Your First Power BI Dashboard: A Simple Walkthrough

Introduction:

Have you ever wondered how to turn messy numbers into colorful charts and easy-to-understand stories? That’s what Power BI helps you do!

What is power BI:

Power BI is a data visualization and business intelligence tool from Microsoft that helps you:

• Collect data from various sources (Excel, databases, cloud).

• Clean and transform data to make it usable.

• Create visual reports and dashboards (charts, maps, graphs).

• Share insights easily with team members or across your organization.

Key Power BI Capabilities:

• Connect to Excel, databases, websites, and cloud data sources.

• Transform and clean messy data efficiently with Power Query.

• Build interactive, explorable dashboards.

• Share reports securely across your organization.

• Access from desktop, mobile devices, and web browsers.

Power BI step by step process:

• Get Started: Download and install Power BI Desktop (free).

• Connect & Prepare Data: Import data, clean and transform using Power Query.

• Model & Combine Data: Create relationships between tables for analysis.

• Build Reports & Dashboards: Add charts and visuals to tell your data story.

• Explore & Analyze: Use filters and drill-down to find insights.

• Share & Collaborate: Publish to Power BI Service to share with your team.

• Administer & Secure: Manage permissions and apply data security.

  

The 2 Main Components of Power BI

1️⃣ Power BI Desktop

A free Windows application you install on your computer. Used to

• Import and clean data.

• Build data models.

• Create reports and dashboards.

2️⃣ Power BI Service

An online (cloud) platform accessed via your browser. Used to:

• Publish and share reports.

• Collaborate with your team.

• Access reports on mobile and web.

• Schedule data refreshes.

  

How to Get Power BI Desktop: Step-by-Step

Step 1: Download from Microsoft Store

Head over to the Power BI Desktop download page and click on the “Download free” button. For easy automatic updates, click “Get it from Microsoft” to install from the Microsoft Store. Or, choose the direct installer option for offline installation if you prefer.

Step 2: Run the Setup Wizard

Open the downloaded setup file and follow the on-screen instructions. Click “Next” and wait for the installation to complete.

Step 3: Launch Power BI Desktop Once installed, open Power BI Desktop. You will see a welcome screen with options to get started. Pin Power BI to your taskbar for easy access in your learning journey.

Now you are ready to start exploring Power BI, importing your data, and building your first dashboards!

“How to Build Your First Dashboard in Power BI”

Have you ever had a lot of marks in your notebook and found it hard to see which subjects you are doing well in?

A dashboard in Power BI turns numbers into colorful charts and graphs so you can see everything clearly at a glance.

Why dashboards are important:

🔹 Make data easy to understand You can see trends and patterns without reading messy tables.

🔹 Help you make decisions Quickly see what is working well and what needs attention.

🔹 Save time Dashboards update automatically when your data updates.

🔹 Allow you to explore your data You can filter and click on charts to learn more about your data.

🔹 Easy to share You can show your dashboard to your teacher, parents, or team for better discussions.

Connect data in Power BI desktop:

Launch Power BI Desktop on your computer. and click on “Get data from other sources”.

You will see a list of data sources like Excel, CSV, and databases. For this example, I chose Excel. and click on connect

Browse your computer, select your sample sales data Excel file, and click “Open.” Power BI will show you the sheets/tables in your file. Check the box for the table you want to import and click “Load.”

Your data will now appear in the Fields pane on the right, ready for you to start building visuals and dashboards.

What I Did:

I used the sample sales data to create:

A Bar Chart to visualize Total Sales by Product. To create a bar chart in Power BI, first open your Power BI Desktop file with your imported dataset and go to Report View by clicking the chart icon on the left. In the Visualizations pane on the right, click the Clustered Bar Chart icon for horizontal bars or the Clustered Column Chart icon for vertical bars to add a blank chart to your canvas. Next, drag a field such as Product into the Axis section and Total Sales into the Values section to display your data visually. You can format the chart using the paint roller icon to adjust colors, labels, and fonts for clarity. Finally, resize or position the chart on your report page as needed. This creates a clean visual that helps you clearly see your data insights in your Power BI dashboard.

A Pie Chart to see sales distribution by region. To create a pie chart in Power BI, open your Power BI Desktop file and go to Report View. In the Visualizations pane on the right, click the Pie Chart icon, and a blank pie chart will appear on your canvas. Next, drag a field like Region into the Legend section to define your categories and Total Sales into the Values section to represent the data you want to visualize. The pie chart will now display how each category contributes to the total sales. You can use the Format (paint roller icon) to adjust colors, add data labels, and customize the look for clarity. Finally, resize and position the pie chart neatly on your dashboard to help you and your readers quickly understand the distribution of your data in Power BI

A Card Visual to display the Total Sales value clearly on my dashboard. To create a card in Power BI, open your Power BI Desktop file and ensure you are in Report View. In the Visualizations pane on the right, click the Card icon, and a blank card visual will appear on your canvas. Next, drag the field you want to display, such as Total Sales, into the card. The card will now show a single large value, making it easy to highlight important metrics clearly on your dashboard. You can use the Format (paint roller icon) to adjust the text size, color, and background to match your report’s style. Finally, resize and position your card on the page to create a clean, informative summary visual for your Power BI dashboard.

A Slicer to filter the data by Customer Name, allowing me to see how the visuals change when I select different customers. In Power BI, a slicer is a visual filter that allows you to easily filter data based on particular values and interact with your dashboard. If you add a slicer for "Customer Name," for instance, you can click on any customer in the slicer, and all of your charts and visuals will immediately display data only for that customer. To create a slicer, go to Report View, click the Slicer icon in the Visualizations pane, and a blank slicer will appear on your canvas. Drag the field you want to filter by (like Region or Product) into the slicer, and it will display a list of values you can select or deselect. You can adjust the slicer to show a dropdown or list view and format it to match your dashboard. Using slicers makes your reports interactive, allowing readers to explore data easily without creating multiple charts for each filter.