# dbt Core vs Hightouch

**Leader by vioscaleAI score:** Hightouch

| Attribute | dbt Core | Hightouch |
|---|---|---|
| **vioscaleAI score** | 65.7 (73% (medium)) | 71.8 (71% (medium)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 100 | - |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 553 | - |
| adoption.github_stars | 14,028 | - |
| adoption.package_downloads_weekly | 21,005,917 | - |
| content.faq | `[{"answer":"dbt is a framework that enables data teams to transform data using SQL-based development practices similar to software engineering, with built-in testing, version control, and deployment capabilities. It provides lineage tracking, documentation, and can run locally or in the cloud. It is indexed under Data Engineering Tools.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"What is dbt Core?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"dbt Core is open source, so it can be self-hosted and used at no licence cost. It is released under the Apache-2.0 licence. A commercial or hosted edition starts at $100 per user per month. Prices are published openly on the vendor's own pricing page. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"Is dbt Core free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"dbt Core supports the web, Windows, macOS, Linux and a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"What platforms does dbt Core support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. dbt Core can be deployed cloud / SaaS and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"Can dbt Core be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 6 integrations for dbt Core, including Tableau, Fivetran, OpenAI, Snowflake, Azure AI and Databricks. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"What does dbt Core integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed ISO 27001 and GDPR for dbt Core. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as dbt Core not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com/security","question":"What security certifications does dbt Core have?","confidence":0.7},{"answer":"Yes. dbt Core is published under the Apache-2.0 licence, a permissive licence that generally allows commercial use and modification. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt-core","question":"Is dbt Core open source?","confidence":0.95},{"answer":"dbt Core is available worldwide. Its primary market is the United States.","source":"https://www.getdbt.com","question":"Where is dbt Core available?","confidence":0.5}]` | `[{"answer":"A data integration platform that connects data warehouses to marketing, sales, and business applications to keep all systems updated with accurate customer information. Includes AI-powered ad creation through its Ad Studio feature. It is indexed under Data Engineering Tools.","source":"https://hightouch.com","question":"What is Hightouch?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Hightouch offers a free tier, so you can start without paying. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://hightouch.com/pricing","question":"Is Hightouch free?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed browser-based access to Hightouch. That is the extent of what we could verify from public sources, so it may well offer desktop or mobile clients we have not indexed.","source":"https://hightouch.com/pricing","question":"What platforms does Hightouch support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have only confirmed a cloud / SaaS deployment for Hightouch, so it appears to be vendor-hosted. If a self-hosted option exists we have not found it documented publicly.","source":"https://hightouch.com","question":"Can Hightouch be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 70 integrations for Hightouch, including Acoustic, ActiveCampaign, Adobe Analytics, Adobe Campaign Classic, Adobe Experience Platform, Adobe Target, Airship and Airtable, plus 62 more. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://hightouch.com","question":"What does Hightouch integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA and GDPR for Hightouch. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as Hightouch not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://hightouch.com/platform/security","question":"What security certifications does Hightouch have?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Hightouch is available worldwide. The vendor is headquartered in the United States.","source":"https://hightouch.com/pricing","question":"Where is Hightouch available?","confidence":0.75}]` |
| deployment.options | `{"cloud":true,"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true}` |
| description.long | A data transformation framework that applies software engineering principles—such as version control, testing, and modularity—to SQL-based analytics workflows. | A data activation platform that syncs information from data warehouses to business applications, with support for numerous pre-built integrations and the ability to create custom connections without coding. |
| features.capabilities | `{"role":"transform","lineage":true,"paradigm":"batch","dbt_native":true,"data_quality":true,"managed_cloud":true,"connector_count":"6+ named integrations with broader ecosystem","self_hosted_oss":true,"self_hosted_available":true}` | `{"role":"reverse_etl","paradigm":"both","dbt_native":true,"elt_pushdown":true,"managed_cloud":true,"connector_count":"300+","self_hosted_oss":false,"incremental_runs":true,"custom_connector_sdk":true,"managed_cloud_available":true}` |
| integrations.count | 6 | 102 |
| integrations.list | `[{"name":"Tableau"},{"name":"Fivetran"},{"name":"OpenAI"},{"name":"Snowflake"},{"name":"Azure AI"},{"name":"Databricks"}]` | `[{"name":"Acoustic"},{"name":"ActiveCampaign"},{"name":"Adobe Analytics"},{"name":"Adobe Campaign Classic"},{"name":"Adobe Experience Platform"},{"name":"Adobe Target"},{"name":"Airship"},{"name":"Airtable"},{"name":"Algolia"},{"name":"Amplitude"},{"name":"Anaplan"},{"name":"Apache Kafka"},{"name":"AppsFlyer"},{"name":"Asana"},{"name":"Attentive"},{"name":"Auth0"},{"name":"Awin"},{"name":"AWS Lambda"},{"name":"Azure Blob Storage"},{"name":"Azure Functions"},{"name":"BigCommerce"},{"name":"Bloomreach"},{"name":"Bluecore"},{"name":"Braze"},{"name":"Brevo"},{"name":"Campaign Monitor"},{"name":"Chargebee"},{"name":"ChartMogul"},{"name":"ChatGPT Ads"},{"name":"ChurnZero"},{"name":"ClickUp"},{"name":"Close"},{"name":"CockroachDB"},{"name":"Cordial"},{"name":"Courier"},{"name":"Criteo"},{"name":"Customer.io"},{"name":"Discord"},{"name":"Drift"},{"name":"Dropbox"},{"name":"DynamoDB"},{"name":"Elasticsearch"},{"name":"Eloqua"},{"name":"Emarsys"},{"name":"Epsilon Retail Media"},{"name":"Freshdesk"},{"name":"Freshsales"},{"name":"Front"},{"name":"FullStory"},{"name":"Gainsight"},{"name":"Snowflake","native":true,"category":"data_warehouse","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Databricks","native":true,"category":"data_warehouse","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"BigQuery","native":true,"category":"data_warehouse","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Teradata Vantage","native":true,"category":"data_warehouse","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"PlanetScale","native":true,"category":"database","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Google Analytics","native":true,"category":"analytics","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Salesforce","native":true,"category":"crm","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Salesforce Marketing Cloud","native":true,"category":"email","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Salesforce Pardot","native":true,"category":"crm","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Google Ads","native":true,"category":"advertising","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Meta Conversions API","native":true,"category":"advertising","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Meta Custom Audiences","native":true,"category":"advertising","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Spotify Ads Manager","native":true,"category":"advertising","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"The Trade Desk","native":true,"category":"advertising","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Pipedrive","native":true,"category":"crm","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Slack","native":true,"category":"communication","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Zapier","native":true,"category":"automation","direction":"bidirectional"},{"name":"Zendesk","native":true,"category":"support","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Workday","native":true,"category":"hcm","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Xero","native":true,"category":"accounting","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Google Cloud Storage","native":true,"category":"cloud_storage","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Google Sheets","native":true,"category":"spreadsheet","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Help Scout"},{"name":"OneSignal"},{"name":"Gong"},{"name":"Box"},{"name":"Smartsheet"},{"name":"Firestore"},{"name":"ClickHouse"},{"name":"OpenSearch"},{"name":"Optimizely"},{"name":"Planhat"},{"name":"Userflow"},{"name":"Vero Cloud"},{"name":"Heap"},{"name":"CleverTap"},{"name":"Microsoft Ads (Bing Ads)"},{"name":"Medallia"},{"name":"Unify"},{"name":"HTTP Request"},{"name":"Hightouch Personalization API"},{"name":"Greenplum Database"}]` |
| language.primary | Rust | - |
| license.spdx | Apache-2.0 | - |
| market.availability | `{"primaryMarkets":["US"],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` | `{"hqCountry":"US","primaryMarkets":[],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` |
| platform.support | `{"cli":true,"mac":true,"web":true,"linux":true,"windows":true}` | `{"web":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"hybrid","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Developer","summary":"Free","features":["Browser-based IDE","Multi-factor authentication (MFA)","Job scheduling","Keep on the latest dbt release"],"minSeats":1,"description":"The fastest way to get started with dbt","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"seats":"1","projects":"1","successful_models_per_month":"3,000"}},{"free":false,"name":"Starter","summary":"$100/seat/month","features":["All Developer features","dbt Catalog basic","dbt Semantic Layer basic","dbt Copilot code generation","API access"],"minSeats":5,"components":[{"kind":"per_unit","unit":"seat","amount":100,"period":"month","currency":"USD"}],"description":"Pay as you go pricing for your first dbt project","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"seats":"5","projects":"1","queried_metrics_per_month":"5,000","successful_models_per_month":"15,000"}},{"free":false,"name":"Enterprise","summary":"Custom pricing","features":["All Starter features","dbt Catalog advanced","dbt Semantic Layer advanced","dbt Copilot","dbt Canvas","dbt Insights","dbt Mesh Enterprise"],"contactSales":true,"includedLimits":{"projects":"30","queried_metrics_per_month":"20,000","successful_models_per_month":"100,000"}},{"free":false,"name":"Enterprise+","summary":"Custom pricing","features":["All Enterprise features","PrivateLink","IP Restrictions","Rollback","Hybrid projects"],"contactSales":true,"includedLimits":{"projects":"Unlimited","queried_metrics_per_month":"20,000","successful_models_per_month":"100,000"}}],"summary":"Free Developer tier, $100/seat/month for Starter, custom pricing for Enterprise","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://www.getdbt.com","retrievedAt":"2026-08-05T13:08:54.690Z","freeTrialDays":14,"startingPrice":{"amount":100,"period":"month","currency":"USD"},"billingPeriods":["month"]}` | `{"type":"usage","plans":[{"free":true,"name":"Basic Reverse ETL","summary":"Free tier","features":["Up to 2 active syncs","Unlimited destination count","Unlimited user seats"],"description":"Reverse ETL platform with limited active syncs","contactSales":false,"includedLimits":{"active_syncs":"2"}}],"addOns":[{"name":"Premium Extensions"}],"summary":"Usage-based pricing with free tier. Mix-and-match products based on actual usage.","currency":"USD","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://hightouch.com/pricing","retrievedAt":"2026-08-13T22:24:29.684Z"}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | open_source | freemium |
| pricing.price_level | free | low |
| pricing.transparent | yes | yes |
| release.cadence_days | 2 | - |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.8","date":"2026-10-14T07:49:06Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.8"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.13.0b1","date":"2026-10-14T07:41:52Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v1.13.0b1"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.12.6","date":"2026-10-14T10:24:02Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.12.6"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.11.16","date":"2026-10-14T08:25:55Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.11.16"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-dev.41-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-23T14:17:38Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-dev.41-test-pypi"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.5","date":"2026-09-18T15:47:44Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.4","date":"2026-09-16T07:12:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.3","date":"2026-09-16T01:44:05Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.2","date":"2026-09-15T16:08:05Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.2-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-15T14:48:47Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.2-test-pypi"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.12.5","date":"2026-09-15T19:07:42Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.12.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.1","date":"2026-09-14T22:07:43Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0","date":"2026-09-14T20:50:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v2.0.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-dev.39-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-09T13:17:55Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-dev.39-test-pypi"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-dev.38-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-09T11:24:08Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-dev.38-test-pypi"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-dev.37-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-09T09:21:59Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-dev.37-test-pypi"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-rc.2","date":"2026-09-08T14:57:16Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-rc.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.12.4","date":"2026-09-08T10:00:57Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.12.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v1.11.15","date":"2026-09-08T06:42:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v1.11.15"},{"url":"https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt/releases/tag/v2.0.0-dev.35-test-pypi","date":"2026-09-03T12:35:02Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v2.0.0-dev.35-test-pypi"}]` | - |
| reliability.status_page | yes | yes |
| security.gdpr | yes | yes |
| security.hipaa | - | yes |
| security.iso27001 | yes | yes |
| security.scorecard | 6 | - |
| security.soc2 | - | yes |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":4,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=pypi&package_name=dbt-core&per_page=100","last_12m":0,"max_severity":"HIGH"}` | - |

## Capabilities (Data Engineering Tools)

| Capability | dbt Core | Hightouch |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Core** |  |  |
| Tool role | Transformation | Reverse-ETL |
| Processing paradigm | Batch | Batch + streaming |
| **Connectivity** |  |  |
| Connector count | 6+ named integrations with broader ecosystem | 300+ |
| CDC / log-based replication | - | - |
| **Transformation** |  |  |
| In-warehouse transformation (push-down) | - | ✓ |
| dbt-native orchestration | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Self-hosted / open-source available | ✓ | ✗ |
| Managed cloud available | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Governance** |  |  |
| Data lineage / asset catalog | ✓ | - |
| **Authoring** |  |  |
| Python-first authoring | - | - |
| **Execution** |  |  |
| Incremental / partition-aware runs | - | ✓ |
| **Quality** |  |  |
| Built-in data quality / tests | ✓ | - |
| **Scale** |  |  |
| Horizontal scale (distributed executor) | - | - |

*Source: vioscaleAI. Generated 2026-10-16T20:14:46.655Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*