How To Add Drop Down Filter In Power Bi

How to Add a Dropdown Filter in Power BI

Adding a dropdown filter in Power BI allows users to select specific values from a list, providing a highly interactive and customizable data exploration experience. The following steps will guide you on how to add a dropdown filter in Power BI:

1. Open your Power BI report and go to the page where you want to add the dropdown filter.
2. Make sure you have a visual (e.g., a table, chart, or graph) on the page that you want to filter based on user selection.
3. In the “Visualizations” pane, select the visual you want to filter.
4. Next, navigate to the “Format” section of the “Visualizations” pane.
5. Look for the “Data Type” dropdown list and choose the type of data you want to filter (e.g., text, number, date).
6. Scroll down in the “Format” section to find the “Filter” option.
7. Toggle the “Data type” field again in the “Filter” options and make sure it matches the chosen data type in step 5.
8. Enable the “Data” field in the “Filter” options.
9. You can now customize the filter by selecting the desired settings, such as allowing multiple selections or displaying a search box for the dropdown.
10. If you want to limit the available options in the dropdown, you can create a slicer using a separate table or column that contains the filter values you want to display.
11. To create a slicer, simply drag the desired field from your data model onto the page and choose the “Dropdown” option in the “Visualizations” pane.
12. Once you have set up the dropdown filter, you can test it by selecting different values and observing how it filters the associated visual(s).
13. Remember to save your Power BI report to preserve the dropdown filter settings.

Example:

Let’s consider an example using a Power BI report that displays sales data. Suppose you have a table visual showing sales by product category, and you want to add a dropdown filter to enable users to select a specific category.

1. Open the Power BI report containing the sales data.
2. Go to the page with the table visual displaying sales by product category.
3. Select the table visual in the “Visualizations” pane.
4. In the “Format” section of the “Visualizations” pane, choose “Text” as the “Data Type” for the filter.
5. Scroll down to the “Filter” options and enable the “Data” field.
6. Customize the filter settings as desired, such as allowing multiple selections and displaying a search box.
7. Create a slicer by dragging the “Product Category” field from the data model onto the page and choosing the “Dropdown” option in the “Visualizations” pane.
8. Save the Power BI report to preserve the dropdown filter configuration.

That’s it! Now, when you open the report, you should see the dropdown filter for selecting the product category in the table visual. Users can choose different categories from the dropdown, and the table visual will dynamically update to show the filtered results.