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Microsoft Power BI

Microsoft Power BI

Overview

What is Microsoft Power BI?

Microsoft Power BI is a visualization and data discovery tool from Microsoft. It allows users to convert data into visuals and graphics, visually explore and analyze data, collaborate on interactive dashboards and reports, and scale across their organization with built-in…

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Recent Reviews

Power Packed Microsoft Power BI

8 out of 10
October 04, 2023
I used Microsoft Power BI for regular data analysis and report generation.
I use to deal with a lot of financial data and Microsoft Power …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 29 features
  • Customizable dashboards (138)
    8.0
    80%
  • Drill-down analysis (138)
    7.2
    72%
  • Report sharing and collaboration (134)
    7.0
    70%
  • Formatting capabilities (137)
    6.4
    64%

Reviewer Pros & Cons

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Pricing

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Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://powerbi.microsoft.com/en…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Starting price (does not include set up fee)

  • $10 per month per user
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Product Demos

Microsoft Power BI Guided Tour

powerbi.microsoft.com
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Features

BI Standard Reporting

Standard reporting means pre-built or canned reports available to users without having to create them.

7.2
Avg 8.2

Ad-hoc Reporting

Ad-Hoc Reports are reports built by the user to meet highly specific requirements.

7
Avg 8.1

Report Output and Scheduling

Ability to schedule and manager report output.

7.8
Avg 8.4

Data Discovery and Visualization

Data Discovery and Visualization is the analysis of multiple data sources in a search for patterns and outliers and the ability to represent the data visually.

7.5
Avg 8.1

Access Control and Security

Access control means being able to determine who has access to which data.

8.2
Avg 8.6

Mobile Capabilities

Support for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.

7.9
Avg 8.0

Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding

APIs are a set of routines, protocols, and tools for used for embedding one application in another

8.4
Avg 7.9
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Product Details

What is Microsoft Power BI?

Power BI: Comprehensive Business Intelligence Platform


Capabilities:

  • Discover Insights with AI: Utilizes advanced data-analysis tools, AI features, and a report-creation tool to transform complex data into accessible visuals, making it easier to uncover valuable insights.

  • Consolidate Data with OneLake: Integrates datasets from diverse sources into OneLake, creating a centralized, reliable source of truth for data. This integration reduces data duplication and simplifies analysis.

  • Drive Decision-Making: Infuse actionable insights into everyday applications like Microsoft 365, enhancing decision-making processes across the organization.

  • Empower Data Teams with Microsoft Fabric: Revolutionizes organization's data management and usage by incorporating Microsoft Fabric into the Power BI experience.


Key Differentiators:

  • Scalability: Power BI offers exceptional scalability, capable of transforming petabytes of data and supporting thousands of users without compromising performance.

  • Integration with Microsoft Ecosystem: Seamlessly embed and share insights across Microsoft services like Teams, PowerPoint, Excel, and the Power Platform, ensuring coherent and unified data handling.

  • Advanced AI Capabilities: Features AI tools that automatically find patterns, generate reports, and provide insights, enhancing efficiency and accuracy.

  • Robust Data Governance: Ensures data security and compliance with Microsoft's comprehensive governance and protection measures.


Copilot in Power BI:

  • Efficient Report Generation: Generates reports rapidly using conversational language. Copilot in Power BI enables quick creation of DAX calculations, summaries, and tailored reports.


Integration with Microsoft Fabric:

  • Enhanced Accessibility: Allows interaction with reports and data across Microsoft Fabric workloads, even for users without paid licenses.

  • OneLake Data Hub: Facilitates the connection and curation of data from varied sources, promoting efficient data engineering.


Power BI PRO:

  • Self-Service Analytics: License individuals for self-service analytics, enabling them to publish and share reports, fostering a culture of self-service BI.


Free Account Options:

  • Power BI Desktop & Free Trial: Offers a free app for data connection, modeling, and visualization, along with an easy-to-use report canvas.

  • Comprehensive Training: Access step-by-step Microsoft training courses to fully leverage Power BI capabilities.


Key Benefits:


  • Unified Data Management: Connect disparate data sources to establish a governed, unified source of truth.

  • Empower All Users: Ensures accessibility and ease of use for everyone, supported by free training resources and numerous accessibility features.

  • Immediate Start: Quickly begin with report creation, AI-generated reports, and a wide range of templates.

  • Customer Engagement: Enhance user engagement in apps by embedding Power BI reports.



Microsoft Power BI Features

BI Platform Features

  • Supported: Administration via Windows App
  • Supported: Administration via Web Interface
  • Supported: Live Connection to External Data
  • Supported: Snapshot of External Data
  • Supported: In-memory data model
  • Supported: OLAP (Pre-processed cube representation)
  • Supported: ROLAP (SQL-layer querying)
  • Supported: Multi-Data Source Reporting (Blending)
  • Supported: Data warehouse / dictionary layer
  • Supported: ETL Capability

Supported Data Sources Features

  • Supported: MS Excel Workbooks
  • Supported: Text Files (CSV, etc)
  • Supported: Oracle
  • Supported: MS SQL Server
  • Supported: IBM DB2
  • Supported: Postgres
  • Supported: MySQL
  • Supported: ODBC
  • Supported: Cloudera Hadoop
  • Supported: Hortonworks Hadoop
  • Supported: EMC Greenplum
  • Supported: IBM Netezza
  • Supported: HP Vertica
  • Supported: ParAccel
  • Supported: SAP Hana
  • Supported: Teradata
  • Supported: Sage 500
  • Supported: Salesforce
  • Supported: SAP
  • Supported: Google Analytics

BI Standard Reporting Features

  • Supported: Pixel Perfect reports
  • Supported: Customizable dashboards
  • Supported: Report Formatting Templates

Ad-hoc Reporting Features

  • Supported: Drill-down analysis
  • Supported: Formatting capabilities
  • Supported: Predictive modeling
  • Supported: Integration with R or other statistical packages
  • Supported: Report sharing and collaboration

Report Output and Scheduling Features

  • Supported: Publish to Web
  • Supported: Publish to PDF
  • Supported: Output Raw Supporting Data
  • Supported: Report Versioning
  • Supported: Report Delivery Scheduling
  • Supported: Delivery to Remote Servers

Data Discovery and Visualization Features

  • Supported: Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)
  • Supported: Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization
  • Supported: Predictive Analytics
  • Supported: Support for Machine Learning models
  • Supported: Pattern Recognition and Data Mining
  • Supported: Integration with R or other statistical packages

Access Control and Security Features

  • Supported: Multi-User Support (named login)
  • Supported: Role-Based Security Model
  • Supported: Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)
  • Supported: Report-Level Access Control
  • Supported: Table-Level Access Control (BI-layer)
  • Supported: Field-Level Access Control (BI-layer)
  • Supported: Single Sign-On (SSO)

Mobile Capabilities Features

  • Supported: Responsive Design for Web Access
  • Supported: Mobile Application
  • Supported: Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile

Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding Features

  • Supported: REST API
  • Supported: Javascript API
  • Supported: Java API
  • Supported: Themeable User Interface (UI)

Microsoft Power BI Screenshots

Screenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Turns insights into impact for business usersScreenshot of Power BI integrates easily with Microsoft 365Screenshot of Microsoft Power BI - AI-Powered CapabilitiesScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Copilot can be used to create reportsScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Data HubScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Scales as organizational needs growScreenshot of Microsoft Power BI - Data Governance

Microsoft Power BI Competitors

Microsoft Power BI Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise, Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsWindows
Mobile ApplicationApple iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Mobile Web
Supported CountriesAsia Pacific, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Europe, France, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Norway, South Africa, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States
Supported LanguagesArabic, Basque - Basque, Bulgarian - Български, Catalan - català, Chinese (Simplified) - 中文(简体), Chinese (Traditional) - 中文(繁體), Croatian - hrvatski, Czech - čeština, Danish - dansk, Dutch - Nederlands, English - English, Estonian - eesti, Finnish - suomi, French - français, Galician - galego, German - Deutsch, Greek - Ελληνικά, Hebrew, Hindi - हिंदी, Hungarian - magyar, Indonesian - Bahasa Indonesia, Italian - italiano, Japanese - 日本語, Kazakh - Қазақ, Korean - 한국어, Latvian - latviešu, Lithuanian - lietuvių, Malay - Bahasa Melayu, Norwegian (Bokmål) - norsk (bokmål), Polish - Polski, Portuguese (Brazil) - Português, Portuguese (Portugal) - português, Romanian - română, Russian - Русский, Serbian (Cyrillic) - српски, Serbian (Latin) - srpski, Slovak - slovenčina, Slovenian - slovenski, Spanish - español, Swedish - svenska, Thai - ไทย, Turkish - Türkçe, Ukrainian - українська, Vietnamese - Tiếng Việt

Frequently Asked Questions

Microsoft Power BI is a visualization and data discovery tool from Microsoft. It allows users to convert data into visuals and graphics, visually explore and analyze data, collaborate on interactive dashboards and reports, and scale across their organization with built-in governance and security.

Microsoft Power BI starts at $10.

Tableau Cloud, Looker, and Domo are common alternatives for Microsoft Power BI.

Reviewers rate Javascript API highest, with a score of 9.6.

The most common users of Microsoft Power BI are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(1781)

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(76-100 of 140)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is being used to create dashboards and company data reports. Currently, it is used in the financial and IT areas. We are working on planning to have a vision of what is to come, planning everything about the company through the visual representation of these sensitive data. And with it, the tool can generate great visualizations that we can take to meetings.
  • Similar to office 365 applications such as Excel and Access, that is, it facilitates the usability of those who already have advanced knowledge of these tools.
  • Optimal ways of presenting data.
  • Data collect.
  • Control panel.
  • Sometimes the table relationship is not no simple to set up.
  • Certain elements are very limited, in the visual part mainly.
  • The tool is unnecessary in relation to the panel interface compared to Tableau.
The recommendation for a company would be that with this free/low-cost tool for desktop it can help a lot in making decisions and thereby get a result that you can visualize if your company is on the right path. The user will also get some more creativity about the creation of the panels.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Currently, Microsoft Power BI is being used by some departments on our organization. Basically, the financial department, and the IT department. Microsoft Power BI is very useful to build numerous dashboards in order to support post-data gathering for all core processes. Furthermore, Microsoft Power BI can build many possible charts. We can use them to show information or even full interactive presentations, that in Microsoft Excel we could not do. Microsoft Power BI has integration with the other Microsoft business tools, and this is really helpful.
  • The cost of it, really affordable.
  • Power BI has a great integration with other tools like Office 365, Azure, etc.
  • Navigation is very similar to Microsoft Excel, so if you are already acquainted with Excel, you'll have no problems with BI.
  • Great variety of chart types, I think it is around sixteen different ones.
  • If you are not a Microsoft Excel power user, it can be a little challenging to use.
  • Slow performance if you have a huge amount of data to analyze.
  • Has a very bulky user interface.
Just like Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Power BI has many types of graphs and charts, but when it comes to creating a tableau of information, the data can be transformed into maps and gauges. There is even a KPI visualization and one called R visualization. Of course, the scenario in which the user has advanced experience in Microsoft Excel is the best scenario—Power BI makes data analysis extremely easy for them. And more, you can see the raw data behind the visualization opening Excel.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is used across the whole organization. Although our company uses many BI tools, there is currently a project to consolidate tools and make Power BI our official BI tool. It's used across each department to provide analytics and insight into each department's OKRs. Our IT team has a specific division that is the main driver behind adoption and consulting on dashboarding for each department.
  • Ability to build visuals with drag-and-drop makes creating dashboards easy for beginners
  • Great training materials and videos online for self-training
  • Ability to work across Microsoft's other platforms
  • Easy sharing of dashboards and built in "usage metrics"
  • Moving reports between the desktop version and Power BI can be cumbersome and lead to multiple versions
Power BI is a really good value for your money and I think it is well suited to all scenarios. In the age of data, we can glean metrics from ANYTHING and having PowerBi allows a quick return on your investment. You can very quickly create valuable visuals and dashboards. I went from never having used the software to a power user very quickly, just by viewing the robust training videos and instructions provided by Microsoft.
Maria Carver | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Great platform for data visualization and data analyzes. The organization is migrating to Power BI because of its integration with Microsoft applications. R is very well integrated with Power BI which makes statistical modelling easier to use. Report generation and sharing has become very simple. Very useful to create dashboards for the top management to make data driven business decisions.
  • Intuitive and User-Friendly
  • R Statistical Modelling modules integrated
  • Very well integrated with Microsoft applications.
  • Not very easy to make custom graphs and charts
  • Requires some time to get used to the interface
  • Documentation can be more detailed
For generating value out of data, the dashboards are very intuitive and showcases a great volume of data. Very easy to make decisions out of it. Also, report generation and sharing has become very easy which makes it easier for the top management. Production reports are generated daily, weekly, monthly and yearly.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is used as an official data visualization solution and all departments have the ability to implement it. It is an important piece of our digital and analytics journey and Power BI is supporting this journey enabling better user experience and powerful dashboards with charts and KPIs. We are improving our operational efficiency and decision-making process.
  • Easy-to-use and straight forward design - decreasing onboarding and training efforts.
  • Powerful features - you can either work on standard reports or advanced analytics capabilities. Power Pivot enables quick merge of data from various sources.
  • Integration with Microsoft stack and suite - great upside as most of the things currently are based on Microsoft (Office 365, Azure cloud and others).
  • Some type of data entry, like forms, could be improved. They are not easy to use and flexible.
  • Overall cost is higher than other suites and products regarding data visualization.
It is really well suited if you want to build dashboards and data visualization with metrics, KPIs and charts, but it's not suitable if you want to build a complete portal, for example. If you want to aggregate other features and functions which are basic elements of a software (data entry, workflows and etc.) you need to consider also other development solutions and techniques.
Scott Herring | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We have just begun working with Power BI to do some data analysis of our student enrollment and certain operational benchmarks related to program participation and school safety.
  • Ease of constructing graphs.
  • Always updated visuals being offered.
  • Variety of data sources to be able to pull data.
  • Does not allow for parameters to be passed to the system as part of a user interaction.
  • Cannot share data to our shareholders that are outside of our domain.
  • Is not yet a complete solution. Still using other reporting tools in addition.
Quick visual representation of datasets is the strong point here when working with reasonable sized files.
Large dataset files are problematic in quickly giving that representation due to application limitations.
Internal operations being guided by the dashboards is a well suited scenario, but as is the case when working in a collaborative environment, external users will lack your functionality that you have internally.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Our Company is a Microsoft shop so naturally, we use all products from Microsoft. Microsoft Power BI is being used in all levels and all departments in my organizations. In our department alone, every team has on average of 5 power BI reports that we actively use everyday. We have created Power BI reports that are also consumed by the E class. The visual aspect of this tool is the most interesting part of the value it brings in providing information. As a Microsoft shop, we use Excel and have been creating enormous amount of reports from it. Because of this the transition to Power BI was not prolonged but rather adopted rather rapidly. Today we have training sessions, Knowledge articles and access to the experts when it comes to doing things thru Power BI. Although we do use other enterprise level reporting tools, power BI Is the most widely used in our company.
  • It is a great tool for Visualization.
  • Microsoft always brings monthly updates to this tool. It is great to see the new features and functionalities that are being added constantly.
  • Power BI is an excellent tool to create all kinds of reports and data visualization. It can go from very simple reports to complex ones.
  • There are enormous amount of Knowledge articles , YouTube videos and the support community to answer any question one has on Power BI. This makes life much easier.
  • Compared to Tableau, it feels like Power BI can improve on the new templates for visualization.
Microsoft Power BI may not be suitable for information and reports where governed data is paramount. For instance, statutory reports or information that is needed by the regulatory or government body may not be suitable thru Power BI. For day to day business, there is no other better alternative than Power BI. For instance, to see the status reports to run your departments business, Power BI is a great choice.
Peter Baker | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We built out numerous dashboards in order to support the analysis post-data gathering for all our core discovery methodologies.

This allowed us to quickly spin up are variable data sets mid- and or post-project in order to start validating results and identify areas required for cleaning etc. prior to analysis and presentation back to our clients with the results.

The free visual market place really helped bolster the initially limiting range of visualizations it comes with out of the box.
  • Data Links, Visual Aid, and Wizard make the process very simple. We found we needed a two-way link 99% of the time but the default was a one-way link that needs changing each time you import etc.
  • Terminology and usability are similar to Excel and Access making it easy to pick up and start creating for most advanced users of those applications.
  • Very powerful out of the box, and even when using the free service it is incredibly capable if working on smaller data sets.
  • Limited visualizations out of the box, market place does help improve this.
  • Some visuals, such as maps, are a bit limiting by default
  • Method of creation is very different from Tableau or Spotfire increasing learning time when switching platforms.
  • Many statistical elements cannot be visualized or calculated such as Confidence Levels, Intervals etc. This must be added.
This is probably my favorite BI platform I have used to date. It feels a bit younger though, missing some features other platforms have. However, it makes up for this with its low price point for small businesses and great feature set that allows easy elimination of bugs and errors in your dashboards through to the ability to layer visuals on top of each other to get around things like limited numbers of Axis in certain visuals.

There are a few things you have to tweak constantly, tucked away in dropdown menus, that could be much more intuitive actions by clicking on components in visuals, like changing a title, axis name, etc. But the foundations are solid.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Our organization uses Power BI across the organization and globally to our network of partners. Several problems were addressed by implementing Power BI.
  1. Report building: Reports can now be built by anyone in the organization with access to the data source where previously it required a developer.
  2. Time required: Along the same lines, the time required to release a new report or update an existing report has decreased significantly and can usually be done the same day.
  3. Embedding: Reports needed to be embedded in our partner portal and allow filtering based on the user so that we're showing the right data to the right people.
  4. One-off reports: There used to be an alarming number of requests for one time or monthly or weekly reports that were manually generated. The data is now accessible via Power BI in a controlled way that allows our users to find their own insights in the data.
  • Easy to build the reports you need. Allows users with any level of experience to start building reports.
  • Users can interact with reports in a natural way allowing them to start using the reports with no/little training or guidance.
  • Powerful enough to handle any report from any data source and size.
  • Secure handling of data and able to ensure the right data is visible to the right people.
  • Large community of users and resources.
  • Greater flexibility in formatting the look and feel or reports and dashboards.
  • Embedding Dashboards the way reports can be embedded.
Power BI is the best / easiest option when:
  1. You want to be able to leverage non-development staff to author reports
  2. You need to be able to embed your reports
  3. You need security around the data you are presenting
  4. You need to be able to access a wide variety of data sources
  5. You want to have access to a large online community for support/learning
Microsoft Power BI may not be the best choice if you have a limited dataset, few reports you are interested in, don't require much functionality in the report, and don't have resources familiar with Power BI.
Jewemars Christian Riano | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power Business Intelligence is being used as a tool for monitoring critical systems, capacity, and system behaviors. It is an essential tool for daily monitoring and operations, it is being widely used in our company as a tool to keep track of data and make sensible data. It also gives us the opportunity to create great visualizations and pleasing presentations in meetings or in data tracking.
  • Visualization
  • Data gathering
  • Dashboard
  • Functionality
  • Integration
  • Visualization Tools
I would recommend this based on the free use of Power BI desktop for personal usage, practice in data analytics and understanding of data structure. It can help a business in operating its daily business or business critical decision also allows users to have a creative aspect in terms of design and structuring of dashboards.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are a software development company with a Business Intelligence and Analytics arm. We work with our clients and try to solve their business problems. Sometimes this involves deploying Microsoft Power BI solutions.
  • Quick turnaround to model the art of what's possible.
  • Quickly connect to any data source and provide data modeling and transformations.
  • Lots of the out-of-the-box visualizations do a good job of showing our clients their data in a different and useful way.
  • Business-to-client offerings fall short. The pricing tier of exposing clients' information from a B2C standpoint scares some of our clients away. We end up proposing a competitor to Power BI as a solution when this arises.
  • Lack of governance can lead to citizen "BI" developers creating data models that don't present accurate data.
  • Pricing, as mentioned above. The PowerBI Pro, used for internal enterprise consumption, is priced well. However, if you want to deploy a solution from a B2C standpoint, PowerBI is not a good choice for smaller clients.
Microsoft Power BI excels in enterprise analytics and reporting. The quick ability to show end users the art of what's possible with their data gets our clients interested.
Maria Piccoli | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is used across departments. The IT department checks all the helpdesk incoming calls/emails.The web analytics have dashboards for customer searches and location. The sales department reports on profit and forecasting.
  • Easy to use
  • Good presentation possibilities
  • Easy to connect to different sources
  • A better way to set up relationships between tables, such as allowing secondary relationships to be active
Power BI is suited for almost every situation - from web analysis to booking/revenue review. Power BI has been used in every department. It is easy to set up connections to different sources and build dashboards with different data views.
Mathieu Gaouette | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is being used to build dashboards and reports. It is used mainly by the marketing department as far as I know but I really wouldn't be surprised that it is being used in other departments. It allows us to have an insight into our business through the visual representation of our data. With this new breed of "reporting tool" (like Tableau software), we are able to simplify the data to allow easy communication to higher management. Power BI helps management make business decisions based on data (ex, whether to close or open branches based on customers in a region, launch refinancing campaign in regions where the mortgage to value rate is low, etc.).
  • Power BI has a step by step approach to integrating data that makes it really easy to get exactly what you want out of your raw data. If you do one manipulation wrong, you can see it right away with the preview.
  • Power BI already contains a wide variety of visual objects you can use but you can also create your own if you have a specific need. Mind you, this will require some node.js knowledge but there are a lot of available tutorials online.
  • The access to the software is extremely easy for people in any organisation as the base software is free (The Author version). It is limited slightly in terms of collaboration and refresh capacity but is perfect for evaluation or one time data analysis.
  • The pricing for pro is a subscription format which I personally dislike. It is also heavily focused on cloud deployment which is probably fine for most of the people but if you need a solution installed on-premise, this solution could be a little more complex (at least it seemed like it to me when we talked about it).
  • I've had a lot of Tableau users telling me that the dashboards created with Power BI weren't as pretty as Tableau. I have to agree that Tableau does have a better look but I never saw Power BI as being a big step down. I just felt I had to have it as more than one person told me the same thing.
Do:
  • One time data analysis/reporting where you want to have some visual representations to help you understand your data.
  • Create dashboards that can help you take business decisions and just generally help you know if your business is on track.
  • With a pro license: deploy dashboards that can be consumed by other users.
Don't
  • Use a Pro install for regulatory reports (Static reports should be created with a reporting tool if available to avoid duplicating tools and costs).
  • Deploy at large (anyone can have it installed) if data governance is important in your organization. It should really be a tool used by people that really understand the data and how to merge it (integrating different sources).
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is being used across the organization. Data can be fed in and reports and visualizations can be accessed with ease by other colleagues.
  • Visualization.
  • Report generation.
  • Ease of use - no need for hard-core coding.
  • Limitations on the input file size.
  • Sharing visualizations with external parties, eg consultants.
It is handy for projects where different groups of people may want to analyze/visualize different aspects of the data. Visualizations can be changed on the fly simply by clicking around, so it's good for projects involving audiences who don't need coding experience to size up the data. It is however not so good at handling gigantic/complex datasets.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft Power BI is currently in use by departments who really want to dig into their data and give additional meaning to what they typically might see on a spreadsheet. It is not in use across the entire organization here, but rather by individual departments who have taken some initiative to get more out of their data. The big problem it addresses is the ability to visualize large complex data sets in simple, easy to read ways.
  • It integrates easily with other applications, especially true of Microsoft products.
  • No specialized technical training needed to get using it quickly.
  • A simple learning curve for people used to a Microsoft environment, familiar feel.
  • There are only a few data sources that permit real-time connections to reports
  • Limit of 1GB per dataset.
  • On-prem installs of the product are very expensive.
Microsoft BI is well suited for a small or large department that really wants to get into the details of their data. It is not that difficult to set up, and it is easy for those coming from a Microsoft background. The downside is the cost, especially for on-prem installs. It is not cheap to host your own instance.
Toby Wenzel | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are fairly new to Power BI, and it's being evaluated by our development team. I've tested the product on a couple of items, and am pretty impressed with how easy it is to figure out without help. I quickly created some easy to read graphs from an Excel spreadsheet. I will be testing more when I have free time.
  • Provide quick graphs from spreadsheet data
  • It's pretty easy to learn how to use the product without help
  • It calculates data and gives suggestions for use
  • I'm not sure it needs a lot of improvement, but I guess it could provide some clear suggestions when you first start using the product
  • It could be a no-cost option with our Microsoft portfolio
  • It could give more suggestions when you are configuring items
Again, my experience has only been using it with Excel spreadsheet data, and it was really cool how fast you can create custom graphs out of simple cells of data.
Francois Salvert | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is mainly used in the Marketing/BI group by analysts. Its main use is to dig into various datasets in order to find answers to various questions directors and VP may ask. Power BI is not really used to produce dashboards but more for reporting (for ad-hoc queries). For example, if there is a specific promo code being used on a given day more than normal, we will use Power BI to investigate patterns from users that have entered this problematic promo code to see if it's legit or not.
  • Easily connect to multiple databases or cloud solutions.
  • Possibility to modify datasets or change formatting in Power BI vs having to modify data at the source.
  • Since Power BI can cache locally some of the data, it's possible to continue working offline on datasets.
  • A bit heavy to run and not that intuitive compared to other tools.
  • Dashboarding is really a pain compared to other tools and the visualization provided with the tool are not what you should expect.
  • Very very frequent updates that require you to reinstall the software almost on a monthly basis. Will need admin rights from your organization.
Perfect for ad-hoc reporting but don't use this software for dashboarding automation. Klipfolio will do a better job for your dashboards.
Brian Munn | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are using Microsoft Power BI throughout or entire organization. Our finance department was the first group to start using Power BI. The ability to display the data easily and with ease of understanding is the key to Power BI. Users can quickly take data from a variety of data sources and display in an easy to read user friendly format. Power BI allows our users to see important data timely without scrolling through a bunch of Excel files.
  • Ability to connect to many different data sources and provide a easy to read graphical output.
  • There is a free version that comes with our O365 subscription that suits most cases and a paid version for the power users.
  • Many different chart types to choose from and active selection criteria makes the charts user interactive
  • Power BI lacks in its ability to integrate directly into AAD to allow you to customize reports based on logged in user.
  • Power BI has issues when trying to access multiple data sets for a report. The data needs to be manipulated outside for Power BI before being used in Power BI.
If you are a Microsoft shop and have users that live and die by Microsoft Excel, Power BI will be a great addition. It is easy to get started and provides powerful professional looking reports without a high cost associated. Power BI is a great solution and easy to implement business intelligence solution.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We started small with few key users in planning and finance areas. Now we have established a governance team and started training and deploying across different functional areas from production, planning, sales, warehouse, quality and others.
  • Easy to combine data views.
  • Dynamic filtering and across reporting objects.
  • Mobile dashboard is easy to build and use.
  • Dax queries interface is not quite simple.
  • Customizing colors and fonts could be easier.
  • Copying data models and apply to different datasets.
Microsoft Power BI can easily and efficiently replace those complex spreadsheets that all areas have and spend ton of hours every month to update with manual ERP extracts, formulas and vlookups.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is currently used by the company to introduce clients to analytics dashboarding but is also useful in creating dashboards that can be shared company wide such as staffing dashboards.
  • Office 365 package
  • Monthly updates
  • Ease of use
  • Clunky and unresponsive in some situations
  • Not very engaging or appealing to view
  • Perceived as sub-standard
Best scenario is for new users to any sort of BI. Great platform for learning and since most companies have access to it already with their O365 licenses it doesn't incur additional costs. Less appropriate when you have more advanced users that have experience with products like Tableau, which provides a more refined BI experience than power BI.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We have designed an additional layer over Atlassian JIRA and enhanced significantly analytical drilldowns in a SW development projects, software maintenance and end user support. We have also developed custom API to JIRA to efficiently gather JIRA data and process and present them in Power BI dashboards. The management was first skeptical, since the JIRA service desk team already had some reports done in the native JIRA environment. However we have convinced them that the connection of Power BI and JIRA logs makes a sense. Today it is used to visualize flow, detect anomalies (too many cycles, overused programmer resources etc.) in a perfect visual form.
  • Quick and easy dashboard deployment
  • Easy integration to existing system (both API and raw data imports were used)
  • Mobile platform (tablets) support
  • I can not think of any. Until now, all works well!
I would recommend this solution (and we have started to use it) since it is cheap. Even our developer started to use it in a cloud version before the project officially started. For a few bucks per month. So there is a really low entry barrier. Basically it will fit in a situation where you need a short development time. Not very well suited for big data analysis in production system though.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
In my current marketing firm, we have clients from all across the globe that we service. We felt the need for providing better analytics for our marketing and sales representatives. We wanted to incorporate a business intelligence tool into our enterprise to get a full 360 view of our mission critical data. Microsoft BI helped fill that role.
  • Microsoft BI integrates seamlessly with the Microsoft Office suite.
  • By using the Power Pivot and Power View it has enabled us to access and mash up data from a variety of sources. Plus it can easily be shared with other users through simple Office applications.
  • The implementation time for Microsoft BI can be fairly lengthy. Its definitely longer than some of the other products we evaluated.
  • The upfront investment in terms of capital and time is fairly large with this tool. It requires a compliant Microsoft SQL server in the back-end to leverage most of its functionality.
The Power BI Desktop and Mobile application in particular has added a lot of value for our business objectives.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft PowerBI is used by the organization to reflect the performance of sales and individual accounts. The Sales team has been using PowerBI to contact customers and reflect on their performance. It is being used to solve the problem of having near real time performance. The tool is also used to drill down on more detailed information and serves as a proxy CRM tool to retrieve additional account information (contact info).
  • Microsoft Power BI has beautiful visuals that are made in-house and externally. It really helps you develop a story.
  • Microsoft Power BI also has an easy to setup database model reader and can really help you at ease with development of buttons/controls for the end user.
  • The web portal works well and users have easy access to their sales data.
  • Using the PRO version, the data reader feeding raw data can be very slow and clunky at times.
  • Even with a node subscription, paying a lot of money, performance for loading and refreshing content on a Power BI dashboard can be very slow.
  • Power BI is a visual tool but does not have CPM functionality to add data and other parts into the data model. This is a huge portion that is lacking.
Power BI is great at dynamically reflecting real time data. It has wonderful views of data and can narrate a story that is powerful and impressive. Decisions can be made on the overall visuals shown. BI can show you where your sales are picking up while showing you areas to focus on. The quality of your BI dashboard tremendously improves with the overall quality of your incoming data. BI has great capability to share results across the organization in a secure and safe way in almost any computer platform. Mobile phones welcome too!
Angad Singh | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft Power Bi is being used by among J&J for data visualization and reporting. My team was using it to visualize and report on certain metrics from our data catalog. I'm not sure if it is used organization wide, but there are many teams in working with data that utilize it. BI makes it convenient for teams to report data to higher management by visualizing it into easy to understand representations.
  • Connectivity with Microsoft tools - As you would expect, since they are developed by the same company, BI is well integrated with the other Microsoft tools such as Excel that are ubiquitous in the workforce.
  • Price - One of the nicest things about BI is its cheap price tag, compared to to other visualization software like Tableau.
  • Excellent variety of visualizations.
  • Not Intuitive - Can be difficult to pick up. They could add tutorial videos like Tableau.
  • Not easy to use with R and Python which Tableau does well.
  • Online version could use some work. Does not allow for all features from desktop version.
Power Bi does well when working with databases to create visualizations or to report certain metrics. It would be ideal for large corporations that collect a lot of data and have to use it to improve their business. It can still be beneficial for smaller businesses and its cheap price tag makes it accessible to anyone.
Gonzalo Angeleri | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Microsoft Power BI can be used by the entire organization, however, in our experience it is mainly used in a departmental way for reporting and dashboarding. Power BI allows users to perform, in a simple way, a complete analysis of their data using different visualizations. Companies can see trends in the data and what is the best way to use them for future decisions.
  • Quick and easy dashboard development
  • Self-Service BI capabilities
  • Mobile support
  • Great amount of data visualizations
  • It is complex to secure access to data taking into account different user profiles.
  • Q&A feature needs to be improved
I would recommend this solution because it provides good analytical capabilities at a low cost. It is even evolving monthly adding new features. For users who currently use Excel, it is a very good evolution that allows you to improve the analysis and governance of the BI environment, being able to reuse the Excel spreadsheets as data sources in Power BI.
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