What is Power BI? Features and Benefits Explained

Microsoft’s Power BI has emerged as the most sought-after data analytics platform across the globe. Power BI is an effective and incredible tool for companies or enterprises that are about to launch, organize, and/or grow their business intelligence efforts. Given the wide array of features Power BI has and the big list of advantages that it brings to the table, it is currently the most powerful data platform in the world.

Gartner's Magic Quadrant data in Feb 2021 declared  Microsoft Power BI company as a leader in data analytics. It has a 36% market share- 1.8x higher than Tableau.

What Is Power BI?

Power BI is the collective name for a distinct array of software services, applications, and connectors that are primarily involved in the analysis of data sources and in providing accurate insights and information. Power BI has been developed by Microsoft as part of its Power Platform. For businesses and organisations that need a solution for the collection, analysis, and management of huge amounts of data- Power BI is the go-to user-friendly solution.

How does Microsoft Power BI Serviceswork? In simple terms, it gathers data from relevant sources, automatically processes it, and returns accurate insights and conclusions to users. The insights are generally provided through charts and graphs.

Versions of Power BI

Power BI comes in several versions and is used according to the specifications and preferences of the user. Following are the different versions of this powerful data analytics platform:

• Power BI Desktop: As the name suggests, this is a free Windows-based application for regular PCs and Laptops and is meant for small and medium-sized businesses.

• Power BI Service Pro: An optimised version of the basic one with more features and options to share reports, and comes with a paid per-user licence.

• Power BI Service Premium: The Premium version is meant for major large businesses and enterprises and has an immense scalability factor.

• Power BI Mobile: This version is meant for smartphones and tablets.

• Power BI Embedded: Software developers who want to create their analytical tools can embed this version in their apps.

• Power BI Report Server: This version is for business owners who wish to store their data and reports on their servers.

What Is Power BI Used For?

Power BI is a very simple tool that can be used by regular managers and employees who don’t have experience in data analysis. It is this feature of Power BI that sets it apart from other data analysis platforms or other business intelligence tools that can be handled and accessed by only data scientists and business analysts.

After Power BI analyses the data, it converts it into reports. The nature of the generated reports vastly depends on the type of data that has been received. Hence, all elements of a business enterprise- like marketing, sales, finance, and Human Resources can utilise Power BI.

Each division can input a set of its own gathered data and receive accurate reports and insights concerning its performance over a certain period. For large-scale reports and insights that can help enhance the overall management of an enterprise, large business organisations use business intelligence professionals to access and use Power BI.

Features of Power BI

Power BI has a wide array of features that can be used depending upon the requirements of the organisation using it. The following are some features of this data analysis platform:

• Power Query: Power Query is a feature that allows you to combine and connect data for analysis. This feature can be used as an add-in feature for your spreadsheets.

• Power Pivot: To organise and model different elements of data, Pivot is employed. Through Pivot, one can use an expression language, curate relationships, and model simple and complex data.

• Power View: This is an incredible visualisation feature of Power BI that will generate charts and graphs based on the data analysis. It will help you to connect to several applications that enable filtering and updating of various visuals.

• Power Q&A: If you want to simply ask questions to retrieve data, the Q&A feature will help. Instead of identifying complex data points, you can quickly retrieve answers to data queries through simple questions.

• Power Map: This is another visualisation feature that helps in the mapping of large chunks of data on a chart or graph. To view data from different perspectives, this tool helps to get 3-D visualisations.

• Power BI Desktop: This tool is used for the configuration of other features like Power Query and Power Pivot developers.

Benefits of Power BI

Visualization

• For easy analysis and understanding of data, Power BI provides engaging and visually appealing dashboards and reports.
• From charts and graphs to maps, tables, and KPIs- the visualisation feature of Power BI helps users to understand and seamlessly communicate insights and data analysis.
• Power BI also provides a wide array of advanced analytics tools, like drill-through, cross-filtering, and data exploration, that will enable users to identify hidden patterns and relationships in their data.

Data Connectivity

Features like Power Query enable users to clean, shape, and transform data before it is imputed into Power BI. This ensures that the data is properly and is ready for analysis, resulting in meaningful insights and reports.

Power BI supports direct connections to several popular data sources, like the following:

• SQL Server
• SharePoint
• Google Analytics
• Azure SQL Database
• Oracle
• Salesforce
• Dynamics 365
• Amazon Redshift

Real-Time Data

Microsoft Power BI services support real-time streaming and visualization of data for organisations and users.

Users can create real-time dashboards that are automatically updated when fresh data is inputted.

Real-time data features are useful for consistent data monitoring, like the performance of a manufacturing unit, tracking the delivery status of a shipment, or overseeing a social media trend.

Collaboration

Power BI provides collaboration tools that will help teams to work efficiently on reports and dashboards. A few key collaborative features of Power BI are:

• Sharing: Users can share reports and dashboards with other users- within the organization or with external partners.
• Workspaces: Teams can collaborate and work together on a set of reports and dashboards.
• Version Control: Users can track modifications and revert to previous versions if necessary.
• Commenting: Users can add comments to reports and dashboards- hence making it easy for them to discuss insights and feedback on specific visualisations.

Scalability

Some of the core scalability features of Power BI are:

• Cloud-based Platform: Power BI is a Very cloud-based solution. Hence, enterprises need not maintain their software or hardware as this platform offers a highly scalable infrastructure.
• Data Capacity: Power BI can process and analyse large amounts of data.
• Power Platform: Power BI is part of the Power Platform, which means that it requires low or no code for creating customised business applications.
• Performance Optimization: Optimization tools like DirectQuery, Power BI Report Server, and Power BI Premium help enhance the performance of reports and dashboards.

Wrapping It Up

Microsoft Power BI company is currently on an upwards trend and is set to become the epitome of data analysis in the future. Ease of use and its simplicity are the core advantages of this platform- making it suitable for users with no background in data analysis. Power BI is easy to learn and hence will dominate the data analysis sector in the coming days.

Transform your business with Microsoft Power BI service!

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