Census vs dbt
Census and dbt are both data integration & ETL tools. Census is aimed at enterprise, while dbt is aimed at developers. Both have a free plan.
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium · $100 |
| Starting price | Not published | $100/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | 14 days | 14 days |
| Built for | Enterprise | Developers |
| Platforms | web | web |
| Country | US · 2018 | US · 2016 |
| Rating | — | — |
Choose Census if
Data teams activating warehouse data.
- Warehouse-native activation
- Strong reliability
- dbt-friendly
Look elsewhere if: Teams without a warehouse.
Choose dbt if
Data teams with a warehouse who want tested, documented, version-controlled transformations.
- Industry standard with huge community
- Brings software engineering practices to analytics
- Free open-source core
Look elsewhere if: Organizations without a warehouse or with only spreadsheet-scale data.
Census vs dbt pricing
Census
- Free$03,500 MAR for activations, 500,000 MAR for connections
- StandardUsage-basedPriced on monthly active rows; unlimited users
- EnterpriseUsage-based1-minute syncs, Audience Hub
- Business CriticalUsage-basedCustomer-managed keys, PCI DSS, private networking
dbt
- Developer$01 seat, 3,000 models built/mo, 1 project
- Starter$100/user/mo5 seats, 15,000 models built/mo, 1 project
- EnterpriseCustomBilled annually; 100,000 models built/mo, 30 projects
- Enterprise+CustomUnlimited projects
Census · Key features
- Reverse ETL
- Audience Hub
- Entity resolution
- Observability
- 200+ destinations
- dbt integration
Cons
- Pricing grows
- Requires warehouse
- Overlap with Hightouch
dbt · Key features
- SQL models with ref() dependencies and DAG
- Tests, documentation and lineage graphs
- Incremental models, snapshots and seeds
- dbt Cloud IDE, scheduler and CI/CD
- Semantic Layer for consistent metrics
- dbt Mesh for cross-team projects
Cons
- Cloud pricing per developer seat adds up
- Jinja templating can get complex
- Long-running DAGs need orchestration tuning
Census vs dbt: FAQ
Do Census and dbt have a free plan?
Yes, both Census and dbt have a free plan; paid plans add more usage and features.