How Much Does Preset (Apache Superset) Cost in 2026?

Preset's positioning is 'managed Apache Superset with SMB-friendly pricing.' Superset is a mature open-source BI tool (Apache Foundation project, originally from Airbnb), comparable to Metabase in SMB targeting but with data-engineer-friendly SQL-first focus. Preset sells the managed cloud version. Starter free tier genuinely generous for small teams: 5 users, 1 workspace, unlimited dashboards and charts, 40+ visualization types, semantic layer, collaborative SQL editor, no-code chart builder. Many 5-person startups never need to upgrade. Professional at $20/user/month annual ($240/user/year) is the jump: role-based access controls, scheduled Slack/email reports, multi-region support, standard customer support, 3 workspaces (vs 1 on Starter). For a 15-person data team: $300/month (15 × $20 annual = $3,600/year). Embedded Dashboards at $500/month for 50 viewer licenses is the add-on to Professional — enables customer-facing embedded analytics. For a SaaS company serving analytics to 50 customers, total is $20/user Professional + $500/month Embedded = competitive with Looker Embed at 10% of the cost. Enterprise is custom with dbt integration (critical for data engineering teams using dbt for transformations), Managed Private Cloud deployment (deploy Preset in your AWS VPC), SSH tunnel database connections (access databases behind firewalls), SSO/SCIM, audit logs, enterprise support with dedicated SLA. Enterprise add-ons: API access, dedicated Slack support, embedded dashboards with volume discounts up to 90% for high-scale deployments. Where Preset wins: free tier up to 5 users enables real product deployment without paying, Apache Superset foundation gives open-source optionality (leave Preset, self-host Superset), Embedded Dashboards at $500/month for 50 licenses is cheapest customer-facing analytics in category, dbt integration at Enterprise tier fits modern data stack. Where it loses: Professional at $20/user/month is 2x Metabase Starter per-user pricing ($6/user), brand recognition smaller than Tableau/Power BI for enterprise sales, requires some Superset/SQL fluency for best value (less beginner-friendly than Metabase), Enterprise pricing opaque.