When comparing MySQL Workbench vs SQLGate, the Slant community recommends SQLGate for most people. In the question“What are the best database design programs?” SQLGate is ranked 2nd while MySQL Workbench is ranked 3rd. The most important reason people chose SQLGate is:
Functions; filter, sort and group on grid / Copy, past, sum and statistics functions like excel.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Easy to use
Actions can be directly carried out on tables. The software prepares the relevant query for approval before execution.
Pro Community version
There is a community edition available that is free and open source; licensed under GPL.
Pro EER diagramming
MySQL Workbench has enhanced entity–relationship modeling support.
Pro Cross-platform
Works on Windows, Linux, OS X.
Pro Database synchronization
Forward & reverse engeneering
Pro Quick data analysis
Functions; filter, sort and group on grid / Copy, past, sum and statistics functions like excel.
Pro Saves time with autocomplete & template functions
Pro Fast processing and easy customization
They put out weekly updates, so there are new and impressive functions being added pretty consistently.
Pro Supports cloud-based DB such as AWS & Azure
Pro Includes PL/SQL editor and debugger
Pro ER diagrams
Entity Relationship database diagrams limitations are: only supports reverse engineering, and can not export to formats other than .erd
Cons
Con Mixed experience
Doesn't support HiDPi mode on Windows, everything looks blurry. On Linux it has missing features. On Mac seems to be working just fine. But overall a mixed experience.
Con Unintuitive UI
Workbench's user interface is regarded by a lot of users as unintuitive and hard to use.
It seems cluttered and hard to get used to. The left side of the application has several sections (which you get to choose which to open) with several tools for each. A lot of features are hidden behind menus and need some getting used to find them.
Con Freezes constantly
Running any kind of query with more than a thousand records or even just opening a file and other actions crashes the application. You are unable to actually stop a query. You have to kill from Windows Task Manager every single time.
Con Logon
The logon process after starting up the application is rather long winded (tested with PostgreSQL, no defaults shown for e.g. port number).
Con Free version is limited
e.g. only 10 tables allowed in ERD designer.