Databricks Notebooks vs Polynote
Comparing two data science notebooks.
Databricks Notebooks
Polynote
Collaborate across engineering, data science, and machine learning teams with support for multiple languages, built-in data visualizations, automatic versioning, and operationalization with jobs.
Polynote is a different kind of notebook. It supports mixing multiple languages in one notebook, and sharing data between them seamlessly. It encourages reproducible notebooks with its immutable data model.
Setup
Can you self-host?
You can self-host (setup in hours)
Can you self-host?
You can self-host (setup in hours)
Features
Is it Jupyter compatible?
Jupyter-compatible
Is it Jupyter compatible?
Not Jupyter-compatible
Programming languages
Jupyter languages (e.g. Python, R)
Programming languages
Scala
Python
What kind of data sources can you connect to?
Connect with Jupyter libraries (e.g. SQLAlchemy, psycopg2)
Connect to data warehouses (Databricks)
What kind of data sources can you connect to?
Unknown
What kind of data visualization can you do?
Jupyter data visualization (e.g. Matplotlib, Altair, Plotly)
UI for building charts
What kind of data visualization can you do?
Unknown
Reactivity
No reactivity, you decide the execution order
Reactivity
No reactivity, you decide the execution order
Management
Reproducability
Environments are reproducible by default
Reproducability
With effort, you can make reproducible environments
Comments
Comment on items within a notebook
Comments
File-based (use GitHub)
Notebook organization
View notebooks in a list
Notebook organization
File-based
Licensing
Price
Free tier
Pay for compute
Price
Free
Alternatives to Databricks Notebooks and Polynote
Compare Databricks Notebooks and Polynote with other data science notebook tools.
| Tool | Setup | Jupyter compatibility | Programming languages | Data visualization | Collaborative editing | Pricing | License |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Databricks Notebooks | Self-hosted or fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code or UI | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Polynote | Self-hosted | None | Scala, Python | Unknown | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Jupyter Compare with | Self-hosted | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Amazon Sagemaker Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Limited collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Google Colab Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Limited collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Deepnote Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter, SQL | Visualize with code or UI | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Hex Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter, SQL | Visualize with code or UI | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| DataCamp Workspace Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter, SQL | Visualize with code or UI | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| JupyterLab Compare with | Self-hosted | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| CoCalc Compare with | Self-hosted or fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Open source |
| Jetbrains Datalore Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code or UI | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Kaggle Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Limited collaboration | Free | Proprietary |
| Nextjournal Compare with | Fully managed | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| nteract Compare with | Self-hosted | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Observable Compare with | Fully managed | None | JS | Visualize with code | Realtime collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Query.me Compare with | Fully managed | None | SQL | Visualization UI builder | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| VS Code Compare with | Self-hosted | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Mode Notebooks Compare with | Fully managed | None | SQL, R, Python | Visualization UI builder | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Unknown | Proprietary |
| Querybook Compare with | Self-hosted | None | Python | Visualization UI builder | Realtime collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Zeppelin Compare with | Self-hosted | None | Python, SQL, Spark | Unknown | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Husprey Compare with | Fully managed | None | SQL | Visualization UI builder | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free and paid options | Proprietary |
| Pluto.jl Compare with | Self-hosted | None | Julia | Unknown | File-based or asynchronous collaboration | Free | Open source |
| Noteable Compare with | Unknown | Jupyter-compatible | Jupyter | Visualize with code | Unknown | Unknown | Proprietary |
| Zepl Compare with | Fully managed | Unknown | Python, R | Unknown | Realtime collaboration | Unknown | Proprietary |
| Count Compare with | Fully managed | None | SQL, Python | Visualization UI builder | Unknown | Unknown | Proprietary |