When comparing DBeaver vs Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), the Slant community recommends DBeaver for most people. In the question“What are the best MySQL client applications for Windows?” DBeaver is ranked 3rd while Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) is ranked 10th. The most important reason people chose DBeaver is:
Supported on Windows (2000/XP/2003/Vista/7/8/10), Linux, Mac OS and Solaris (x86).
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Cross-platform
Supported on Windows (2000/XP/2003/Vista/7/8/10), Linux, Mac OS and Solaris (x86).
Pro Free
It is licensed under GPL v2.
Pro Works for many types of databases
MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL, IBM DB2, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Access, Sybase, Java DB (Derby), Firebird (Interbase), Derby (JavaDB), SQLite, Mimer, HSQLDB, H2, IBM Informix, Teradata, SAP MAX DB, Cache, Ingres, Linter, Vertica, MongoDB, Cassandra, ODBC, Any JDBC compliant data source.
Pro Follow foreign key to their primary key
If you have a table with a foreign key you can click on it to see the table row where this key references to.
Pro Formatted text view
It has the classic grid view and a well-organized text view that you can quick-select with CTRL-A.
Pro Easy to use, clean neat inteface
Pro Can work for other databases if Linked Servers are used
Pro Great for SQL Server
Cons
Con Never-ending function errors
Like, 'Communications link failure', 'Connection refused' (Community Edition 6.2.1).
Con Cannot view function
Con Trigger edition
Until version 3.5.8 you can not edit triggers, only view (since 3.5.6).
Con Bloated
SSMS eats up a lot of disk space and memory, but Microsoft seems to have addressed the issue in the newest version, quote "The current size of the bundle is less than half of what SSMS 17.x is (~400 MB). The size will eventually grow a little when the IS components are added back to SSMS, but it should not be as large as it used to be."
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/ssms/sql-server-management-studio-changelog-ssms?view=sql-server-2017
Con Doesn't natively support other databases
SSMS is aimed at SQL Server.
Use of Linked Servers will give you some access to query other types of DBs using the tool, but this is a workaround.