Skills
What skills do business analyst jobs ask for?
On this page
Short answer
SQL comes first. Of 1,309 live business analyst roles on realanalystjobs.com on 11 October 2026, 383 name the tools they want, and the most common are SQL (69%), Python (36%) and Power BI (31%). Power BI and Tableau: Power BI leads (31% against 28% for Tableau).
What business analyst postings ask for
Every role on the board whose title contains business analyst was counted, worldwide. A tool counts when the listing names it; the table also shows the share for all 5,737 analyst roles, so you can see what is specific to this job.
| Tool | Roles | Share | All analyst roles |
|---|---|---|---|
| SQL | 263 | 69% | 74% |
| Python | 138 | 36% | 56% |
| Power BI | 118 | 31% | 27% |
| Tableau | 107 | 28% | 31% |
| R | 54 | 14% | 14% |
| Looker | 53 | 14% | 16% |
| dbt | 14 | 4% | 10% |
Tools named in business analyst roles (383 roles that list tools). Shares are of roles whose listing names at least one tool. Excel is left out because the board's Excel tag overcounted until October 2026.
How business analyst jobs differ from other analyst jobs
Python shows up less often: 36% of business analyst roles against 56% of analyst roles overall.
dbt shows up less often: 4% of business analyst roles against 10% of analyst roles overall.
SQL shows up less often: 69% of business analyst roles against 74% of analyst roles overall.
What to learn first
The work is requirements, process mapping and stakeholder sign-off, so writing and facilitation carry as much weight as tools.
SQL still helps: it lets you check a requirement against the data yourself instead of waiting on an engineer.
Learn one BI tool to show results. Backlog tools such as Jira and Confluence are worth knowing; they are not in our tool counts.
Where these jobs are
The countries with the most business analyst roles are United States (241), France (225), India (156) and United Kingdom (88). Employers with the most open: Talan (84), capco (69), Sopra Steria (55), Nagarro (40) and AtriaGroupLLC (37).
5% are entry level and 6% are remote.
Where the numbers come from
Every number on this page is computed from the live analyst roles on realanalystjobs.com on 11 October 2026, read from the employers' own career pages and re-checked daily, and it updates as roles open and close. H-1B figures come from the USCIS H-1B Employer Data Hub (data as of 2026-06-30). Nothing is estimated or projected.
Frequently asked
Do business analysts need Python?
Python is named in 36% of business analyst listings that name tools, against 56% across all analyst roles. SQL is named in 69%.
Is Power BI or Tableau more common in business analyst jobs?
Power BI leads (31% against 28% for Tableau), counted across 383 business analyst roles that name tools.
How many business analyst jobs are open?
1,309 live roles at 399 companies on realanalystjobs.com on 11 October 2026, 256 of them first seen in the last 7 days.
See the roles
Browse every live analyst role.
Pulled from company career pages, re-checked daily. Free to browse.
