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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

(26-50 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 categorically the most advanced yet beginner-friendly business intelligence tool that I have come across. Because of its beautiful, user-friendly interface, automated onboarding, and a dedicated website for tutorials, the learning curve is flattened as much as possible, which gets the user going in no time. Even if something gets overwhelming for you, you can hop to their friendly and helpful user community forum, which is invariably ready to help you with alacrity.
Greg Watkins | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are using PowerBI across our organization for sales, CSM's, as well as our finance leadership and product teams. Our entire company receives value from it, since we use it for revenue forecasting, understanding our customers' adoption and journeys. We also use it to review different data as it pertains to the customers' invoice processing and other valuable KPI [metrics]. We use data from it from the CSM team to create QBR business review decks which are very impactful.
Christian Maxwell | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We needed a way to pull large amounts of data from our construction management software and create reports that we could use to set and measure expected metrics for project team performance. Being able to track these and create configurable reports that company executives could view from anywhere and see historical performance helped us set and track company performance goals.
Dustin Ghia | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I have used [Microsoft] Power BI Desktop with the Power BI Service on the cloud as a component of IT solutions for businesses and organizations[.] The main use of [Microsoft] Power BI is to create reports and share them on the web for embedding in websites and applications. The more advanced uses of [Microsoft] Power BI, like analytics for example, are less required by companies.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We have suggested Power BI to multiple clients for visualization purposes and they found it is really useful to generate their daily insights. We have created numerous reports and dashboards showing a variety of data from various domains and industries.

Highlights:
Rich UI
Data accuracy
Intensive data modeling
Data compression and optimization
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft Power BI is used by the entire organization for basic analytics and data visualization purposes. It enables the functional users without technical background to quickly customize their reports as per the requirements and even share the reports as well as the insights from the reports with other users in the organization. Also, the information can be analyzed and visualized in the real-time making sure that actions can be taken based on insights in due time.
Alex Brielmann | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
[Microsoft] Power BI was used at Conga mainly as a data visualization tool, while also using it as a repository for data from multiple systems. We used Snowflake to combine data from different systems and then housed everything in [Microsoft] Power BI. We could use data pulls to put together our weekly board deck, as well as to simply provide simple charts for all different teams throughout the entire sales process.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft Power BI is being used by the Finance and Administration Team. This solution helped us to improve our data analysis and reporting, bringing it to the next level. We moved from plain spreadsheets to interactive dashboards where every stakeholder can review it and interact/filter based on their specific needs.
April 30, 2021

The Industry Standard

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Microsoft Power BI is used by various teams across our organization to compile data into easy to read reports and metrics. Specifically, my use with it is related to portfolio and project management. We use it to create a 'placemat' type report to show the full technology portfolio to our most senior leaders at the organization.
Gabrielle Wayman | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is available across the enterprise. Our department uses Power BI to make cost and repair data easily digestible for account managers, who then use it to report and sell to customers. Before Power BI, analysts received dozens of data pull and process requests weekly. Since these requests were often very similar, we realized that AMs could self-serve through Power BI dashboards.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are currently using Power BI for all reporting and analysis across multiple functions, including Finance, Commercial, Clinical and Operations. There are several other groups that use Power BI with a more adhoc approach, focused on ensuring prompt resolution of ongoing issues and rapid remediation. Visibility to real-time or close to real-time data are the primary business problems solved by Power BI, particularly across multiple disparate systems.
Luciana Montivero | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is used in my organization only in the analytics and biostatistics team, within the medical informatics department. We mainly use it to easily integrate our different databases information into a one-only report. As it's easy to use, it helps us deliver complex and clean metrics truly fast, and as we work in the health industry time is a big factor to take into account (especially during a pandemic).
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
My company uses Microsoft Power BI throughout the organization for daily reporting tasks as well as analysis. One of the major projects we did using Power BI is to identify the services which are taking more than 2 days to complete (typically is should be done within 48 hours). This helped us to reduce the overall costs for business.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is being used across the whole organization to organize our data and show data in a way that is effective for decision making and helpful for upcoming projects and winning new work. The storytelling that PowerBI provides is very valuable, along with the ability to collaborate on dashboards with coworkers.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We currently use Microsoft Power BI across our whole organization to for visualization and trending of product data. It addresses the need for automated dashboarding of data and the ability to quickly filter and access trends that are occurring without the need to manually query and plot the data by interested individuals.
April 27, 2021

Do try PowerBi !

Ilektra Skepetari | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I used [Microsoft] Power BI to create and share dashboards with analytics and graphs across different areas of the business. It makes sharing data easier and provides customizable visualizations that are easy to create even without technological background. Most importantly, it is easy to load great amounts of data as it is very easy to connect with azure data sources.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We have several departments across our organization that use [Microsoft] Power BI. It helps us aggregate data sources and better understand (visualize) the data when the source systems do not have these capabilities built in.

[Microsoft] Power BI allows us to easily create visuals and share findings with others across our organizations.
April 27, 2021

Power BI Review

Akhilesh Arya | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Power BI is an easy to use analytical tool. We are using this tool in the department of computer science and engineering for analytic purposes in research. When you have a large data set and you want to derive some meaningful results from it this tool will help you to convert your numbers into interactive charts from which you can derive the insights of data. I am working in the field of data analytics and everyone who is in the same field will love this tool.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
My company uses Power BI for our entire organizational reporting. We are a mid-size company with several different departments that each have their own unique ways of looking at things. Power BI enables us to provide that level of detail while at the same time being able to roll up data to be easily consumed by executives and management.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
The organization is currently shifting from Tableau to Power BI as its primary BI visualization tool. This began as parallel efforts both by IT to decide to make the switch due to the value proposition, as well as in some business units which had begun to use the tool for their own data needs.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
[We use it] to find insights within our company's data records. Microsoft Power BI helps connect disparate data sets, transform and clean the data into a data model and create charts or graphs to provide visuals of the data. Additionally, we partner with SEER interactive to build out our digital shelf dashboard and gain insights on our coverage across google SERPs and our retail partners.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Several departments use Power BI as part of Office 365. I use the Desktop Tool for offline creation of advanced BI reports which are later published as Apps for my stakeholders. Microsoft Power BI is allowing me to have real-time analytics and dashboards, instead of processing and distributing spreadsheet reports on an ongoing basis.
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