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Database & Data Management · head to head

Amazon Redshift vs Cyfe

Amazon Redshift logo

Amazon Redshift

Database & Data Management

Fast, scalable cloud data warehouse from AWS

From
Free
Rated
-
Cyfe logo

Cyfe

Business Intelligence

All-in-one business dashboard

From
Free
Rated
-

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Amazon Redshift on-demand pricing runs up to 75% higher than competitors like Snowflake and BigQuery; Cyfe dashboards are the billing unit, at 2 on the $29 Starter plan and 5 on the $39 Standard plan
  • They diverge on capability: Amazon Redshift covers Columnar Storage, Cyfe covers Pre-built Widgets.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Amazon Redshift and Cyfe actually diverge.

Attributes where Amazon Redshift and Cyfe differ
AttributeAmazon RedshiftCyfe
Pricing modelusage-basedsubscription
PlatformsWebWeb, Mobile, Tv
CategoryDatabase & Data ManagementBusiness Intelligence

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated), founded (2012).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Amazon Redshift

  • Columnar Storage
  • Massively Parallel
  • Machine Learning
  • AQUA Acceleration
  • Data Sharing
  • Federated Query
  • Concurrency Scaling
  • S3

Only in Cyfe

  • Pre-built Widgets
  • Custom Metrics
  • Historical Data
  • White-labeling
  • Embedding
  • Google Analytics
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Both cover

  • Web support

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Amazon Redshift

  • Business intelligencenot Cyfe
  • Data warehousingnot Cyfe
  • Real-time analyticsnot Cyfe
  • Reportingnot Cyfe
  • Machine learningnot Cyfe

Cyfe

  • Building business dashboards from marketing, sales and finance sourcesnot Amazon Redshift
  • Displaying live metrics on office screens and shared public URLsnot Amazon Redshift

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Amazon Redshift

  • On-demand pricing runs up to 75% higher than competitors like Snowflake and BigQuery
  • Requires significant manual tuning including managing concurrency scaling costs and configuring Workload Management queues
  • Performance degrades without proper design of distribution keys and sort keys
  • Limited elastic resize options - can only halve or double current cluster size
  • AWS lock-in makes it unsuitable for multi-cloud architectures

Cyfe

  • Dashboards are the billing unit, at 2 on the $29 Starter plan and 5 on the $39 Standard plan
  • Users are capped separately, at 1 on Starter and 2 on Standard, so a two person team needs the second tier for seats alone
  • Unlimited users only appears on the $119 Premier plan
  • Additional dashboards beyond a plan are $5 each
  • The Agency plan includes 10 clients with further clients at $19 each

Pricing, plan by plan

Amazon Redshift

Free
  • Free TrialFree
    • 750 DC2.Large hours
    • 2 months free
    • Full features
  • On-Demand$0.25/hour
    • Pay per node hour
    • All features
    • Standard support

Cyfe

Free
  • FreeFree
    • 5 Widgets
    • Basic Features
    • Community Support
  • Solo$19/month
    • 10 Dashboards
    • Premium Widgets
    • Email Support

Which should you pick?

Choose Amazon Redshift if

  • You need columnar storage.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You also want massively parallel.

Choose Cyfe if

  • You need pre-built widgets.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Mobile, Tv.
  • You also want custom metrics.

Questions people ask

Is Amazon Redshift or Cyfe better?
Neither clearly leads. Amazon Redshift starts at Free and Cyfe at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Amazon Redshift or Cyfe?
Amazon Redshift starts at Free and Cyfe at Free.
Does Amazon Redshift or Cyfe run on more platforms?
Amazon Redshift runs on Web. Cyfe runs on Web, Mobile, Tv.
Can I use Amazon Redshift for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Amazon Redshift best used for?
Amazon Redshift is most often used for business intelligence, data warehousing, real-time analytics, reporting. Of those, business intelligence and data warehousing are not what Cyfe is typically brought in for.
What can Amazon Redshift do that Cyfe cannot?
Amazon Redshift covers Columnar Storage, Massively Parallel, Machine Learning, AQUA Acceleration. Cyfe covers Pre-built Widgets, Custom Metrics, Historical Data, White-labeling. Both handle Web support.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Amazon Redshift: What deployment options does Amazon Redshift offer?

Redshift offers Provisioned Cluster (with RA3 or DC2 nodes) and Serverless options to match varying workloads. The new Redshift RG instance family, powered by Graviton, delivers 2.4x faster performance than RA3 at 30% lower cost per vCPU.

Source
Amazon Redshift: What does Amazon Redshift cost?

Provisioned cluster pricing: RA3 on-demand starts at $1.086/hour for ra3.xlplus. Serverless costs approximately $0.375 per RPU-hour with 4-RPU minimum (roughly $1.50/hour active workload). Managed storage costs $0.024/GB-month.

Source
Amazon Redshift: Does Redshift work with data lakes?

Yes, Redshift's integrated data lake query engine processes workloads on Apache Iceberg tables and other supported formats in Amazon S3, allowing you to run SQL analytics across your data warehouse and data lake from the same engine.

Source
Amazon Redshift: Is there a free tier for Amazon Redshift?

AWS offers a free trial with $300 USD in Serverless credits valid for 90 days, but Redshift is not part of the permanent AWS Free Tier.

Source

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