Hightouch vs Matillion For ETL/ELT in 2025

Hightouch is a reverse ETL and AI platform designed for marketing and personalization, while Matillion is a cloud-native ETL/ELT platform for building and managing pipelines across cloud data platforms. In this article, we'll compare Hightouch and Matillion to see which one is the best ETL solution for a unified data warehouse.

What are Hightouch and Matillion?

Hightouch

Hightouch is a reverse ETL and AI platform crafted for marketing and personalization, allowing companies to uncover insights, execute campaigns, and develop AI agents using their data.

It features an AI Decisioning Platform for lifecycle marketing and a Composable Customer Data Platform (CDP) that is adaptable, secure, and swiftly deployable, built on top of a data warehouse.

Matillion

Matillion is a cloud-native ETL/ELT platform that empowers data teams to construct and oversee pipelines across cloud data platforms like Snowflake, Redshift, BigQuery, and Azure Synapse.

It features a low-code interface and push-down transformations for streamlined data processing.

Feature-by-Feature Breakdown: Alternatives & Competitors

Features
Sync to Warehouse (ETL/ELT)
Sync from warehouse (Reverse ETL)
Sync directly between SaaS Applications
Self-Hosted Option
High-Scale Database CDC
2-way, Read +Write Environment as Terraform
Real-time SOQL Transformations on Salesforce
Workspaces
Entity-level RBAC Permissions
Built for Enterprise Use Cases
Support Chat Reply in Minutes from Actual US-based Engineers
First-class API with Native Clients
White-label API with Auth-handling
Robust Connectors, None in Beta Version
Fast Turnaround Time on New Connectors
Straightforward Pricing (Easy to Understand)
Polytomic
Hightouch
Matillion

Compare Hightouch and Matillion

Hightouch

Matillion

Key Features

  • Sync your data using Reverse ETL
  • Focus on AI capabilities and personalized marketing
  • Start with a free tier

Key Features

  • Sync to Warehouse (ETL/ELT)
  • Contemporary User Experience

Limitations

  • Does not support syncing to data warehouses (No ETL)
  • Too many features and high pricing for just Reverse ETL
  • Does not offer unlimited workspaces

Limitations

  • Challenging version control and limited visibility of change logs
  • Outdated point-and-click interface
  • Supports only ETL, lacking Reverse ETL capabilities
  • Expensive for the features offered

Pricing

Hightouch's Starter Plan includes a free tier at $0 and a paid tier at $350 per month, billed annually with a 20% discount.

For larger teams, the Business Plan offers custom pricing tailored to specific needs, featuring unlimited user seats and advanced personalization features.

Pricing

Matillion's pricing model is consumption-based, where users buy credits that can be used for both Matillion ETL and Data Loader services, with costs influenced by virtual core hours for ETL processing and the volume of data rows for loading.

Pricing is also affected by deployment size, execution runtime, and support needs, making it flexible to accommodate different business requirements.

Reviews

Hightouch has a rating of 4.6 out of 5 stars. Some users mentioned that Hightouch can be expensive, especially for startups or when using the paid solution extensively.

There are comments about the learning curve and the need for better error handling and debugging processes. The UI is sometimes described as confusing and not very intuitive. Error reporting, especially for large batches, needs improvement. Check out more of their reviews here.

Reviews

Matillion has a rating of 4.4 out of 5 stars. Users have reported challenges with version control, particularly when merging branches, and have noted that certain components are less versatile, leading to reliance on custom SQL scripts.

Some reviews mention a steep learning curve for advanced features and limitations in testing capabilities. Check out more of their reviews here.

WHICH ONE SHOULD YOU CHOOSE?

Why customers are switching to Polytomic

Polytomic unifies ETL/ELT, Reverse ETL, and database CDC into a single platform—so your data moves in and out of the data warehouse without relying on multiple vendors.

  • Built for Data Teams: Consolidate your ETL and Reverse ETL needs with one solution. Polytomic handles high-throughput CDC streaming, full SQL transformations, and support for infrastructure-as-code.
  • RevOps and Marketing-Friendly: Launch data pipelines to your CRM and ad platforms in minutes with an intuitive UI, plus advanced tools like live SOQL transformations on Salesforce data.
  • API for AI & Product Teams: Deliver embedded customer integrations via our white-labeled native API. Polytomic supports seamless syncing into customer CRMs and data warehouses with built-in auth and integrations with the whole GTM stack.
  • Enterprise-Grade: Deploy on-prem or in the cloud, manage complex orgs with multi-tenant workspaces and fine-grained RBAC permissions, and cut costs by 30–50% through platform consolidation. Backed by fast, responsive support from real data engineers.

What is Polytomic?

Polytomic

Polytomic combines high-scale ETL, Reverse ETL, and CDC streaming in a single platform so you can move data to and from your data warehouses, databases, CRMs, finance applications, marketing tools, and APIs, without managing brittle pipelines or multiple vendors.

Data teams appreciate our single ETL platform with unified monitoring to centralize all data movement. We have full SQL support and first-class support for infrastructure-as-code.

RevOps and marketing teams use our no-code UI to quickly and independently set up syncs for product data to their CRM and ad platforms.

Built for enterprise scale, Polytomic can be self-hosted, handles billions of rows reliably, and has multi-tenant workspaces with fine-grained access controls.
Trusted by Data and ops teams
Brex
CloudTrucks
Vanta
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Mercury
Vercel
Telnyx

All the features you need, on the platform that does it all

Replace multiple vendors

Reduce costs and simplify workflows

One platform for all syncs

ETL, Reverse ETL, CDC, iPaaS, APIs, and spreadsheets

Sync only what’s changed

Save on API limits and compute costs

Point and click

Select and filter your data without writing code

SQL query support

Powerful transformations when you need them

Pull from any API

No more glue code for custom integrations

Self-hosting available

Turnkey deployment to your private cloud

Enterprise-ready

SOC 2, GDPR, permissions, and audit logs

Move data between all of your favorite tools

Sync any of your proprietary data to and from your databases, data warehouses, spreadsheets, and business systems.
See all integrations
"Polytomic’s customer support has been unbelievably great. The level of consistent, immediate responsiveness has been a huge benefit to us. It’s clear that Polytomic invests in the success of our business in a way that most companies talk about but don’t actually do. More than just support, we feel we have a thought partner."
Jonathan Krangel
Director of Revenue Operations
@Retool

Pricing begins at $500/month

Standard

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Everything in Basic, plus:

  • Sync to and from databases, warehouses, spreadsheets, apps, and APIs
  • Multiple sync destinations
  • Live chat support

Enterprise

Let’s chat
Book call

Everything in Standard, plus:

  • On-prem deployment
  • Single sign-on (SSO)
  • Dedicated engineer
  • Phone support
Get hands-on with Polytomic
See how easy it is to sync data to the tools your team actually uses—no code, no waiting.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between ETL and Reverse ETL?
ETL / ELT move data into a warehouse (ETL transforms first, ELT transforms after load). Reverse ETL sends modeled warehouse data back out to SaaS apps like Salesforce so teams can act on it. Think “data warehouse as a destination” vs. “data warehouse as a source.”
How can Polytomic do both ETL and Reverse ETL when other tools can't?
Polytomic was designed from the start to do both ETL and Reverse ETL. While they are both "moving data", they require different technical architectures. WIth Polytomic, you can replace a multi-vendor stack with a single contract.
How frequent should my data syncs be?
Higher cadence means more API calls, warehouse credits, and compute, so start with the slowest interval that meets your SLA and tighten only where ROI is clear. Polytomic’s continuous mode runs as fast as every 5 minutes; for most revenue-ops or analytics cases, 15-min, 30-min, hourly, or daily schedules are cheaper and plenty fresh. We can help you determine what's best for your needs.
Why does quality of customer support matter?
When every pipeline fuels dashboards, campaigns, and revenue ops, downtime or mis-configured syncs have a direct cost. Polytomic’s proactive, engineer-led support responds in minutes to your message, not hours or days. We cut spend through proactive tuning of sync cadence and warehouse usage. We ship new connectors and features on request, quickly and reliably.
What is Fivetran?
Fivetran is a data integration platform that automatically syncs data from various sources into your data warehouse for easy analysis.