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HR · head to head

Culture Amp vs Snowplow

Culture Amp logo

Culture Amp

HR

Build a better workplace with employee experience data

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Snowplow logo

Snowplow

Business Intelligence

Behavioural data pipeline you run in your own cloud, relicensed away from Apache 2.0 in 2024

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Culture Amp no price is published, and cost depends on employee count, product chosen and service tier; Snowplow the core pipeline was relicensed from Apache 2.0 on 8 January 2024 to the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement and a Confluent-derived community licence, so organisations that adopted it as permissively licensed software must now review their entitlement, buy a licence, or migrate.
  • They diverge on capability: Culture Amp covers Employee engagement surveys, Snowplow covers Own-cloud deployment.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Culture Amp and Snowplow actually diverge.

Attributes where Culture Amp and Snowplow differ
AttributeCulture AmpSnowplow
Pricing modelsubscriptionquote
PlatformsWeb, Ios, Android, ApiLinux, Web, Docker
CategoryHRBusiness Intelligence
Founded2009Unknown

Identical on both: starting price (On request), free tier (No), user rating (Not yet rated).

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 Culture Amp

  • Employee engagement surveys
  • Pulse surveys
  • Performance management
  • Goal tracking
  • 360-degree feedback
  • Analytics & insights
  • Action planning
  • Manager effectiveness

Only in Snowplow

  • Own-cloud deployment
  • Schema enforcement
  • Warehouse loading
  • Enrichment
  • Trackers
  • Streaming output
  • Data models
  • Snowplow BDP

What people use each for

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

Culture Amp

  • Employee engagement surveys and analysisnot Snowplow
  • Performance reviews and development planning across an organisationnot Snowplow

Snowplow

  • A data team that needs full-fidelity event data in its own warehouse to build attribution or machine learning features rather than to populate dashboardsnot Culture Amp
  • A regulated business that cannot send behavioural data to a third-party analytics vendor and must keep collection inside its own cloud accountnot Culture Amp
  • A product organisation tired of silently malformed events, which wants a schema contract enforced at collection timenot Culture Amp
  • A company modelling customer behaviour across web, mobile and server events that needs them in one consistent structurenot Culture Amp

Where each one falls short

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

Culture Amp

  • No price is published, and cost depends on employee count, product chosen and service tier
  • All products are billed annually
  • Support level is banded by organisation size, with additional support starting at 200 employees and enterprise treatment at 1,000, so smaller customers get less for the same product

Snowplow

  • The core pipeline was relicensed from Apache 2.0 on 8 January 2024 to the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement and a Confluent-derived community licence, so organisations that adopted it as permissively licensed software must now review their entitlement, buy a licence, or migrate.
  • You run the pipeline in your own cloud, which means the infrastructure bill, the on-call rota and the upgrade work are yours, and at high event volume that operational cost frequently exceeds what a hosted product would have charged.
  • Schema enforcement is the main benefit and the main friction, because every new event requires a schema to be authored and versioned, and teams without discipline around that end up blocked on their own governance process.
  • There is no analysis layer: Snowplow delivers data to your warehouse and nothing else, so you still need modelling, a BI tool and the people to run them before anyone sees a number.
  • The licence change fractured the community, spawning an Apache 2.0 fork, which means community contributions and third-party tooling are now split across two codebases with uncertain long-term maintenance.

Pricing, plan by plan

Culture Amp

On request
  • Engage$undefined/month
    • Engagement surveys
    • Pulse surveys
    • Action planning
  • Perform$undefined/month
    • Goal tracking
    • Performance reviews
    • 1-on-1 meetings
  • Develop$undefined/month
    • Skills development
    • Career paths
    • Learning integrations

Snowplow

On request
  • Snowplow BDP$undefined/year
    • Commercial pricing quoted by event volume and deployment
    • Core pipeline components under the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement, not Apache 2.0
    • Trackers, analytics SDKs and Iglu SDKs remain Apache 2.0

Which should you pick?

Choose Culture Amp if

  • You need employee engagement surveys.
  • You work on Web, Ios, Android, Api.
  • You also want pulse surveys.
Culture Amp review

Choose Snowplow if

  • You need own-cloud deployment.
  • You work on Linux, Web, Docker.
  • You also want schema enforcement.
Snowplow review

Questions people ask

Is Culture Amp or Snowplow better?
Neither clearly leads. Culture Amp starts at On request and Snowplow at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Culture Amp or Snowplow?
Culture Amp starts at On request and Snowplow at On request.
Does Culture Amp or Snowplow run on more platforms?
Culture Amp runs on Web, Ios, Android, Api. Snowplow runs on Linux, Web, Docker.
What is Culture Amp best used for?
Culture Amp is most often used for employee engagement surveys and analysis, performance reviews and development planning across an organisation. Of those, employee engagement surveys and analysis and performance reviews and development planning across an organisation are not what Snowplow is typically brought in for.
What can Culture Amp do that Snowplow cannot?
Culture Amp covers Employee engagement surveys, Pulse surveys, Performance management, Goal tracking. Snowplow covers Own-cloud deployment, Schema enforcement, Warehouse loading, Enrichment.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Culture Amp: How much does Culture Amp cost?

Culture Amp does not publish specific pricing. The vendor uses a custom pricing model based on the number of employees in your organization, the product chosen, and the service tier needed. Annual billing is required. Interested customers must request a quote to receive pricing details.

Source
Snowplow: Is Snowplow still open source?

Not in the permissive sense. On 8 January 2024 the core pipeline moved from Apache 2.0 to the Snowplow Limited Use Licence Agreement, with version 1.1 following in December 2024, alongside a community licence based on the Confluent Community Licence. Trackers and analytics SDKs remain Apache 2.0.

Culture Amp: What factors determine Culture Amp pricing?

Culture Amp pricing depends on three factors: the number of employees, the specific product chosen, and the service tier. Organizations are typically categorized as small/medium (under 200 employees), mid-market (200-999 employees), or enterprise (1000+ employees). Annual prepayment is required.

Source
Snowplow: Can we still run it for free in production?

Free use of the relicensed core components is materially constrained and commercial use generally requires an agreement. Read the current licence text against your intended use rather than relying on older documentation.

Snowplow: Is there an Apache 2.0 alternative?

Yes, a fork called OpenSnowcat was created in response to the relicensing and continues under Apache 2.0.

Snowplow: What does Snowplow BDP cost?

Not published. It is quoted by event volume and deployment, and your own cloud infrastructure costs are separate and additional.

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