In 2025, the demand for business intelligence (BI) platforms continues to accelerate, driven by the explosion of data, digital transformation, and the need for real-time decision-making. But which BI tools are the most widely adopted by leading enterprises today?

Based on company-level usage data from hundreds of businesses, this article explores the most popular BI platforms in 2025. Breaking down who uses what and why, including examples from some of the world’s largest corporations.

#️⃣ Most Widely Used BI Platforms

According to our data, the top five most used BI platforms in 2025 are:

Check out the full category stats

These numbers are based on real usage data across all companies tracked by Relha.

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💲 BI Platform Usage by Company Revenue

Key Takeaways:

• Microsoft Power BI dominates across all revenue tiers — from startups to mega-corporations.
• Tableau holds strong in companies with $5B–$20B in revenue.
• Amazon QuickSight and Looker see increasing adoption among high-revenue, cloud-native enterprises.
• SAP Crystal Reports is concentrated in legacy-heavy enterprise environments.

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🔍 In-Depth Look: Top BI Platforms and Their Users

 

1. Microsoft Power BI

Used by: Walmart, Amazon, Synchrony Financial, Pearson, Block
Adoption Count: 1,106 companies

Why it's popular:

• Tight integration with the Microsoft ecosystem (Excel, Azure, Teams)
• Low cost of entry and strong scalability
• Strong dashboarding, modeling, and sharing features

Real-World Examples:

• Walmart (Revenue: $673.8B): Uses Power BI for real-time retail analytics across its global supply chain.
• Amazon (Revenue: $637.9B): Employs Power BI in select departments despite also offering its own QuickSight platform.
• Pearson (Revenue: $3.55B): Applies Power BI for higher education reporting and analytics.

 

2. Tableau

Used by: Walmart, Amazon, Principal Financial, TD Bank
Adoption Count: 629 companies

Why it's popular:

• Advanced visualization and interactivity
• Rich support for large-scale dashboards
• Strong presence in academia, healthcare, and finance

Real-World Examples:

• Walmart: Uses Tableau alongside Power BI, likely for custom visualization use cases in marketing and inventory.
• Amazon: Adopts Tableau for embedded analytics and internal business operations.
• TD Bank: Relies on Tableau for customer insights and trading behavior analytics.

 

3. Microstrategy

Used by: Home Depot, Lowes, Disney
Adoption Count: 120 companies

Why it's popular:

• Early mainstream adoption by large organizations
• Difficult and expensive for these large orgs to move to more modern platforms

 

4. Looker (Google Cloud)

Used by: Walmart, Amazon, GoDaddy
Adoption Count: 129 companies

Why it's popular:

• Centralized metrics via LookML
• Ideal for modern cloud-native architectures
• Flexible for embedded and customer-facing analytics

Real-World Examples:

• Walmart: Implements Looker for consistent KPI tracking and performance reporting.
• Amazon: Integrates Looker within its Google Cloud stack for specific analytics workloads.
• GoDaddy: Uses Looker to deliver self-service analytics to both product and marketing teams.

 

5. QlikView

Used by: Honda, General Motors, Verizon
Adoption Count: 105 companies

Why it's popular:

• Real-time data analytics
• Cost-effective solution
• User friendly

Real-World Examples:

• Popular in the automotive industry - Honda, General Motors, Ford, BMW Group & Volvo Group
• Used at many organizations that are seemingly migrating away from their existing BI solutions or maintain multiple solutions strategically - Citigroup, Intel, & Abbot Laboratories

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↗️ BI Platform Trends in 2025

1. Multi-Tool Strategy

Many companies (e.g., Walmart, Amazon) use multiple BI platforms. This is likely due to the difficulty of migrating from one tool to the next in addition to different areas of larger businesses having different needs and preferences.

2. Cloud-Native Preference

Cloud-centric BI tools (QuickSight, Looker) are gaining traction among companies with modern data lakes and distributed architectures.

3. Legacy Systems Persist

Platforms like SAP Crystal Reports and IBM Cognos remain in play within enterprises needing high compliance or maintaining legacy infrastructure.

4. Democratized Data Access

Power BI and Tableau lead in self-service analytics adoption, reducing the reliance on IT and empowering business users to explore data.

5. AI-Driven Insights

Emerging tools are embedding AI directly into BI workflows. Power BI, for example, now includes AI visuals and Copilot, while Tableau offers predictive modeling with Einstein Analytics (Salesforce).

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✅ Choosing the Right BI Platform

When evaluating a BI solution, organizations should consider:

📌 Conclusion

The 2025 BI landscape is defined by diversity, integration, and user empowerment. While Microsoft Power BI leads in sheer adoption, tools like Tableau, Looker, and QlikView are carving out specialized use cases across different sectors and revenue tiers.

Companies like Walmart, Amazon, and Apple showcase how flexible and layered a modern BI strategy can be, often blending multiple tools to serve different teams and objectives.

As data volumes grow and decision-making accelerates, choosing the right BI platform (or combination) is more critical than ever.

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