Data warehouses · September 2026 Edition
Snowflake vs Google BigQuery
Nine of twelve models named Snowflake first on the direct prompt; three named Google BigQuery. Both were named by all twelve models and Snowflake carries 65 labels and Google BigQuery 67, so the shares are not directly comparable.
Named in three categories this edition.
Named in two categories this edition.
First-choice share47%44%Of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, 0 to 100.
Negative rate28%16%Negative labels as a share of the product's labels, 0 to 100.
Rank in category#1#2A position in a field of 7; printed, not drawn.
Labels6567A count; the two differ.
The two percentage rows are drawn on one 0 to 100 track, Snowflake reading right to left. Rank and label count are printed, not drawn.Amazon Redshift was named alongside these two in nine of the twelve direct answers. Snowflake vs ClickHouse Cloud · Google BigQuery vs ClickHouse Cloud
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all twelve models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category; every quote names the model and the prompt it came from. Both figures come from the data warehouses page.
By framing
How many of the twelve models made each the first choice, per way of asking, and how many argued against it.
SnowflakeFirst choices, of twelve modelsGoogle BigQuery
Direct931 against Snowflake
Paraphrase93
Comparative84
Budget-constrained0117 against Snowflake
Scale-constrained33
Negative1010 against Snowflake · 11 against Google BigQuery
Bars are first choices, 0 to 12 each sideModels that argued againstA model can name both, so the two sides of a row do not sum to twelve.
The direct prompt
The plain question, one answer per model, grouped by where Snowflake and Google BigQuery stood in it.
Both were the first choice
1 of 12 modelsThe answer named them together, and the judge labeled each a first choice.Mistral SmallGoogle BigQuery, Snowflake
Snowflake first, Google BigQuery an alternative
8 of 12 modelsGoogle BigQuery was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.GPT-5.4 miniSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Databricks SQL, Google BigQuery
Gemini 3.5 FlashSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery, Microsoft Fabric
Perplexity SonarSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Azure SQL Database, Databricks, Google BigQuery, Microsoft Fabric
Grok 4.1 FastSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery
DeepSeek V4 FlashSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery
Llama 4 MaverickSnowflake alternatives: Azure SQL Database, Google BigQuery
Qwen 3.7 FlashSnowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery, Microsoft Fabric
MiniMax M2.5Snowflake alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Azure Synapse Analytics, Databricks, Google BigQuery
Google BigQuery first, Snowflake an alternative
2 of 12 modelsSnowflake was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Kimi K2Google BigQuery alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Snowflake
GLM 4.7 FlashXGoogle BigQuery alternatives: Amazon Redshift, Microsoft Fabric, Snowflake
Neither was named
1 of 12 modelsThe answer made no first choice from these two in this category.Claude Haiku 4.5no first choice alternatives: Firebolt
Bold names in an answer are the products the judge labeled a first choice; a model naming several gives each of them that label. The full answer text for every row is in the record.
By buyer segment
The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment and they are never added together. The figures above are the mid-market standing, which is the one the category orders by.
Small business
Google BigQuery leads by sixty-seven points.
Google BigQuery80%#1 of 8Snowflake12%#2 of 8Mid-marketThe figures above
The order flips: Snowflake leads at mid-market.
Snowflake47%#1 of 7Google BigQuery44%#2 of 7Enterprise
Snowflake leads by fifty-nine points.
Snowflake72%#1 of 8Google BigQuery13%#3 of 8What the models said about Snowflake
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Six of eight in this category shown.
“Avoid Snowflake for tight budgets” DeepSeek V4 Flash · budget prompt · hard negative
“Snowflake is also powerful, but you should watch warehouse usage, autosuspend/autoresume settings, cloud-services charges, and serverless features” GPT-5.4 mini · negative prompt · soft negative
“Traditional cloud data warehouses like Snowflake and BigQuery, which may not be suitable for operational workloads or real-time analytics.” Llama 4 Maverick · negative prompt · soft negative
“Snowflake is a popular choice among mid-sized companies due to its near-zero maintenance, ecosystem maturity, and marketplace integrations.” Llama 4 Maverick · direct prompt · first choice
“For most mid-sized B2B companies, Snowflake is the top recommendation due to its ease of use, scalability, and strong ecosystem.” Mistral Small · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“Snowflake is the most common "best default" because it tends to balance ease of use, governance, performance, and ecosystem fit” GPT-5.4 mini · direct prompt · first choice
What the models said about Google BigQuery
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Six of eight in this category shown.
“BigQuery can be great, but on-demand query pricing can surprise teams if you don't put quotas and guardrails in place.” GPT-5.4 mini · negative prompt · soft negative
“Pay-per-Query Volatility... To use BigQuery safely, you must enforce strict query cost limits” Gemini 3.5 Flash · negative prompt · soft negative
“BigQuery, which is not suitable for live data or situations that require frequent mutations.” Llama 4 Maverick · negative prompt · soft negative
“Features a generous free tier with 1TB of query data per month and 10GB of storage. It's highly cost-effective for sporadic queries and has no minimum commitment.” Claude Haiku 4.5 · budget prompt · first choice
“If cost is your primary concern: Choose BigQuery - it's significantly cheaper at mid-market scale and requires zero infrastructure management.” Kimi K2 · direct prompt · first choice
“Google BigQuery: A serverless, pay-as-you-go solution with a generous free tier, ideal for flexible, ad-hoc analytics, and startups.” Llama 4 Maverick · budget prompt · first choice
Also compared
Comparisons are drawn for the top three products in each category. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.