BIRT is an open source technology platform used to create data visualizations and reports, which can be embedded into rich client, and web applications. Developers who use BIRT Report Designer are able to access information from multiple data sources easily and quickly in order to create reports and applications that encompass stunning data visualizations.

The developers behind BIRT, Actuate, provide a free report server, BIRT iHub F-Type, to deploy BIRT content, so developers don't have to build their own infrastructure. Developers working with open source BIRT can now leverage this free enterprise-grade server to generate, manage, and securely deliver BIRT reports and web applications.

With a flexible Open Data Access framework, developers can write custom data drivers to access data from any source, including Big Data sources such as Apache Hadoop, Cassandra, and MongoDB, along with all traditional relational databases, Flat Files, XML data streams, and data stored in proprietary systems.

As the system has been built for embedding, BIRT includes APIs for data access, chart generation, output formats, content execution, and integration within larger applications.