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A Solid Product With Areas for Refinement
What do you like best about the product?
Alation is a strong and mature data catalog platform built around the idea of making data easier to discover, govern, and trust. Its biggest strengths are its user-friendly interface and its ability to bring business, technical, and governance users together in one place. Search works well, the catalog structure is intuitive, and built-in features like popularity ranking and behavioral analysis help users quickly find the right data. The right startnprogram that they offer was a great way to kick off the implementation of the product. We also have a wonderful Customer Engagement Manager. The admin team uses the site everyday to make updates that are scalable and the interface is extremely user friendly.
Where Alation really shines is in governance workflows. The stewardship framework, policy center, and data quality integrations provide organizations with a structured, repeatable way to manage data. For teams focused on compliance or consistency across domains, this can be a major advantage. Collaboration features—such as conversations, article creation, and steward assignments—help create a shared understanding of data assets.
Where Alation really shines is in governance workflows. The stewardship framework, policy center, and data quality integrations provide organizations with a structured, repeatable way to manage data. For teams focused on compliance or consistency across domains, this can be a major advantage. Collaboration features—such as conversations, article creation, and steward assignments—help create a shared understanding of data assets.
What do you dislike about the product?
That said, Alation isn’t perfect. Some features feel rigid, especially when it comes to custom workflows or notifications. We often find the stewardship assignments, forms, and conversation-triggered emails to be more limited than expected. Integration with certain platforms (like Microsoft Fabric or customized semantic models) can require additional configuration. Performance and metadata freshness can vary depending on how ingestion jobs are set up and the size of the catalog.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Alation solves the challenges of finding, understanding, and governing data across the organization. By centralizing data assets, standardizing definitions, and enabling collaboration, it reduces time spent searching for information and increases confidence in the accuracy of data. The platform improves efficiency, promotes data literacy, and supports better, faster decision-making, making it a valuable tool for any data-driven team.
Effortless Metadata Understanding with Room for UI Improvement
What do you like best about the product?
I appreciate how easy Alation is to use and access, which simplifies my tasks when working with metadata. Its capability to help identify the correct data structures, tables, and views is invaluable to me. I find it particularly helpful in resolving issues I encounter during my day-to-day querying tasks, as it effectively removes blockers related to data points and tables, enabling me to move forward smoothly. Furthermore, the initial setup of Alation was straightforward, enhancing my overall user experience.
What do you dislike about the product?
I think the data structures in Alation need to be organized in buckets for metadata to allow for easier identification, so simplification in this area is needed. Additionally, the user interface and user experience could be further simplified to provide quicker answers.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Alation to understand metadata and identify the correct data structures, facilitating day-to-day querying and eliminating blockers related to data points and tables.
Great Features and Usability, But Performance Needs Work
What do you like best about the product?
Ease of use
Compose feature
Conversations
Analytics
Compose feature
Conversations
Analytics
What do you dislike about the product?
Performance can lag when integrating large number of data sources
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Active metadata management
SQL user tool
Conversations
SQL user tool
Conversations
Empowers Data Governance with Actionable Lineage and Seamless Stewardship
What do you like best about the product?
Trust signals (certified, deprecated, warnings) that put governance right in the user’s flow.
Business glossary + policies tied to real objects, keeping definitions, owners, and rules in one place.
Lineage you can act on (table → column → BI asset) to see impact before you change a model or warehouse.
Stewardship workflows (owners, Q&A, flags) that make “who maintains this?” obvious.
Business glossary + policies tied to real objects, keeping definitions, owners, and rules in one place.
Lineage you can act on (table → column → BI asset) to see impact before you change a model or warehouse.
Stewardship workflows (owners, Q&A, flags) that make “who maintains this?” obvious.
What do you dislike about the product?
Lineage gaps. Cross-system lineage (e.g., Snowflake → dbt → Tableau) can be incomplete, and column-level lineage isn’t perfect for all connectors.
Freshness lag. Harvesters run on schedules; usage/lineage can be hours or days behind fast-moving warehouses.
Freshness lag. Harvesters run on schedules; usage/lineage can be hours or days behind fast-moving warehouses.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
1) Finding the right data fast
Problem: Analysts can’t tell which table/view to use; lots of “where is X?” pings.
Alation: Google-like search ranked by real usage, with owners, certifications, and synonyms.
Benefit: Faster time-to-insight; fewer Slack/ServiceDesk tickets; quicker onboarding for new analysts.
2) Trust & governance in-flow
Problem: Unclear definitions and stale docs lead to inconsistent metrics.
Alation: Business glossary tied to physical objects, certifications/deprecation badges, policy notes.
Benefit: Consistent KPIs across teams; less rework; auditable definitions.
3) End-to-end lineage & impact analysis
Problem: Hard to see downstream blast radius of a schema change.
Alation: Table→column→BI lineage (Snowflake to Tableau), popularity, and usage context.
Benefit: Safer changes, faster RCA when dashboards break, fewer “mystery” dependencies.
4) Ownership & stewardship
Problem: “Who owns this dataset?” remains unanswered; content goes stale.
Alation: Clear owners/stewards, workflows for Q&A and curation, usage signals to prioritize.
Benefit: Better data product hygiene; accountable teams; retiring unused assets.
Problem: Analysts can’t tell which table/view to use; lots of “where is X?” pings.
Alation: Google-like search ranked by real usage, with owners, certifications, and synonyms.
Benefit: Faster time-to-insight; fewer Slack/ServiceDesk tickets; quicker onboarding for new analysts.
2) Trust & governance in-flow
Problem: Unclear definitions and stale docs lead to inconsistent metrics.
Alation: Business glossary tied to physical objects, certifications/deprecation badges, policy notes.
Benefit: Consistent KPIs across teams; less rework; auditable definitions.
3) End-to-end lineage & impact analysis
Problem: Hard to see downstream blast radius of a schema change.
Alation: Table→column→BI lineage (Snowflake to Tableau), popularity, and usage context.
Benefit: Safer changes, faster RCA when dashboards break, fewer “mystery” dependencies.
4) Ownership & stewardship
Problem: “Who owns this dataset?” remains unanswered; content goes stale.
Alation: Clear owners/stewards, workflows for Q&A and curation, usage signals to prioritize.
Benefit: Better data product hygiene; accountable teams; retiring unused assets.
Beginners experience
What do you like best about the product?
Product suites our needs, I am a beginner in this area
What do you dislike about the product?
Nothing as of now, perhaps they could strengthen their presence in Sweden
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Defining our glossary
Empowering Data Governance with Seamless Integration and Automation
What do you like best about the product?
We value how the platform allows us to connect detailed technical information about our data, such as data dictionaries and lineage, with non-technical documentation. Automations of essential data governance functions has proven crucial for us to effectively manage regulatory & data risk compliance requirements. Alation’s highly engaged approach, along with their account management and technical support, has truly set them apart.
What do you dislike about the product?
The roll-out of (agentic) AI has started in Alation's product offering, but has not matured as much yet as we would like. Data profiling capabilities do exist but in our view are underdeveloped.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Alation for us predominantly is a data governance toolkit, designed to clearly articulate information ownership & accountability, and to describe critical data elements and regulatory outcomes. Documenting artifacts in this space and spending the time to articulate data lineage have proven to be real time savers for us, when performing data incident triage, to deliver impact assessments, as well as when responding to information requests from the regulators & auditors
Exceptional Data Governance with Alation
What do you like best about the product?
I find Alation to be fantastic with its product innovation and am impressed by its ongoing development, including piloting a new AI product feature. The excellent customer service stands out, with the Alation team being very approachable and consistent in their client interactions. From the initial sale through to software renewal, they immerse themselves in understanding the client's perspective and strive to ensure their success. I'm grateful for the ease of setup, facilitated by Alation's professional services team through their Right Start program, making the implementation process smooth and hassle-free.
What do you dislike about the product?
I find the pricing of Alation relatively high, which is an area that needs to be reconsidered, especially given the current financial situation. When comparing Alation with other products in the market, the cost stands out as a notable concern, suggesting room for improvement in this aspect.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I utilize Alation to resolve inconsistencies in business metadata definitions, establish clear data ownership, and enhance data quality through profiling.
Elevates Data Confidence and Connectivity
What do you like best about the product?
I find Alation to be incredibly valuable for exploring our data catalogue and executing queries. With its central location, it facilitates easy data exploration and enhances trust in our data through the provision of high-quality metadata. I particularly appreciate the simple, context-rich search feature that allows me to find and understand data quickly. This enables me to delve deeper into our datasets and execute queries efficiently. The deep integration with various services like AWS Glue, AWS S3, and Zeppelin is another aspect I greatly enjoy, as it allows for seamless connectivity with other tools we use. Alation has been our primary data catalogue for five years, a testament to its reliability and effectiveness in meeting our needs. Overall, these features make Alation indispensable in my daily work, and I highly recommend it.
What do you dislike about the product?
I feel that Alation could benefit from enhanced AI features, such as a better understanding of data and the ability to prefill missing metadata. Additionally, during the initial setup, I encountered the need for reworking, particularly in renaming and ensuring that autogenerated titles were correct and contextually appropriate.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Alation as a central location to explore data, enhancing trust with high-quality metadata, enabling fast data discovery, understanding, and query execution.
Customized to Encourage Stewardship Engagement
What do you like best about the product?
Very flexible model; able to adjust the varies aspects to best fit our requirements. Front end's flexibility and ease of use helped sell stewardship engagement.
What do you dislike about the product?
Integration with other governance and catalog products can be a pain; more options to automate the extraction of data for integration with our other products would be helpful.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
1) Catalog of Catalogs. Brings all metadata together from a variety of BI and data platforms, as well as other catalogs, into a single pane of glass.
2) Allows us to capture and associate data policies and standards to our metadata. This then allows us to identify where standards and policies should be enforced.
3) Stewardship engagement - ease of use increases the chances that stewards will provide more complete information regarding their assets
2) Allows us to capture and associate data policies and standards to our metadata. This then allows us to identify where standards and policies should be enforced.
3) Stewardship engagement - ease of use increases the chances that stewards will provide more complete information regarding their assets
Centralized Metadata Management with Growing Marketplace Capabilities
What do you like best about the product?
I love that Alation is evolving from a mere catalog to a highly efficient data marketplace, which greatly enhances our data management capabilities. The easy search and guided navigation are standout features for me, particularly the enhanced left-handed navigation which has significantly improved our ability to find necessary data. I find Alation's lineage feature to be incredibly useful, and their analytics is extremely user-friendly, catering well to our analytical needs. This functionality, combined with the seamless integration with tools like Snowflake and Databricks, maximizes our data architecture's effectiveness. I truly appreciate how straightforward the initial setup of Alation was, which eased our transition from Informatica EDC and has established a strong foundation for our metadata management and enterprise initiatives.
What do you dislike about the product?
I dislike the inconsistency in Alation's approach to Lineage Analytics. It has been added and removed from their roadmap for years, which makes it difficult to rely on this feature for long-term planning.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Alation for centralized metadata management, enhancing data search and discovery, and supporting data quality index and lineage audibility with a user-friendly data model.
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