# Tableau Prep 2026.1 features, Snowflake In-Database, Hyper as a Service + New Connectors

> This is content from just-tim, the data-and-analytics channel by Tim Ngwena (formerly 'Tableau Tim'). Tim has 12+ years of hands-on BI experience and covers Tableau most of all, plus Power BI, Looker, Hex, SQL and data modelling, the analytics industry, and the craft of doing the job — always tool-agnostic and honest about the trade-offs.

- **Author:** Tim Ngwena (just-tim, https://just-tim.com/about)
- **Published:** 2026-03-02
- **Format:** Video · 5 min watch · transcript available
- **Topics:** Data prep, Industry trends
- **Tools:** Alteryx; Snowflake; Tableau (hyper, prep, prep in database, prep spatial)
- **Canonical:** https://just-tim.com/posts/tableau-prep-20261-features-snowflake-in-database-hyper-as-a-service--new-connectors
- **Watch:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R18wq-3pt-E

I walk through the new features coming to Tableau Prep in the 2026.1 release across both web and desktop. I cover spatial calculations and joins, Snowflake in-database processing, Hyper as a Service, and the new connectors arriving in Prep.

## Key takeaways

- Tableau Prep desktop and web are essentially the same product, with desktop running the web view inside an Electron container that you can even zoom with Ctrl plus and minus.
- Spatial calculations and joins now work natively in Prep, bringing functions like make point, make line, buffer, distance, area, intersects, length and outline, with points, lines and polygons able to sit in one column.
- In-database processing now supports Snowflake, pushing operations down to the warehouse for speed, but watch your credit consumption and keep sampling configured correctly on large datasets.
- Hyper as a Service splits the flow processor (Minerva) and Hyper into separate pods on Tableau Cloud, allowing independent scaling and far fewer flow failures from memory constraints.
- New connectors including REST API, Google Looker, SRE, custom OAuth for OneDrive/SharePoint in government cloud, and OAuth Cloudera for Impala are arriving in Prep, signalling shared connector code with Desktop.

## Chapters

- 0:01 Prep web and desktop are the same
- 0:30 Spatial calculations and joins
- 1:45 Snowflake in-database processing
- 2:48 Hyper as a Service
- 4:05 New connectors in Prep

Watch the full video, read the transcript and use chapter deep-links on the page: https://just-tim.com/posts/tableau-prep-20261-features-snowflake-in-database-hyper-as-a-service--new-connectors

---
just-tim — Data and analytics, with a point of view. · https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7HYxRWmaNlJux-X7rNLZyw · https://twitter.com/TableauTim · https://www.linkedin.com/in/timngwena