Our take
Pick dbt if analytics engineers who will stay on Developer Free (1 seat, 3,000 models / month, 1 project) while they open a first Explorer graph, then buy Starter at $100 / user / month when they want Catalog lineage and the Semantic Layer. Pick Hex if solo analysts who will stay on Community $0 (small compute, agent trial), then buy Professional at $36/Editor/month when they need Medium compute, Standard agent
Best for
dbt Models, jobs, and lineage you start at $0
Hex Trusted exploration you later ship as a data app
Free plan
dbt $0 · for the open-source CLI. You run the warehouse and the scheduler
Hex No free plan
Lowest paid
dbt Not published by the vendor
Hex Professional $36/mo
Coding agent
dbt
Hex Hex agent
Runs where
dbt Local or hosted
Hex
Watch out
dbt Developer Free is 1 seat, 1 project, 3,000 models / month
Hex Community is Small compute and an agent trial
Last checked
dbt 2026-10-23 · getdbt.com/pricing
Hex 2026-10-22 · hex.tech/pricing
analytics engineers who will stay on Developer Free (1 seat, 3,000 models / month, 1 project) while they open a first Explorer graph, then buy Starter at $100 / user / month when they want Catalog lineage and the Semantic Layer.
Read the dbt pagesolo analysts who will stay on Community $0 (small compute, agent trial), then buy Professional at $36/Editor/month when they need Medium compute, Standard agent credits, and 30-day history.
Read the Hex page
