Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Plotly VS Business Functions

Compare Plotly VS Business Functions and see what are their differences

Plotly logo Plotly

Low-Code Data Apps

Business Functions logo Business Functions

Business Functions is a function library for Microsoft Excel that's been around since 2002.
  • Plotly Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-31
  • Business Functions Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-04-20

Plotly features and specs

  • Interactivity
    Plotly offers highly interactive plots that allow users to pan, zoom, and hover over data points for more information. This enhances the user experience and provides deeper insights.
  • High-quality visualizations
    It provides aesthetically pleasing and highly customizable charts, making it suitable for publication-quality visuals.
  • Versatility
    Plotly supports multiple chart types including line charts, scatter plots, bar charts, and 3D plots, making it suitable for a wide range of applications.
  • Python integration
    Plotly is well-integrated with Python and works seamlessly with other popular data science libraries like Pandas, NumPy, and Scikit-learn.
  • Web-based
    The plots can be easily embedded in web applications or dashboards, making it ideal for sharing insights over the internet.
  • Open-source
    Plotly offers an open-source version, which allows users to create and share visualizations without any cost.

Possible disadvantages of Plotly

  • Performance
    Rendering very large datasets can sometimes be slow, which may not be suitable for real-time data visualization requirements.
  • Learning curve
    Even though the library is well-documented, the extensive range of features can have a steep learning curve for beginners.
  • Cost for advanced features
    While the basic functionality is free, more advanced features, such as export to certain formats and additional customizable options, require a paid subscription.
  • Dependency management
    Plotly has a number of dependencies that need to be managed properly, which can sometimes complicate the setup process.
  • Complexity
    For simple visualizations, Plotly might be overkill and simpler libraries like Matplotlib or Seaborn could be more appropriate.

Business Functions features and specs

  • Efficiency
    Business Functions provides a wide array of pre-built Excel functions, which can save users time by streamlining complex calculations and tasks that would otherwise be done manually.
  • Versatility
    The software offers versatility with an extensive library of functions that can be applied to various fields such as finance, engineering, and statistics, catering to different professional needs.
  • User-Friendly
    The interface is designed to be intuitive, making it accessible for users with different levels of expertise in Excel, thus reducing the learning curve associated with complex data analysis.
  • Cost-effective
    By automating tasks and reducing manual labor, Business Functions can lead to overall cost savings for businesses who heavily rely on data processing and analysis.

Possible disadvantages of Business Functions

  • Compatibility
    Some functions may not be compatible with all versions of Excel, which could limit usability for some businesses using older software versions.
  • Dependency on Software
    Reliance on Business Functions could lead to a dependency where users may find it difficult to switch to other tools or methods without significant effort.
  • Learning Curve
    Despite being user-friendly, mastering all available functions might require time and training, especially for users who are accustomed to standard Excel functions.
  • Subscription Costs
    While it can be cost-effective, the software may also involve ongoing subscription fees, which can add up, particularly for small enterprises or individual users.

Analysis of Plotly

Overall verdict

  • Overall, Plotly is a strong choice for those looking to create dynamic and interactive data visualizations, thanks to its range of features and ease of integration with web technologies.

Why this product is good

  • Plotly is considered good because it offers a comprehensive suite of tools for creating interactive visualizations that can be used in web applications, reports, and dashboards. It supports many different types of plots, is easy to use for both beginners and experienced developers, and integrates well with popular programming languages like Python, R, and JavaScript.

Recommended for

    Plotly is recommended for data scientists, analysts, and developers who need to create interactive and visually appealing data visualizations. It's particularly useful for those who work with Python or R and want the ability to embed their visualizations in web applications or dashboards.

Plotly videos

Create Real-time Chart with Javascript | Plotly.js Tutorial

More videos:

  • Review - Introducing plotly.py 3.0
  • Review - Is Plotly The Better Matplotlib?
  • Tutorial - Plotly Tutorial 2021
  • Review - Data Visualization as The First and Last Mile of Data Science Plotly Express and Dash | SciPy 2021

Business Functions videos

Introduction To Business Functions

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Plotly and Business Functions)
Data Visualization
100 100%
0% 0
Data Dashboard
88 88%
12% 12
Technical Computing
0 0%
100% 100
Charting Libraries
89 89%
11% 11

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Plotly and Business Functions

Plotly Reviews

Best 8 Redash Alternatives in 2023 [In Depth Guide]
Plotly is specifically designed for companies who want to build and deploy analytic applications like dashboards using Python, Julia, or R without needing DevOps or Javascript developers.
Source: www.datapad.io
5 Best Python Libraries For Data Visualization in 2023
Plotly is a web-based data visualization toolkit that comes with unique functionalities such as dendrograms, 3D charts, and also contour plots, which is not very common in other libraries. It has a great API offering scatter plots, line charts, bar charts, error bars, box plots, and other visualizations. Plotly can even be accessed from a Python Notebook.
Top 8 Python Libraries for Data Visualization
Plotly is a free open-source graphing library that can be used to form data visualizations. Plotly (plotly.py) is built on top of the Plotly JavaScript library (plotly.js) and can be used to create web-based data visualizations that can be displayed in Jupyter notebooks or web applications using Dash or saved as individual HTML files. Plotly provides more than 40 unique...
5 top picks for JavaScript chart libraries
Plotly is a graphing library that’s available for various runtime environments, including the browser. It supports many kinds of charts and graphs that we can configure with a variety of options.

Business Functions Reviews

We have no reviews of Business Functions yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Plotly seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 33 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Plotly mentions (33)

  • Python for Data Visualization: Best Tools and Practices
    Plotly is perfect for interactive visualizations. You can create interactive charts and graphs that allow users to hover, click, and zoom in. Plotly is also great for web-based visuals, making it easy to share your findings online. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Generative AI Powered QnA & Visualization Chatbot
    Front End: A React application that leverages React-Chatbotify library to easily integrate a chatbot GUI. It also uses the Plotly library to display the charts/visualizations. The generative AI implementation and details are entirely abstracted from the front end. The front-end application depends on a single REST endpoint of the backend application. - Source: dev.to / 4 months ago
  • Build a Stock Dashboard in less than 40 lines of Python code!🤓
    In this tutorial, Mariya Sha will guide you through building a stock value dashboard using Taipy, Plotly, and a dataset from Kaggle. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • Essential Deep Learning Checklist: Best Practices Unveiled
    How to Accomplish: Utilize visualization libraries like Matplotlib, Seaborn, or Plotly in Python to create histograms, scatter plots, and bar charts. For image data, use tools that visualize images alongside their labels to check for labeling accuracy. For structured data, correlation matrices and pair plots can be highly informative. - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • Python equivalent to power bi/power query?
    For dashboards: - https://plotly.com/ is probably my favourite, but there are others like streamlit, voila and others... Source: over 1 year ago
View more

Business Functions mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of Business Functions yet. Tracking of Business Functions recommendations started around Mar 2021.

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Plotly and Business Functions, you can also consider the following products

D3.js - D3.js is a JavaScript library for manipulating documents based on data. D3 helps you bring data to life using HTML, SVG, and CSS.

Kutools for Excel - A handy Microsoft Excel add-ins collection to free you from time-consuming operations.

Chart.js - Easy, object oriented client side graphs for designers and developers.

Devart Excel Add-ins - Devart Excel Add-ins allow you to connect Microsoft Excel to live database and cloud data and work with them as with usual Excel spreadsheets.

RAWGraphs - RAWGraphs is an open source app built with the goal of making the visualization of complex data...

ASAP Utilities - ASAP Utilities is a powerful Excel add-in that fills the gaps in Excel.