Best Meltano Alternatives to Consider in 2025

Best Meltano Alternatives to Consider in 2025

You might be using Meltano to build data pipelines or considering it for your next ELT project. It is open source and flexible, but does it keep up with your growing data needs?

Many teams outgrow Meltano as they scale. Often, the reason is a complex setup, a lack of an intuitive interface, or missing features such as real-time sync, broader connector coverage, and built-in orchestration.

If this is your story, this guide is for you. In this post, we will walk you through the top 10 Meltano alternatives that offer faster, more scalable, and flexible data solutions.

We will compare the pros, cons, pricing, and key features, all backed by customer reviews, so you can find the best fit for your team..

What Is Meltano?

Meltano is an open-source data integration platform that helps you build, manage, and customize your ELT pipelines. Originally developed by GitLab, it helps data teams extract, load, and transform data from SaaS apps, databases, and cloud storage into data warehouses.

Meltano uses a code-first, command-line interface (CLI) approach. This makes it a good match for data engineers and analytics teams that prefer full control, reproducibility, and version control using tools like Git. It also helps small to mid-sized businesses manage multiple SaaS sources.

Why Are People Moving Away From Meltano?

Meltano is a strong choice for an open-source solution for data integration, but many users face challenges, especially during development and scaling. Here’s how:

1. Steep learning curve

Users often report a significant initial learning curve with Meltano. While powerful for engineers, its CLI and configuration-as-code philosophy can be complex for newcomers.

2. Limited real-time or streaming support

Meltano mainly works as a batch-processing tool and cannot keep up well with real-time or continuous data sync. Users have shared that pipelines run slower even with moderate data volumes, making it hard to meet live data needs.

3. Connector reliability and maintenance

Meltano heavily depends on community-built Singer connectors. Some of these connectors break often or miss key features, and users have to fix bugs or build their own connectors, which adds to their workload.

4. Scaling challenges for large data volumes

Users also express their struggles with Meltano’s scalability challenges, particularly when dealing with a big data pipeline. As data grows, Meltano pipelines become harder to manage. Connectors handle data differently, leading to inconsistent outputs.

Top 10 Meltano Alternatives to Consider

After going through real customer reviews on G2 and Reddit, we have curated this list of data pipeline tools, detailing the key features, pricing, pros, and cons of each tool.

But first, let’s look at our top five picks for Meltano competitors.

1. Hevo

G2 Rating: 4.4 (263)

Capterra Rating: 4.7 (109)

Hevo is a no-code, real-time data pipeline platform that helps you move data from over 150 sources into cloud data warehouses. Its biggest strength lies in automating complex ELT workflows and providing reliable, low-latency data ingestion.

Choose Hevo if you want an easy-to-use interface that even non-technical users can set up and manage data pipelines. It centralizes your data with minimal effort and helps deliver faster, more consistent insights without constant developer involvement.

Key features:

• Fully managed service: Handles all infrastructure, updates, and scaling, and offers dedicated customer support, unlike self-hosted Meltano.
• Error handling and monitoring: Offers built-in error handling, automatic retries, and proactive alerts directly within its user interface.
• In-warehouse transformations: Supports both pre-load and post-load data transformations using SQL.
• Multi-source to multi-destination routing: Supports sending the same data from one source to multiple warehouses simultaneously.
• Data lineage and governance controls: Ensures data visibility, access control, audit logs, and usage tracking for governance and cost predictability.

Customer review:

Hevo unlocked unmatched reliability and zero downtime for Thoughtspot, cutting infrastructure costs by 85% and ETL tools expenses by 50%. Hevo also empowered analytics users and boosted data usage by 30-35% with its user-friendly interface.

Ramkumar Natarajan

Senior Manager, Data Operations

View Customer Story

Pros:

• High-speed, parallel processing.
• Predictable and transparent pricing.
• Automated schema handling.

Cons:

• Cloud-based only (no on-premises option).
• Niche connectors may require requests.
• Advanced custom transformation may require scripting.

Why choose Hevo over Meltano?

Choose Hevo if your team prioritizes speed, simplicity, and reliability over constant engineering work. It offers a fully managed, no-code platform that handles everything from real-time ingestion to error recovery, in contrast to Meltano’s significant manual effort demands.

You get automated scaling, governance controls, and multi-destination routing without stitching tools together. Unlike Meltano’s Git-based collaboration, Hevo provides built-in workspace management for easier team collaboration through a UI. This helps you centralize data pipelines quickly, keeps operational costs predictable, and lets you focus on insights rather than maintenance.

Pricing:

• Free plan: Up to 1M events monthly for 5 users.
• Starter: Starts at $239/month for 5M events and goes up to 50M events per month with SSH/SSL encryption for up to 10 users.
• Professional: Starts at $679/month for 20M events and goes up to 100M events per month with reverse SSH for unlimited users
• Business Critical: Contact sales for custom pricing over 100M events.
  

2. Fivetran

G2 Rating: 4.3 (784)

Capterra Rating: 4.5 (24)

Fivetran is an ELT tool that helps you scale without spending time on pipeline maintenance. It has an extensive library of enterprise-grade connectors built to handle complex schema changes.

If you are a company with diverse data sources and strict reliability needs, Fivetran is a strong choice. It is ideal for teams prioritizing large-scale data movement, connector depth, and security compliance over custom workflows or heavy in-pipeline transformations.

Key features:

• Fully managed pipelines: Manages hosting, scaling, updates, and error recovery without any manual setup.
• Automated schema evolution: Detects and syncs schema changes automatically.
• Pre-built connectors: Offers one of the largest connector libraries with 700+ connectors maintained and updated by Fivetran.
• High data accuracy: Built-in mechanisms for deduplication, soft deletes, and reliable historical data handling.
• Scales with data: Handles large datasets and frequent syncs without manual tuning or infrastructure changes.

Customer review:

The ease of use. Their supported connectors are a cinch to set up and it\'s nearly effortless to maintain.

Jonathan R.

Licensed Realtor

Pros:

• Zero-maintenance pipelines.
• Rapid setup and fast data delivery.
• Enterprise-grade security and compliance.

Cons:

• Limited custom transformations.
• Usage-based pricing can get expensive.
• Limited transparency for troubleshooting.

Why choose Fivetran over Meltano?

Fiveetran gives your team an entirely hands-off experience. Unlike Meltano, which requires constant setup, monitoring, and connector fixes, Fivetran manages everything for you. It ensures a reliable data flow and accuracy, without the usual risks of pipeline breaks or schema issues.

You save time, avoid infrastructure issues, and deliver insights faster rather than focusing on backend troubleshooting.

Pricing:

Pricing depends on Monthly Active Rows (MAR) and increases with the volume. The free plan offers 500,000 MAR and 5,000 model runs per month.

Paid plans start at $500 monthly for the first million MAR and go up to higher-tier options.

3. Airbyte

G2 Rating: 4.4 (65)

Capterra Rating: NA

Airbyte gives you full control over moving and managing structured and unstructured data into warehouses, lakes, and databases. It is an open-source ELT platform with a growing library of 600+ connectors, and you can also build your own using AI tools or code. This flexibility makes it a go-to choice for teams with complex or changing data needs.

If your priority is control and customization, Airbyte fits well. You decide where and how to deploy it, whether on your servers, in the cloud, or as a hybrid setup.

Key features:

• AI-ready data integration: Handles structured and unstructured data with vector database support for AI use cases.
• Flexible hybrid deployment: Lets you choose self-hosted, cloud, or hybrid setups through an easy-to-use web interface.
• Advanced CDC with metadata tracking: Offers real-time sync using embedded CDC libraries like Debezium and automatic metadata columns.
• No-code AI connector builder: helps you build or customize connectors using AI tools or the Connector Development Kit (CDK).
• Strong API and orchestration support: Works natively with tools like dbt, Airflow, and Terraform for full programmatic control.

Customer review:

The best thing about airbyte is easy transferring of data. There are lots of sources and destinations where we can transfer the data between the different types of databases. And we can perform transformations through dbt for data visualization and analytics. And one more thing we can create our own connectors to transfer data between the databases.

Mahesh B.

Data Scientist

Pros:

• Cost-efficient through open source.
• Large and active community.
• Full control over data and setup.

Cons:

• Requires technical effort, especially for self-hosting.
• Self-hosted setups require ongoing management.
• Inconsistent connector support.

Why choose Airbyte over Meltano?

Airbyte lets your team build highly adaptable data pipelines with complete control over how data flows, updates, and integrates. It goes beyond Meltano’s CLI-first approach by combining open-source transparency with easier UI management and deep customization options.

If your priority is long-term flexibility, AI readiness, and avoiding platform lock-in, Airbyte gives you that control while scaling alongside modern business needs.

Pricing:

• Open Source Edition: Free forever and self-hosted.
• Cloud: Starts at $10 per month with 4 credits. Additional credits cost $2.50 each.
• Teams: Capacity-based custom pricing for teams needing scalability and governance.
• Enterprise plans: Self-hosted, with capacity-based custom pricing for teams needing full infrastructure control.

Want to get into more detail? Check out this post about Airbyte vs Meltano.

4. Matillion

G2 Rating: 4.4 (83)

Capterra Rating: 4.3 (111)

Matillion is one of the leading ETL tools that helps you turn raw data into analytics-ready insights faster by combining data integration, transformation, and orchestration in a single cloud-native platform. Built specifically for modern data warehouses like Snowflake, Databricks, and Redshift, it simplifies cloud migration and AI/ML data preparation workflows.

What makes Matillion good is its generative AI assistant, which automates complex pipeline tasks and boosts productivity. It’s a strong choice for organizations that want both visual, no-code workflows and full control through SQL, Python, or dbt.

Key features:

• Unified cloud platform: Combines ingestion, transformation, and orchestration in one managed environment.
• AI-powered data engineering: Automates pipeline creation and task setup with generative AI assistant, Maia.
• Low-code and high-code flexibility: Blends drag-and-drop workflows with SQL, Python, and dbt for tailored transformation, with complete Git integration for team collaboration.
• Broad data connectivity: Includes hundreds of pre-built connectors for SaaS apps, databases, and legacy systems.

Customer review:

Early on in the company, our non technical stakeholders could learn how to set up transformations on Matillion and build them up themselves. It is good to see the transformations visually.

Melisa K.

Head of Business Intelligence and Data Science

Pros:

• Fast pipeline deployment with AI automation.
• Better team collaboration due to easy setup, bridging skill gaps.
• Integrates with cloud data platforms like BigQuery, Redshift, etc.

Cons:

• Learning curve for advanced transformation with SQL and Python.
• Pricing can get expensive and lacks transparency.
• Only works with major cloud warehouses and isn’t suited for on-premises or small-scale ETL setups.

Why choose Matillion over Meltano?

Matillion is built for speed, governance, and collaboration without the overhead of managing open-source stacks like Meltano. Where Meltano emphasizes developer control through manual setup, Matillion focuses on accelerating outcomes through a well-rounded, managed environment backed by AI automation.

Pricing:

Matillion uses a credit-based pricing model, calculated based on virtual core (vCore) usage per hour. The Developer plan for individuals starts at $2.50/credit.

The higher-tiered plans are subscription-based with a Minimum Monthly Commit for credits. If you use fewer credits than committed, you still pay for the difference at the standard PAY-GO rates.

5. Integrate.io

G2 Rating: 4.3 (207)

Capterra Rating: 4.6 (17)

Integrate.io is a user-friendly data integration solution that simplifies various data movement processes, like ELT, ETL, and more, for operations and analytics teams. Its quick pipeline setup through a drag-and-drop interface makes it convenient for teams without heavy engineering resources.

You should consider Integrate.io if you want to automate everyday data workflows with minimal setup time and predictable costs. It also handles real-time replication, B2B file data sharing, and streamlined data movement across cloud apps and warehouses.

Key features:

• Low-code pipelines: It helps you build and manage workflows using a drag-and-drop interface.
• All-inclusive data movement: This covers ELT, ETL, CDC, and Reverse ETL in one platform.
• Managed SaaS and support: No hosting or maintenance is required, and dedicated solution engineers provide 24/7 support.
• Two-way sync: The tool automates flows like Salesforce sync and API creation for operational use cases.

Customer review:

Doing a simple data transfer is exactly that -- extremely simple. With only a ten minute overview, we had our first transfer up and working in under two hours. We can create a new one now in minutes. But there is power there when we need it--for transformations, for controlling and monitoring the jobs, for taking a different path due to success, error, or any other scenario we can test for. It\'s the best of both worlds.

Arlene S.

Salesforce Technical Architect

Pros:

• Fast setup and easy pipeline updates.
• Predictable pricing structure.
• Compatible with diverse systems

Cons:

• Cloud-only, no on-premises option.
• Performance issues with highly complex or high-volume real-time transformations.
• Interpreting error logs might be challenging.

Why choose Integrate.io over Meltano?

Unlike Meltano’s developer-first, open-source model with unpredictable pricing, Integrate.io provides a low-code, fully managed platform. Features like bidirectional data sync and real-time streaming offer you a real advantage by helping you focus on outcomes, not pipeline management. 

Pricing:

It has a fixed-fee pricing model. Integrate.io Core plan costs $1,999/month. You can also use the custom-quoted Design Your Perfect Plan for higher-scale enterprise requirements.

6. Databricks

G2 Rating: 4.6 (609)

Capterra Rating: 4.5 (22)

Databricks is a unified analytics and AI platform powered by Apache Spark that helps you work with large, complex datasets across cloud environments. Built on the Lakehouse architecture, it combines the structure of a data warehouse with the flexibility of a data lake.

This lets you manage both structured and unstructured data, like generative AI projects. It also improves collaboration through real-time co-authoring in notebooks and shared workspaces.

Key features:

• Lakehouse architecture: Unifies data lakes and warehouses with Delta Lake, ensuring scalable storage and ACID compliance.
• Built-in ETL pipelines: Automates ETL workflows with Delta Live Tables without any external tools required.
• End-to-End MLOps and AI support: Lets you build, train, and deploy machine learning and generative AI models within the same platform.
• Real-time data streaming: Handles both batch and real-time ingestion and processing for faster insights.

Customer review:

This lake house architecture brings the best of both data lakes and warehouses , so we don\'t have to deal with the unnecessary complexity. Delta lakes ensures reliability while the notebook based interface makes collaboration seamless. The platform ability to handle batch, streaming, and machine learning workloads in one place is a huge advantage.

Sachin V.

Data Engineer

Pros:

• Easy team collaboration.
• Multi-cloud deployment.
• Consistent data security.

Cons:

• Setup is complex and requires technical expertise.
• The pay-as-you-go model gets expensive fast.
• Production through notebooks risks poorly engineered code.

Why choose Databricks over Meltano?

Databricks is ideal for organizations that need more than data pipelines. If you want one platform that can handle analytics, real-time processing, machine learning, and AI at scale, Databricks is for you.

It unifies your data, people, and processes into one environment, letting teams collaborate faster without being limited by traditional data silos.

Pricing:

The pay-as-you-go model is billed per second based on the Databricks Unit (DBU), which represents the computational resources used, starting from $0.15/DBU. Charges vary depending on workload type.

7. Rivery

G2 Rating: 4.7 (120)

Capterra Rating: 5 (12)

Rivery is a SaaS-based ELT and data orchestration platform for teams that want to centralize and automate their entire data in one place. It lets you pull data from over 200 sources, transform it in your warehouse, and automate workflows, all without coding.

If you are looking for a tool that handles both ELT and Reverse ETL on one platform, Rivery is a practical choice. It’s built for teams that want customization options like SQL transformations and Python scripting.

Key features:

• No-maintenance platform: Offers a cloud-based solution with automatic scaling and maintenance.
• Built-in orchestration: Helps you manage complex pipeline schedules and conditional workflows directly in Rivery.
• In-platform SQL and Python: Performs both SQL and Python transformations inside the platform, avoiding external tools and additional setups.
• Reverse ETL: Pushes processed data back into business apps like CRMs and ad platforms.
• Environment and version control: Manages dev, staging, and production pipelines with integrated version control for safer deployments.

Customer review:

Using Rivery for marketing APIs has really streamlined the process of pulling data from multiple marketing platforms and centralizing it for analysis and reporting. By far the best thing about my own experience with Rivery has been the attentititve customer support, clear onboarding/suppotr process, and regular check ins.

Harry C.

Data Analyst

Pros:

• Strong customer service.
• Reduced operational overhead.
• Faster onboarding with pre-built templates.

Cons:

• Unpredictable pricing.
• Some users express inadequate documentation for certain sources.
• Limited granular control over infrastructure.

Why choose Rivery over Meltano?

Go with Rivery if you need one tool to handle everything from bringing in data to activating it. It is ideal if you prefer visual workflows over heavy CLI or code-first setups. Rivery lets non-technical and technical users collaborate easily while keeping pipelines secure and versioned across environments.

Pricing:

Costs depend on Rivery Pricing Units (RPU) credits, which are tied to your platform usage. The Base tier offers a pay-as-you-go pricing starting at $0.90/BDU credit. Higher tiers offer a free trial or have custom pricing.

8. Keboola

G2 Rating: 4.6 (131)

Capterra Rating: 4.9 (12)

Keboola is a data operations platform designed for fast, flexible, and team-friendly workflows. It simplifies how you collect, transform, and deliver data while keeping everything transparent and easy to control.

What sets Keboola apart is its balance between technical depth and accessibility. Data engineers can customize pipelines with code, while analysts can use prebuilt templates and no-code tools. It suits teams that need both control and quick execution without a complex setup.

Key features:

• Unified data operations platform: Handles ingestion, storage, transformation, orchestration, and governance.
• Fully managed SaaS: Takes care of scaling, updates, and maintenance.
• Visual + code interface: Offers a hybrid UI for no-code or low-code users while supporting SQL, Python, and CLI or API for engineers.
• Built-in data governance: Comes with data catalog, version control, access rights, and audit logs, ensuring secure and compliant operations by default.
• AI model support: Let’s teams prepare and deploy data products and AI models directly within the platform.

Customer review:

A clear and very useful tool. Data processing from many sources (like Oracle, MySQL, CSV, GA4, Meta...) and further processing is possible even with only basic programming (SQL) knowledge. There is also a great free account option for small companies.

Vojta F.

IT manager

Pros:

• Fast setup and deployment.
• Reduces IT maintenance needs.
• Better collaboration between technical and business users.

Cons:

• Scaling escalates cost.
• Learning curve for deeper customization.
• Some users find the data insertion process complex.

Why choose Keboola over Meltano?

Keboola gives you a complete, managed platform for handling your entire data workflow from ingestion to AI preparation. Where Meltano focuses mainly on ELT pipelines with more setup and custom management, Keboola combines transformation, governance, and orchestration in one environment.

Pricing:

Keboola uses seat-based subscriptions plus usage-based billing for processing time.

• Free Tier: Offers 120 free computational minutes in the first month, then 60 minutes monthly. Extra minutes cost 14 cents each.
• Enterprise Plan: Custom pricing for advanced features like multiple project architecture and unlimited users.

9. Portable

G2 Rating: 4.8 (23)

Capterra Rating: NA

Portable is an ELT tool that specializes in providing 1500+ world-class connectors for long-tail data sources that mainstream ELT platforms often skip. It is a fast-growing catalog of niche connectors delivered on demand, with turnaround times as quick as a few hours.

Portable is promising if your business struggles with unsupported data sources or unpredictable billing tied to usage or rows. It helps you simplify niche data integration without building custom connectors yourself.

Key features:

• On-demand niche connectors: Build custom connectors for long-tail data sources within days.
• Fully managed ELT: Handles hosting, maintenance, API updates, and schema changes.
• Proactive monitoring: Automated retries, error handling, and rate limit management.
• No-code simplicity: Focuses on easy data ingestion through a no-code interface for teams that don’t need orchestration or transformation.

Customer review:

1. It\'s incredibly easy to use and very straightforward, with none of the tehnical faff of the other products. Super easy to set up and really flexible. 2. The support is literally next level. If there\'s an extension or an api change, the team is ON it. Incredibly well priced as well.

Ibby S.

Founder

Pros:

• Predictable cost model.
• Strong customer support.
• Fast insights through quick data source setup.

Cons:

• No built-in transformation or Reverse ETL.
• No on-premises deployment.
• Limited for core database ELT needs compared to larger tools.

Why choose Portable over Meltano?

If your biggest blocker is unsupported SaaS sources and you prefer not to manage pipelines yourself, Portable offers a simpler path. It removes the overhead of connector development and gives you quick access to niche data. If your focus is on reliable EL with minimal fuss, Portable easily beats Meltano’s complexity and infrastructure demands.

Pricing:

• Starter: $290/month for 1 scheduled data flow with a 24-hour data sync cycle
• Scale: $1,790/month for 10 scheduled data flows with a 15-minute data sync cycle
• Pro: $2,790/month for 20 scheduled data flows with a 15-minute data sync cycle.
• Enterprise: Custom pricing for 20+ scheduled data flows with near real-time syncs
  

10. Stitch

G2 Rating: 4.4 (68)

Capterra Rating: 4.3 (4)

Stitch is a cloud-first ELT platform that specializes in replicating data from SaaS apps and databases into cloud data warehouses like Snowflake or BigQuery, using Singer open-source connectors to expand source coverage.

While both Stitch and Meltano leverage Singer, Stitch does it better by providing automated scheduling, scaling, and maintenance. Its setup takes minutes, and pipelines run with little oversight for easy data replication at scale.

Key features:

• Extensive connector library: Offers 140+ ready-to-use connectors to simplify deployment without manual Singer setup.
• Automated schema handling: Manages schema changes and data updates automatically with minimal manual input.
• User-friendly UI: Helps you set up pipelines in minutes through a web interface accessible to non-technical users.
• Enterprise-grade security: Provides built-in security, including SOC 2, HIPAA, and GDPR compliance.

Customer review:

Certainly this is one of the best ETL service provider. It integrates the data from various sources within and outside the organisation swiftly. 14 days trial is certainly cherrybon the top.

Yash B.

Analyst

Pros:

• Fast setup with minimal maintenance.
• Transparent and comparatively affordable pricing.
• Scales easily with growing data needs.

Cons:

• Users have given mixed reviews about customer support.
• No in-platform transformation or Reverse ETL.
• Less customization control than open-source tools.

Why choose Stitch over Meltano?

Stitch takes care of the details that Meltano leaves to you. While Meltano requires too much time to configure plugins, set up orchestration, or manage connector reliability, Stitch automates them by default.

From incremental data loads to error handling and connector updates, Stitch helps you in your day-to-day data operations. It’s ideal for teams that want reliable pipelines without managing orchestration tools or writing extra scripts.

Pricing:

• Standard: Starts at $100/month for 5 million monthly rows and scales up to 300 million rows.
• Advanced: $1,250/month for 100 million monthly rows
• Premium: $2,500/month for 1 billion monthly rows

Factors to Consider When Choosing an Alternative to Meltano

When choosing from the top Meltano alternatives, pick a tool that balances covering Meltano’s limitations and your team’s needs. Here are some factors to consider:

1. Ease of use

Check how easily your team can pick up the tool. If your team is not heavy on Python or command-line skills, look for a platform with a simple visual interface. Faster onboarding and smoother pipeline building save both time and frustration.

2. Real-time and streaming capabilities

If your workflows rely on live insights or continuous data syncing, ensure the tool supports real-time ingesting and processing. Many Meltano competitors, like Hevo, Fivetran, and Airbyte, handle low-latency data streams better.

3. Total cost of ownership (TCO)

Look beyond the base pricing. Consider hosting charges, maintenance, developer hours spent on fixes, and custom setups. A free tool may cost more if your team spends too many hours managing it.

4. Ecosystem integration

Ensure the tools connect easily with your existing cloud warehouses, BI tools, and other platforms. Smooth integration keeps your workflows efficient and prevents extra manual steps.

5. Transformation capabilities

Choose a tool that matches your team’s data transformation needs. Some offer no-code or SQL-based in-warehouse transformations. Pick based on how your team prefers to prepare and clean data.

Why Is Hevo the Right Choice?

Most alternatives to Meltano solve only part of the problem, whether it’s offering a visual UI, managing connectors, or handling long-tail sources. But very few bring it all together like Hevo does.

Beyond no-code ELT, Hevo combines CDC, real-time streaming, data observability, and automatic schema management in a single platform.

It also wins because of its predictable pricing. Hevo is transparent with its charges and doesn’t surprise you with bills based on rows or usage.

So, if you are looking for a practical, low-maintenance Meltano replacement that scales without hidden trade-offs, Hevo is that choice.

Start your 14-day free trial today!

FAQs on Meltano Alternatives