Moving and transforming data on Snowflake: Streams and Tasks, Dynamic Tables, Snowpipe, and where each one earns its keep.
Snowflake Iceberg tables store data in open Apache Iceberg format in your own cloud storage, so Snowflake bills zero storage and other engines can read it. The catch: only Snowflake-managed catalog tables get full platform support, external-catalog tables lose clustering, cloning, and replication.
Openflow is Snowflake's managed data integration service, built on Apache NiFi, that moves structured and unstructured data from any source into Snowflake. It runs in two modes: inside Snowflake on container services, or in your own cloud VPC, and each bills and isolates differently.
Dynamic Tables let you declare a SELECT and a target lag and let Snowflake refresh it; Streams and Tasks give you imperative control. Dynamic Tables bottom out at a 60-second minimum lag, so sub-minute freshness still means Snowpipe Streaming or Tasks.