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Business Intelligence · head to head

Rill Data vs Visual Studio

Rill Data logo

Rill Data

Business Intelligence

Local-first BI on DuckDB and ClickHouse with dashboards defined as code

From
$20/month
Free plan
No
Visit Rill DataFull review
Visual Studio logo

Visual Studio

Developer Tools

IDE for .NET and C++ development on Windows

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Visit Visual StudioFull review

The short version

  • Visual Studio is free; Rill Data starts at $20/mo.
  • Where Visual Studio falls short: A standalone perpetually licensed Visual Studio Professional 2022 costs $499 as a one-time purchase, separate from the subscription tiers.
  • Prices and features on this page were last checked on 13 November 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Rill Data and Visual Studio actually diverge.

Attributes where Rill Data and Visual Studio differ
AttributeRill DataVisual Studio
Starting price$20/monthFree
Pricing modelPer user per month plus metered computeFreemium
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWeb, Linux, macOS, WindowsWeb
CategoryBusiness IntelligenceDeveloper Tools

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 Rill Data

  • Local development
  • Dashboards as code
  • Embedded DuckDB
  • Bring your own database
  • Alerts and scheduled reports
  • Embedded analytics

Only in Visual Studio

Nothing recorded that Rill Data does not also cover.

What people use each for

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

Rill Data

  • An analytics team that wants dashboard changes to go through code review rather than being edited in a web UInot Visual Studio
  • Interactive exploration of event-scale data where a warehouse round trip per filter click is too slownot Visual Studio
  • Embedding fast slice-and-dice dashboards into a product where the underlying store is already ClickHouse or Druidnot Visual Studio
  • A data engineer prototyping a metrics layer locally on a laptop before committing to any cloud spendnot Visual Studio

Visual Studio

  • Managing complex, large-scale projects across multiple platformsnot Rill Data
  • Commercial development in small businessesnot Rill Data
  • DevOps and automated deployment workflowsnot Rill Data
  • Windows/SQL Server developer and tester rolesnot Rill Data
  • Short-term or month-to-month IDE access needsnot Rill Data

Where each one falls short

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

Rill Data

  • The seat price of 20 dollars is misleading as a budget figure: Rill’s own calculator puts a small two-seat project at around 256 dollars a month, with compute making up the great majority
  • Dashboards are defined in YAML and SQL, so business users cannot create or change one without a developer and a Git workflow, which stalls self-service adoption
  • It is built for the explore-a-metric pattern and does not produce pixel-perfect financial or operational reports, so most organisations still need a second reporting tool
  • AI tokens and API calls are quota-limited per seat, with API overage at a cent per call, so programmatic consumers can create an unbudgeted line item
  • As a smaller vendor competing against Looker, Tableau and Power BI, the ecosystem of consultants, templates and trained analysts is thin, which raises the cost of hiring for it

Visual Studio

  • Community edition is free only for individual developers, classroom use, academic research and open-source contribution, not general commercial use
  • Monthly subscriptions are $45 per user per month for Professional and $250 per user per month for Enterprise, and do not include perpetual use rights the way annual Standard subscriptions do
  • A standalone perpetually licensed Visual Studio Professional 2022 costs $499 as a one-time purchase, separate from the subscription tiers

Pricing, plan by plan

Rill Data

$20/month
  • Starter$20/mo
    • Per seat, up to twenty seats
    • Three projects
    • Compute at 0.15 USD per compute unit hour
  • Growth$30/mo
    • Per seat, up to one hundred seats
    • Ten projects
    • Compute at 0.20 USD per compute unit hour
  • EnterpriseOn request
    • Annual platform licence with negotiated capacity
    • Unlimited seats and projects
    • Dedicated infrastructure

Visual Studio

Free

No published plan breakdown. See the Visual Studio review.

Which should you pick?

Choose Rill Data if

  • You need local development.
  • You work on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want dashboards as code.
Rill Data review

Choose Visual Studio if

  • You want to start without paying.
Visual Studio review

Questions people ask

Is Rill Data or Visual Studio better?
Neither clearly leads. Rill Data starts at $20/month and Visual Studio at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Rill Data or Visual Studio?
Visual Studio has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at $20/month for Rill Data and Free for Visual Studio.
Does Rill Data or Visual Studio run on more platforms?
Rill Data runs on Web, Linux, macOS, Windows. Visual Studio runs on Web.
Can I use Visual Studio for free?
Yes. Visual Studio has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Rill Data starts at $20/month.
What is Rill Data best used for?
Rill Data is most often used for an analytics team that wants dashboard changes to go through code review rather than being edited in a web ui, interactive exploration of event-scale data where a warehouse round trip per filter click is too slow, embedding fast slice-and-dice dashboards into a product where the underlying store is already clickhouse or druid, a data engineer prototyping a metrics layer locally on a laptop before committing to any cloud spend. Of those, an analytics team that wants dashboard changes to go through code review rather than being edited in a web ui and interactive exploration of event-scale data where a warehouse round trip per filter click is too slow are not what Visual Studio is typically brought in for.
What can Rill Data do that Visual Studio cannot?
Rill Data covers Local development, Dashboards as code, Embedded DuckDB, Bring your own database.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Rill Data: Is Rill open source?

The Rill developer binary is open source and free to run locally; Rill Cloud is the paid product.

Visual Studio: What are the pricing differences between subscription types?

Standard subscriptions include access to more benefits, such as Azure dev/test pricing, monthly Azure individual credit, software and download access, services, training, and support. Monthly subscriptions offer flexibility but fewer benefits.

Source
Rill Data: How much does it actually cost?

Seats start at 20 USD per month, but hosted compute at 0.15 USD per compute unit hour typically dominates the bill. Bringing your own database removes the usage fee.

Visual Studio: Are discounts available for startups?

There aren't any discounts available to start-ups, however an unlimited number of users within an organization can use Visual Studio Community for specific scenarios like open source work.

Source
Rill Data: Can business users build dashboards?

Not directly. Dashboards are YAML and SQL under version control.

Visual Studio: Who can use Visual Studio Community for free?

In non-enterprise organizations, up to five users can use it. Enterprise organizations (greater than 250 PCs or greater than $1M annual revenue) cannot use it beyond academic/open-source scenarios.

Source
Rill Data: Which databases can back a deployed project?

DuckDB, ClickHouse, Druid, Pinot, Snowflake and others.

Visual Studio: What's the renewal pricing structure?

Enterprise standard renews at $214.09/month (after initial $499.92); Professional at $66.59/month (after $99.99).

Source
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