When comparing Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) vs HeidiSQL, the Slant community recommends HeidiSQL for most people. In the question“What are the best MySQL client applications for Windows?” HeidiSQL is ranked 1st while Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) is ranked 10th. The most important reason people chose HeidiSQL is:
Licensed under GNU GPL.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Can work for other databases if Linked Servers are used
Pro Great for SQL Server
Pro Free
Licensed under GNU GPL.
Pro Portable
Alongside the possibility of downloading the installer and sourcecode, a portable version of the software is available.
Pro Great UI and ease of use
HeidiSQL has a comprehensive and intuitive interface.
Pro Syntax completion
Pro Lightweight
Pro Great user management
The user manager of HeidiSQL can easily set privileges on a per-database level or give access to only certain commands.
Pro Data synchronization
HeidiSQL can compare and synchronize your data and structure between local and remote databases.
Pro SSH tunnel
HeidiSQL allows connecting to your MySQL database via SSH tunnel.
Pro Connect to servers via command line
You can use command line parameters to automate connections.
Pro Works fine with Wine under Linux
Cons
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.
Con Can be buggy
HeidiSQL is known to have some bugs that results in crashes.
Con Intellisense is not intelligent
No intellisense for columns unless table name is aliased.
Con UI design is very bad
Generic windows form
Con No session backup
You cannot recover your session after close or even worse crash.
Con Works under Linux only with Wine
It works quite well under Wine with Linux, but you must always take notice if the last version of HeidiSQL has been tested, for it may not run at all. There are some bugs in the Wine version that can be annoying and you have to kill the program and restart it. A native Linux version would be great.