PII Masking
• Intuitive web platform

Pricing

It provides 4 pricing models:

• Starter- $399/mo
• Standard-$599/mo
• Advanced-$1099/mo
• Custom-contact sales

4. Improvado

G2 Rating: 4.5/5

Improvado empowers enterprises and agencies to automate complex campaign reporting, make data-driven decisions, and leverage AI agents to optimize performance and drive ROI.

Key Features

• Extensive Data Source Integration
• Automated data pipeline
• A wide variety of data sources supported
• Advanced Analytics and Reporting

Pricing

It provides three pricing models:

• Growth
• Advanced
• Enterprise

You can contact the sales team to get the quotations from them.

5. Matillion

G2 Rating: 4.4/5

Matillion is one of the best cloud-native ETL tools designed for the cloud. It can work seamlessly on all significant cloud-based data platforms, such as Snowflake, Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery, Azure Synapse, etc. Matillion’s intuitive interface reduces maintenance and overhead costs by running all data jobs in the cloud.

Features

• High Availablity
• Multiplane architecture
• ETL/ELT/Reverse ETL provided.

Pricing

It provides three packages: 

• Basic- $2.00/credit
• Advanced- $2.50/credit
• Enterprise- $2.70/credit

6. Airbyte

G2 Rating: 4.4/5

Airbyte is a robust data replication and integration technology for building seamless pipelines. It’s an open-source connectivity library with over 350 pre-built connectors. It has a vast list of pre-built connectors. Airbyte allows you to create custom connectors if not present in the pre-built connect listing.

Key Features

• Extensive library with 350+ pre-built connectors.
• Connector Development Kit (CDK) for building new connectors 
• High-volume data replication with CDC and SSH tunnels
• supports incremental and full extraction. 

Pricing

It offers various pricing models:

• Open Source- Free
• Cloud—It offers a free trial and charges $360/mo for a 30GB volume of data replicated per month.
• Team- Talk to the sales team for the pricing details
• Enterprise- Talk to the sales team for the pricing details

7. Informatica PowerCenter

G2 Rating: 4.4 / 5

Informatica PowerCenter allows organizations to integrate data from different sources into a usable format and manages complicated data integration jobs. 

Informatica uses integrated, high-quality data to power business growth and enable better-informed decision-making. 

Key Features

• AI-charged master data management with Claire AI.
• It offers a range of features that can be used for data quality improvement, monitoring, and maintenance.
• Highly scalable

Pricing

Informatica supports volume-based pricing and offers a free plan and three different paid plans for cloud data management.

8. Integrate.io

G2 Rating: 4.3 / 5

Integrate.io is a leading low-code data pipeline platform that provides ETL services to businesses. Its constantly updated data offers insightful information for the organization to make decisions and perform activities like lowering its CAC, increasing its ROAS, and driving go-to-market success.

Key Features

• User-friendly interface.
• Provides REST API connectors.
• Low-code/No-code platform
• Drag and drop editor

Pricing

Integrate.io provides four elaborate pricing models such as:

• Starter-$2.99/credit
• Professional-$0.62/credit
• Expert-$0.83/credit
• Business Critical-custom

9. Fivetran

G2 Rating: 4.2/5

Fivetran’s platform simplifies data management. The intuitive software retrieves the most recent information from your database and keeps up with API updates. 

In addition to hundreds of pre-built connectors, Fivetran can create custom cloud functions to extract data from a source. It supports AWS Lambda, Azure Functions, and Google Cloud Functions.

Key Features

• Provides a huge list of connectors.
• Performs automated data cleaning.
• Helps perform complex transformations.

Pricing

Fivetran offers the following pricing plans:

• Free 
• Starter
• Standard
• Enterprise

Contact their sales team to get quotations for these plans. 

10. Talend

G2 Rating: 4.0/5

Talend delivers a comprehensive contemporary data management platform that integrates with any data environment or architecture, reduces risk, and shortens time to value. As a cloud-independent solution, Talend enables you to operate seamlessly across your data landscape, whether it is cloud, multi-cloud, hybrid, or on-premises.

Key Features

• Easy to use and set up. 
• Compatibility with data sources.
• Open source
• Some AI/ML capabilities allow data scientists to model data. 

Pricing

Talend has been acquired by Qlik and you can contact their sales team for getting the quotation on your pricing plan. 

How to Choose a Data Extraction Tool?

Deciding which data extraction tool to use is a crucial step. It is essential to keep your business requirements in mind to get the most out of your data. A few important points that an organization should consider while looking for a robust data extraction solution include:

• Support for Multiple Formats: Enterprise data exists in all formats, from structured to unstructured and semi-structured. An ideal data extraction tool must support most formats, including unstructured formats like DOC, DOCX, PDF, TXT, RTF, etc. 
• Source Compatibility: Different data sources may have different formats, protocols, standards, and security requirements, and you need a tool that can handle them without compromising the quality and integrity of the data.
• Scalability: Businesses are constantly growing, and as the volume of data increases, Data Extraction tools should also be able to scale out to accommodate the company’s business needs. 
• Data transformation capabilities: Assess whether the tool offers data transformation features to clean, structure, or enrich the extracted data.
• User-Friendly Interface: The data extraction solution should provide an easy-to-use working interface for the business user to create as many data extraction templates as desired. These need to demonstrate ease in manipulating data without any coding requirements.
• Pricing: Cost is an essential factor when selecting a data extraction tool. The license or subscription fee may vary depending on features, the number of users, or usage limits; the hardware or software requirements may affect performance, scalability, compatibility, etc. So, assess your data needs wisely and select the best tool. 

How to Automate Data Extraction with Hevo?

With Hevo, you can experience effortless data flow with its straightforward and no-code platform in three easy steps. All you need to do is:

• Configure your source- It could be a database, SaaS application, API, etc. 
• Select the Data you want to extract.
• Choose your destination and configure it similarly.

After following these simple steps, you can create a pipeline to extract data from your source. You can also perform any necessary transformations using Hevo’s intuitive interface to make your data clean and usable. 

For example, suppose you want to extract sales data from Shopify and load it to Snowflake. In that case, you just need to connect and configure your Shopify data source by providing the Pipeline Name, Shop Name, and Admin API Password, then configure Snowflake as your destination by providing the account name, region of your account, database username, and password, database and schema name, and the Data Warehouse name. You can perform any required transformations, and then your data will be extracted from Shopify.  

Conclusion

Data Extraction tools are essential for your company to retrieve data from various sources. To fully profit from analytics and BI initiatives, you must first understand the context of your data sources and destinations and then apply the appropriate tools; extracting correct and consistent data without hampering the data integrity is essential.

FAQ on Data Extraction Tools