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Amazon Athena

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Company health

Employee growth
11% increase in the last year
Web traffic
10% increase in the last quarter

Ratings

G2
4.4/5
(200)
Glassdoor
3.7/5
(206324)

Amazon Athena description

Amazon Athena is a service that lets you analyze large datasets stored in Amazon S3 using standard SQL queries. It's serverless, so there's no infrastructure to manage, and you pay only for the queries you run. This makes it a cost-effective way to get insights from your data without the complexity of traditional data warehousing.


Who is Amazon Athena best for

Amazon Athena is a serverless query service that allows you to analyze data in Amazon S3 using standard SQL. Ideal for data analysts and engineers, Athena offers a cost-effective, pay-per-query pricing model. Users praise its ease of use and fast query execution for smaller datasets, but some have noted occasional performance issues with larger datasets.

  • Best for small to enterprise-level companies seeking efficient data analysis.

  • Suitable for various data-heavy industries leveraging cloud storage.


Amazon Athena features

Supported

Athena supports standard SQL queries, including complex analyses like large joins and window functions.

Supported

Athena is deployed and managed within the AWS cloud environment.

Supported

Athena seamlessly integrates with popular data lake technologies like Amazon S3, Azure Data Lake Storage, and Google Cloud Storage.

Supported

Athena automatically scales compute resources to handle workload fluctuations.

Supported

Athena uses pay-per-query pricing, suitable for occasional analysis.

Supported

Athena supports writing queries using standard SQL syntax.

Qualities

We evaluate the sentiment that users express about non-functional aspects of the software

Value and Pricing Transparency

Strongly positive
+1

Customer Service

Rather positive
+0.33

Ease of Use

Rather positive
+0.64

Reliability and Performance

Rather positive
+0.67

Ease of Implementation

Rather positive
+0.6

Scalability

Strongly positive
+1

Amazon Athena reviews

We've summarised 197 Amazon Athena reviews (Amazon Athena G2 reviews) and summarised the main points below.

Pros of Amazon Athena
  • Serverless architecture; no infrastructure management needed.
  • Cost-effective, pay-per-query pricing model.
  • Easy to use for users familiar with SQL.
  • Fast query execution for smaller datasets.
  • Directly queries data in S3 without requiring ETL.
Cons of Amazon Athena
  • Occasional performance lags, especially with large datasets.
  • Limited SQL syntax support; some standard features are missing.
  • Error messages could be more informative and precise.
  • UI/UX could be improved, particularly for query history and navigation.
  • Limited integration with other data sources besides S3.

Amazon Athena pricing

The commentary is based on 29 reviews from Amazon Athena G2 reviews.

Amazon Athena's pricing is based on the amount of data scanned by queries (for SQL queries) or compute used (for Apache Spark applications).

Users sentiment

Rather positive
+0.33

See the Amazon Athena pricing page.

  • Amazon Athena has a free trial.

SQL Queries
$5 per TB/TB

Pay per query based on the amount of data scanned. Data is scanned from Amazon S3 or other data sources.

Apache Spark
$0.35 per DPU-Hour/hour

Pay an hourly rate for executing Apache Spark code.


Amazon Athena alternatives

  • Logo of Firebolt
    Firebolt
    Blazing-fast cloud data warehouse for instant insights.
    Read more
  • Logo of Amazon Redshift
    Amazon Redshift
    Fast, scalable data warehousing for powerful business insights.
    Read more
  • Logo of Snowflake
    Snowflake
    Cloud data platform. Scales effortlessly. Simplifies data warehousing.
    Read more
  • Logo of Google Cloud BigQuery
    Google Cloud BigQuery
    Serverless data warehouse for fast, massive dataset analysis.
    Read more
  • Logo of Google Cloud SQL
    amazon-athena vs Google Cloud SQL
    Fully managed database service for MySQL, PostgreSQL, and SQL Server.
    Read more
  • Logo of Render
    Render
    Effortless cloud hosting and deployments for websites and apps.
    Read more

Amazon Athena FAQ

  • What is Amazon Athena and what does Amazon Athena do?

    Amazon Athena is a serverless interactive query service that makes it easy to analyze data in Amazon S3 using standard SQL. Pay only for the queries you run, with no infrastructure to manage. Athena is ideal for quick, ad-hoc queries and large-scale data analysis.

  • How does Amazon Athena integrate with other tools?

    Amazon Athena integrates seamlessly with other AWS services, especially those within the data ecosystem like Amazon S3, Glue, and QuickSight. It supports various data formats and offers JDBC and ODBC drivers, enabling integration with business intelligence and data visualization tools.

  • What the main competitors of Amazon Athena?

    Top alternatives to Amazon Athena include Snowflake, Google BigQuery, and Presto. These competitors offer similar serverless data warehousing capabilities with SQL-based querying for large datasets. They also provide varying degrees of scalability, performance, and integrations with other cloud services.

  • Is Amazon Athena legit?

    Yes, Amazon Athena is a legitimate service offered by Amazon Web Services (AWS). It's a safe and reliable way to query data stored in S3 using standard SQL. It's serverless and cost-effective, making data analysis accessible without managing infrastructure. Users appreciate its ease of use and integration with S3.

  • How much does Amazon Athena cost?

    Amazon Athena's pricing is based on the amount of data scanned per query, at a rate of $5 per terabyte. There are no upfront costs or reserved instances to consider. This makes it a cost-effective option for data analysis.

  • Is Amazon Athena customer service good?

    Customer reviews suggest Amazon Athena's customer support is generally helpful and responsive. Users appreciate the readily available documentation and resources, which contribute to a positive support experience.


Reviewed by

MK
Michal Kaczor
CEO at Gralio

Michal has worked at startups for many years and writes about topics relating to software selection and IT management. As a former consultant for Bain, a business advisory company, he also knows how to understand needs of any business and find solutions to its problems.

TT
Tymon Terlikiewicz
CTO at Gralio

Tymon is a seasoned CTO who loves finding the perfect tools for any task. He recently headed up the tech department at Batmaid, a well-known Swiss company, where he managed about 60 software purchases, including CX, HR, Payroll, Marketing automation and various developer tools.

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