Telerik Reporting Alternative for .NET: Complete Guide (2026)

Why .NET Teams Are Moving Away from Telerik Reporting

Telerik Reporting (now published as part of Progress’ Telerik UI suite) has been around since the early 2000s. For years it was one of the only serious embedded reporting options for ASP.NET teams. That’s no longer true in 2026, and the licensing model that made sense when Telerik had few competitors now looks very different when evaluated against modern alternatives.

Here are the four reasons we hear most often from teams who come to us after leaving Telerik:

None of this makes Telerik Reporting a bad product — for certain use cases (especially internal developer tooling and pixel-perfect print layouts) it’s still a reasonable choice. But for teams building embedded reporting into commercial SaaS applications for end users, the tradeoffs have shifted.

What Telerik Reporting Does Well (And Where It Falls Short)

Before switching, it’s worth being honest about what you’re giving up. Telerik has real strengths worth acknowledging:

Telerik Reporting Strengths

• Mature, stable product with a long track record in enterprise .NET applications
• Excellent pixel-perfect report layout control for print-ready documents (invoices, compliance reports, etc.)
• Deep Visual Studio integration and a Windows-style report designer
• Strong export options: PDF, Excel, Word, HTML, CSV, and more
• Part of the Progress ecosystem, which many large enterprise teams already use

Where It Falls Short for Modern Teams

• No self-service report builder for end users — report design requires developers
• Per-developer seat licensing is expensive and unpredictable as teams grow
• Limited built-in multi-tenancy — requires significant custom code for SaaS apps
• Dashboard capabilities are limited compared to purpose-built embedded BI platforms
• Setup and configuration in .NET Core is considerably more complex than alternatives
• No AI-assisted query generation or natural language report creation

The fundamental issue is that Telerik Reporting was designed for a different era: developers building internal reports in classic .NET Framework apps. Modern embedded BI requirements — self-service, multi-tenancy, SaaS-friendly pricing, AI features — are a different problem set.

What to Look for in a Telerik Reporting Alternative

When evaluating replacements, these are the criteria that matter most for .NET teams building commercial applications:

Dotnet Report: Purpose-Built Embedded Reporting for .NET

Dotnet Report was designed from the ground up for teams building commercial .NET applications that need embedded reporting and self-service BI. Unlike Telerik Reporting, it was never a developer tooling product that got extended — it’s been an end-user-facing embedded BI platform from day one.

Here’s how the integration works:

After installing the NuGet package, you register two API endpoints in your .NET application. Dotnet Report calls these endpoints to resolve user permissions, tenant context, and database connections. The entire reporting engine runs inside your application — your data never touches Dotnet Report’s servers.

Key capabilities that directly address the gaps in Telerik Reporting:

• Drag-and-drop report builder for end users. Business users can create their own reports by selecting tables, adding fields, applying filters, and choosing chart types — no SQL, no developer tickets.
• Live dashboards with drag-and-drop layout. Users can assemble reports into dashboards, resize and rearrange widgets, and share dashboard views with their team.
• Built-in multi-tenancy. Configure tenant isolation so each customer sees only their own data, reports, and dashboards — with a single installation serving all tenants.
• Row-level security via forced filters. Apply mandatory filter conditions per role or user, enforced at query time, so users can never access data outside their scope even if they construct their own reports.
• Scheduled report delivery. Reports can be scheduled to run on a cron-based schedule and emailed to recipients automatically.
• AI-assisted Smart Query (Beta). Users can describe a report in plain language and let AI generate the query structure, reducing the learning curve for business users.
• Open-source frontend. The report builder and dashboard UI are open source, giving you full control over the look, feel, and branding.
• Flat annual pricing. No per-seat fees. No runtime royalties. One flat annual license regardless of how many developers you have or how many users access your application.

Telerik Reporting vs. Dotnet Report: Feature Comparison

Here is a direct comparison across the capabilities that matter most for teams building embedded reporting into .NET commercial applications:

The headline difference: Telerik Reporting is a developer tool for producing reports. Dotnet Report is an embedded BI platform for end users. If your users need to create and interact with their own reports — which is the standard expectation in 2026 — that distinction matters enormously.

How to Migrate from Telerik Reporting (Step by Step)

Most teams complete a Telerik-to-Dotnet Report migration in 2–4 weeks. Here’s what that process looks like in practice.

Step 1: Audit Your Current Report Inventory

Before writing any code, document every report in your Telerik implementation. Create a spreadsheet listing each report’s name, the data source it queries, who uses it, and how often. Pull usage logs if you have them.

In most applications, 20–30% of reports are rarely or never used. Identifying this now lets you skip migrating dead weight and focus your energy on what actually matters.

Step 2: Install Dotnet Report and Connect Your Database

Install the NuGet package in your .NET project:

Register the required API endpoints. These give Dotnet Report a way to resolve the current user’s identity, roles, and database connection — so your security model controls what data is accessible. Connect the same database(s) that Telerik was querying.

At this point you can open the Dotnet Report admin panel, browse your tables, and start building your first report. The connection to your data is live.

Step 3: Recreate Your Top 10 Reports First

Resist the urge to migrate everything at once. Identify the 10 reports your users rely on most and recreate them first using the drag-and-drop builder. For most reports, this takes minutes — select your tables, add fields, apply filters, choose a visualization.

For more complex reports involving stored procedures, calculated fields, or pivots: these are all supported. Set aside more time for these, but don’t let them block the initial rollout.

Step 4: Configure Security, Roles, and Multi-Tenancy

Replicate your security model in Dotnet Report. Set up roles with access to specific data sources. Configure forced filters — these are conditions applied at query time, invisibly to the user, that restrict what data they can see regardless of what reports they build.

If you’re running a multi-tenant SaaS application, configure tenant isolation: each tenant gets their own workspace with separate database connection strings, their own report library, and independent permissions. Other tenants’ data is completely inaccessible.

Step 5: Run Parallel and Validate

With Dotnet Report running alongside Telerik, ask your power users to validate that reports return the same data. Compare outputs side-by-side for your most critical reports. Once you’re confident the data is correct and the migration is complete:

• Remove Telerik Reporting from your project dependencies
• Remove any Telerik-specific controllers or report viewer components
• Cancel your Telerik Reporting license renewal

Step 6: Announce Self-Service to Your Users

This is the part that surprises most teams: once users discover they can build their own reports without submitting tickets, adoption accelerates quickly. Schedule a short demo for your power users, show them the drag-and-drop builder, and watch the backlog of report requests shrink.

Common Questions Answered

“We have complex pixel-perfect reports. Can Dotnet Report handle them?”

Dotnet Report handles the types of reports that business users actually need: tabular reports with filters, charts, pivots, and grouped summaries. For highly complex print-layout documents — like multi-column invoice templates or compliance documents with precise formatting — Telerik Reporting or SSRS may still be a better fit for those specific documents. Many teams use Dotnet Report for the bulk of their reporting while keeping a lightweight tool for one or two specialized print documents.

“What databases are supported?”

SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, and DB2. If you’re running one of these with Telerik today, it will work with Dotnet Report without any changes to your database.

“What about our existing Telerik report definitions (.trdp/.trdx files)?”

Telerik’s report definition format is proprietary and cannot be imported directly into another tool. Reports need to be recreated using the new builder. The silver lining: the drag-and-drop builder is fast, and the most common reports take minutes to recreate. The definitions don’t migrate; the data connections do.

“Our developers are familiar with Telerik. What’s the learning curve?”

The developer integration is simpler than Telerik — two API endpoints rather than a full report designer toolchain. Your developers will spend less time on reporting infrastructure. For end users, the drag-and-drop builder is intuitive; most pick it up in a single session.

“What does it cost compared to Telerik?”

Telerik Reporting pricing is structured around developer seats, and for applications requiring runtime deployment to end users, additional royalty fees may apply. Teams migrating from Telerik to Dotnet Report typically save 60–80% on their annual reporting licensing costs. Contact us for a pricing comparison specific to your situation →

FAQ

Is Dotnet Report open source?

The frontend components — the report builder UI, dashboard builder, and viewer — are open source on GitHub. The backend NuGet package that handles query generation, security enforcement, and data access is a licensed commercial product.

Does it work with Blazor?

Yes. Dotnet Report works with ASP.NET Core MVC and Razor Pages out of the box. Blazor integration is supported via the JavaScript interop layer.

Can users export reports to PDF and Excel?

Yes. Exports to PDF, Excel, Word, and CSV are included as standard features. Users can export any report directly from the viewer interface.

How does Dotnet Report handle stored procedures?

Stored procedures can be registered as data sources in the Dotnet Report admin panel. They show up as first-class data sources in the report builder, just like tables and views.

Is there a free trial?

Yes — no credit card required. Install the NuGet package, connect your development database, and build your first report. The trial gives you the full product for 30 days. Start the free trial here →

Next Steps

If you’re evaluating alternatives to Telerik Reporting, here are three paths forward: