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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

(1-25 of 56)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
October 13, 2023

One stop solution for your data visuluzation

Verified User
Engineer in Quality Assurance
Mechanical Or Industrial Engineering Company, 51-200 employees
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Usability
9
1. Microsoft Power BI helps a lot in every project for presenting our current status with defined goals 2. POWER BI helped with the daily monitoring activity such as yesterday's record of every employee and tracking their report against their goal.it also helped us with the final presentation of projects
August 02, 2022

Power BI - not quite there yet, but getting there.

David Shi | TrustRadius Reviewer
David Shi
Manager, Data Visualisation
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (Banking, 10,001+ employees)
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
7
For any users with a heavy background in Microsoft applications, the interface will generally be regarded as familiar but not excellent.

Functionality wise it works but is still a bit clunky, which is very typical of your average Microsoft application. Technically the product itself is excellent in that it does what you need it to, albeit sometimes in a less ideal manner compared to the likes of Tableau where the overall usability appears to take on a more user centric approach as opposed to just plugging in as many functionality as you can with [Microsoft] Power BI.
July 21, 2022

Great value. Would use again.

Scott Kennedy | TrustRadius Reviewer
Scott Kennedy
Director, eCommerce Analytics and Digital Marketing
Franklin Sports (Sporting Goods, 201-500 employees)
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
10
The usability is great. Microsoft has been in the reporting game in one way or another for many years. Think about Excel, SSRS and other products like that. The Microsoft team has a deep bench of people who understand what analysts are trying to achieve with business intelligence tools to get their jobs done.
July 12, 2022

Power BI Multi- Geo Location Architecture and Licensing Review

MS
Mahboobur Shaikat
IT Architect
Intact Financial Corporation (Insurance, 10,001+ employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Usability
9
The best feature sets available in the market provide the following: 1) SSO (single sign-on with Azure as the primary IDP) 2) Monitoring integration with Azure Sentinel and Defender for the cloud. 3) Workspace security and Power BI gateway architecture model for on-prem connections.
June 07, 2022

Best ETL and advanced data visualization tool

NC
Nagaraj C
Senior Software Engineer
KPMG (Investment Management, 10,001+ employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
10
It is the very best ETL and visualization tool available in the market with various best features. It has more than 200 plus visuals available in store not in any other BI tool. It has all most all kinds of data sources accessibility in this tool. Row-level security works best in service.
March 14, 2022

Microsoft Power BI - great tool for reports

JS
Jacek Szczepiński
Group IT Project Manager
ViaCon Group (Civil Engineering, 501-1000 employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
A great tool to work with, create different views and dimensions for the data without touching the source data. It requires a bit of time to get used to it and work with it properly. Access level and sharing could be done a bit easier - because of that a 9 instead of 10.
February 07, 2022

Microsoft Power BI Desktop is it good ?

Verified User
Manager in Information Technology
Food Production Company, 10,001+ employees
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Usability
10
Based on Excel skills is easy to transition to Power BI and have better use of the data. Microsoft is constantly evolving and developing new visuals and improving the tool. I believe is a great investment for the tool and the return from it.
January 10, 2022

Great tool. All you can think data wise, you can built it there.

JM
Jose-Angel Mangas
Global Digital Operations Manager - BA Electrification
ABB (Mechanical Or Industrial Engineering, 10,001+ employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
7
Once you get into the way of using it, it is a super powerful tool and becomes your "new excel" as everything is easier in Power BI and you have same power than in Excel (except for small things...).
But the starting is difficult, it is a new tool that feels like make for data analysts or experts and not for everyone, what i have learned is not true, as with a bit of training everybody can use the tool. I think something needs to change there or some extra on boarding should be done in order to make it super accesible from the beginning.
November 11, 2021

"Simplifies Data Dashboards and Visualization Amidst Microsoft Power BI."

Afia Tamanna | TrustRadius Reviewer
Afia Tamanna
Information Technology Business Consultant
Alfa NET+ (Information Technology & Services, 11-50 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Usability
10
Even if you've used similar software before, this product will be challenging to master. UI and data sync, it's simple to create and update the reports you need. This tool helps me gain more profound and more detailed insights into my portfolio.
November 06, 2021

Power BI: A great tool for beginner to mid-level data manipulation.

Colin Sebastian | TrustRadius Reviewer
Colin Sebastian
Supply Chain Compliance Manager
Crown Castle (Real Estate, 5001-10,000 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
Microsoft Power BI is very easy to use start to finish in the lifecycle of data management is very straight forward. The main benefit is that during the input the data can be manipulated to then input into Power BI. Once this connection is set up it is very easy to continually update and produce data is a very simple easily way.
August 24, 2021

MS Power BI is a good buy for non-coder

Verified User
Analyst in Professional Services
Financial Services Company, 10,001+ employees
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
7
Overall, I would give MS Power BI a 7 out of 10 rating. It is a good tool to use for some none coding people and the tool makes it very easy to make interactive plots and share that with colleagues. The integration with R definitely is a big plus.
July 04, 2021

Enterprise Software that is Pretty Good

Blake Baron | TrustRadius Reviewer
Blake Baron
Senior Financial Analyst - Cost Analytics
Lowe's Companies, Inc. (Retail, 10,001+ employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
If you've used Microsoft Excel (and most professionals reading this have), then you can intuitively navigate through the Power BI interface without too much trouble. There's a slight learning curve the first time you enter the interface, but that dissipates before long. The filters are creatively designed and you can easily find what you need.
June 22, 2021

Data will never be the same again, thanks to PowerBI

Verified User
C-Level Executive in Information Technology
Information Technology & Services Company, 201-500 employees
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
Usability
8
[Microsoft] Power BI is fairly easy to use, quick to setup and simple to build reports, it's very quick and easy to create your first report using it, a small learning curve is required to build your first report, but once you get the hang of it, it becomes much easier to work with and with time you start to build great reports and get more future insights and forecasts from your data.

One downside is the desktop app performance, the app gets stuck sometimes, and usually spends time processing even when the data is very small, there is surely an area for improvement on the performance side.
June 18, 2021

Power BI is a Powerful Tool

BG
Bryan Goodyear
Program Director
dentsu (Marketing & Advertising, 10,001+ employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
8
I give Power BI an 8 out of 10 because it is very intuitive and flexible. It gets the job done while complimenting the rest of your applications. I wish some of the subscription capabilities were more dynamic as one example of the desired enhancement, but I'm confident in the future development of additional features. Also, since it's a Microsoft product, you can bet on the security and ongoing supportability of the product.
May 21, 2021

Microsoft Power BI | Analytics made easy

Verified User
Analyst in Information Technology
Information Technology & Services Company, 201-500 employees
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
Usability is an important aspect in terms of Power BI, the tool is designed in a way that the learning curve is quite fast. It has an easy navigation for loading, transforming, formatting, and analytics.
May 15, 2021

Enhanced interactive data visualization tool

Verified User
Consultant in Professional Services
Management Consulting Company, 10,001+ employees
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
As a user, Power BI presents the analysis in a much easy to use and understand manner. Also, they are live dashboards which get updated on go with updates in input files. A lot of information can be shown in same dashboard with easy slicing and dicing and saves lot of time in navigating through multiple reports.
May 15, 2021

The King of Data Visualization!

Amr Saad | TrustRadius Reviewer
Amr Saad
Lead Quality Engineer
Sumerge (Computer Software, 51-200 employees)
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
10
Microsoft Power BI is very easy to use and I was able to Create Dashboards and Charts with ease. Also, I was able to get insightful information from different charts easily. Overall, I liked the user experience and how straightforward it was.
May 13, 2021

Power BI is the microscope you never knew your data needed!

TP
Tanish Pruthi
Marketing Associate
Mercer-Mettl (Information Technology and Services, 501-1000 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
At this point, I think we all know who has taken the lead in the business intelligence and analytics market worldwide. With fresh new updates every other day on top of an already robustly built product with all features that one can dream of is a no brainer, I feel. Microsoft will invariably be synonymous with quality and professionalism.
May 12, 2021

Improved financial and customer data at scale across the entire organization!

Greg Watkins | TrustRadius Reviewer
Greg Watkins
Senior Customer Success Manager (Strategic Accounts)
Tipalti (Financial Services, 201-500 employees)
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usability
9
As a company and as an organization, we are very pleased with the system and tool as a whole. In total I believe we have about 50 or so users across multiple departments (1/10 of our organization size). Because of the variety of use cases that the system can support across different team[s], it has become a very powerful tool as part of our arsenal. As a CSM here, I am using the tool almost daily for deeper and further insights and analysis on my customer portfolio.
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