Spotfire end users connect to Spotfire Server using either an installed client or a web client.

Spotfire Analyst is a fully-featured client for working with data sources and creating complex analyses. It is installed on a user's local computer. See the Spotfire Analyst User's Guide for more information.

To make it possible to view or create interactive analyses in a web browser, a Web Player service must be installed on the server. Depending on which licenses a user has, the web client will have different capabilities. With a Consumer license, users can view and interact with analyses that others have created for them. With the Business Author license, it is also possible to create and edit analyses in the web client, even though not all of the functionality from the installed client is available. See the Spotfire Business Author and Consumer User's Guide for more information about which features are available in the web clients.