Companies today have structured and unstructured data in multiple SaaS applications, databases, etc. Moving their data into a data warehouse/ data lake for analytics can be a challenge. Many companies have realized that it is more efficient to use tools that build and maintain data pipelines rather than code in-house.
In this article, let us compare three major cloud-based data integration platforms – Alooma vs Fivetran vs Hevo.
A Summarised Comparison of Alooma, Fivetran & Hevo Data
|  |  |  |
| Platform Focus | Data ingestion, ETL | Data Ingestion & ELT | Data Ingestion, ELT, ETL |
| SaaS Data Sources | – | About 100 | About 90 |
| Ability to develop new /modify existing data sources supported by the Platform | No | Yes | No |
| Support for Data lakes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Data Transformation | ETL | ELT | Both ETL & ELT |
| Reverse ETL Support | No | No | Yes, Native Reverse ETL solution called Hevo Activate |
| Data Security Certifications/ Compliance | HIPAA, GDPR & SOC II | GDPR & SOC I/II | HIPAA, GDPR & SOC II |
| SLA Support | No | Yes | Yes |
| Pricing | Not Transparent | Credit/Consumption-based. Transparent Pricing | Events & Paid Sources-based. Transparent Pricing |
| Purchase Process | Contacting Sales Team | Self Service or By Contacting Sales Team | Self Service or By Contacting Sales Team |
| Free Trial | Yes | Yes, 14-day free trial | Yes, 14-day free trial |
| Vendor Lock-in | Annual Contracts Only | Monthly or Annual Contracts Only | No Lock-in – Flexible subscription plans |
| Developer Tools | Python APIs | REST APIs only for Enterprise Subscription | REST APIs |
| Platform Training | No | No | Users can request a Platform Demo by contacting support,
Demo Videos on YouTube and
Implementation & Setup-based Documentation |
Introduction
Alooma
Alooma is an ETL/data pipeline platform, built for the cloud. It provides an ETL solution to bring data from a source to a data warehouse.
Fivetran
Fivetran is an ELT, data integration tool moving data from source to destination.
Hevo
Hevo is a No-Code data integration tool based on the cloud. It can load data from sources to a data warehouse.
Image Source: https://hevodata.com/
Features
Alooma
- Alooma platform provides horizontal scalability.
- Alooma doesn’t store any data permanently and encrypts all data in motion.
- Alooma provides great reliability and data integrity.
- Alooma allows customization to transform data.
- Alooma infers schemas and maps changes.
Fivetran
- Fivetran incrementally updates data sources rather than loading full data dumps.
- Fivetran provides real-time feedback on progress and delays.
- Fivetran sends granular logs of every sync to your logging system.
- Fivetran adjusts schema automatically.
Hevo
- Hevo is completely automated, flagging, and resolving any errors detected. So there is no need to write custom code.
- Hevo requires zero maintenance. It manages future changes automatically.
- Hevo handles all future schema changes in your incoming data like column additions, new tables, or changes in data types.
- Hevo detects any anomaly in data and notifies instantly to ensure smooth analytics.
- Hevo is built to handle millions of records per minute without latency.
Time to Set up
Alooma
The time to set up Alooma should take around 10 minutes. But it depends on the number of integrations you add. To perform any back-end historical data dump or schema mapping it may take around 24 hours after the first sign-up.
Fivetran
The time taken to set up Fivetran depends on the sources and destinations selected. Each source and destination has certain prerequisites. If the prerequisites are ready, the setup can be faster.
Hevo
Hevo has a quick 4-step process to set up a data pipeline. How long it takes depends upon its complexity. A simple one will take less than 3 minutes and a complex one might take around 30 minutes.
Error Handling
Alooma
Alooma catches the events that don’t get loaded to the destinations and these events can be restreamed after fixing the issue using Restream Queue.
Fivetran
When an overall integration fails, all the tables fail. The failure can be detected down to the table level. Bad data is not loaded into the destination. Partial data, however, can be loaded.
Hevo
Hevo’s Replay Queue eliminates the need to handle errors manually. Replay Queue ensures that no data is lost from the pipeline. It comes with a simple UI so that timely action can be taken when errors are detected.
Pricing
Alooma
Alooma does not disclose its pricing.
Fivetran
Fivetran has a consumption-based pricing model with three plans. The Starter plan costs $1.00 / Credit. The Standard plan costs $ 1.50 / Credit and the Enterprise plan costs $ 2.00 / Credit.
Hevo
Hevo has three pricing plans namely Basic, Starter, and Business. Within the plan, you can optimize the price based on your requirements.
- The Basic plan $ 249 / month when charged yearly or $ 299 / month when charged monthly. It includes 20 million events. The Basic plan includes up to 2 sources and up to 10 data models.
- Under the Starter plan, the price varies depending upon the number of events. It costs $ 399 / month for 50 million events, $ 499 / month for 100 million events, $ 679 for 200 million events, and $ 799 / month for 300 million events when charged yearly.
- Similarly, the Business plan price can be optimized based on your requirement where the price varies from $ 999 for 400 million events to $ 1599 for a billion events. For more details on pricing visit the pricing page.
Integrations
Alooma
Alooma supports around 40 integrations natively. For other sources, webhooks, REST API connectors can be used.
Fivetran
Fivetran has over 300+ prebuilt connectors from many popular sources.
Hevo
Hevo has 150+ ready to use integrations with databases, Cloud Storage, SDKs, Streaming Services, and SaaS applications. All the native integrations are built keeping in mind source specific APIs to ensure reliable data replication.
All are constantly adding new integrations.
Transformations
Alooma
Alooma handles problems created by transformation during data discovery, rule generation, execution, and review effectively.
Fivetran
Fivetran is an ELT tool and hence it doesn’t perform transformations before loading. In Fivetran, transformations are SQL scripts that are executed based on specific conditions. It runs in the destination after the data is loaded.
Hevo
Hevo allows transformations on data before loading. Hevo performs cleansing, data enrichment, re-expression, filtering, and normalization to get the data into the right format by changing the properties of the event.
Security
Alooma
Customer data in Alooma is encrypted both in transit and at rest. Data is not stored persistently (except the metadata). Customer data is stored for 3 days. Events that face pipeline errors may be stored for a longer period based on the customer’s request.
Fivetran
All Fivetran web portal connections are encrypted. All Fivetran services are GDPR- compliant. Data is not stored longer than 24 hours on the Fivetran servers.
Hevo
Hevo follows strict policies for security and removing customer’s data. All customer credentials are encrypted with a key specific to the customer. Connections with the sources and destinations are encrypted through SSL by default. Data is stored encrypted and deleted permanently within 24 hours. Failed events data is retained or 30 days until it is replayed or skipped from the pipelines.
Hevo is GDPR, HIPAA and SOC2 compliant.
Support and Documentation
Alooma
Alooma provides support to users through its support portal and has comprehensive documentation guiding users through its overview, mapping, error handling, etc.
Fivetran
Fivetran has support for inquiries related to various issues such as product, consulting, etc. Fivetran also has extensive documentation.
Hevo
Hevo has quick and dedicated support to answer your queries. Hevo documentation is comprehensive, lucid, and consistent.
Conclusion
Finally, every organization has to decide which tool works best for them based on their requirements. You can check it out right now! Sign up for Hevo, and get the complete tool for free for 14 days.
Visit our Website to Explore Hevo
Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline, helps you transfer data from a source of your choice in a fully-automated and secure manner without having to write the code repeatedly. Hevo with its strong integration with 150+ sources & BI tools, allows you to not only export & load data but also transform & enrich your data & make it analysis-ready in a jiffy.
Want to take Hevo for a spin? Sign Up for a 14-day free trial and experience the feature-rich Hevo suite first hand.
Nikhil specializes in freelance writing within the data industry, delivering informative and engaging content related to data science by blending his problem solving ability.