How to Create a Graph in Power BI
Creating your first graph in Power BI turns a spreadsheet full of numbers into a clear, visual story. If you're tired of staring at rows and columns of data, you're in the right place. This guide will walk you through, step-by-step, how to build and customize useful graphs that make your data easy to understand.
First, Why Do We Bother with Graphs Anyway?
Imagine trying to explain which marketing channel brought in the most revenue last quarter by reading from a giant spreadsheet. It’s possible, but it’s painful. Now imagine pointing to a simple bar chart where the tallest bar is clearly labeled "Email Marketing." Instantly, everyone gets it.
Graphs help us:
Spot trends and patterns quickly. Is revenue growing month over month? A line chart will show you in seconds.
Identify outliers. Did sales in one region inexplicably plummet? It will stand out on a map or bar chart.
Compare different data sets. How does the performance of Product A stack up against Product B? A column chart makes the comparison immediate.
In short, graphs transform raw data into scannable insights. Power BI is a fantastic tool for this, but getting started can feel a bit intimidating. Let’s break it down.
Step 1: Get Your Data into Power BI
You can't create a graph without data. Power BI can connect to a staggering number of data sources, from a simple Excel file on your desktop to complex cloud-based databases. For this tutorial, we’ll use a very common scenario: connecting to an Excel workbook.
The cardinal rule of data analysis is that your output is only as good as your input. Before importing, make sure your Excel data is formatted as a table. This means having clean headers in the first row and consistent data in each column (e.g., numbers in the "Sales" column, dates in the "Date" column). This simple step will save you a lot of headaches.
Once your data is ready, let's load it:
Open Power BI Desktop.
On the Home ribbon, click Get Data.
Select Excel workbook from the common data sources list (or click "More..." to find it).
Navigate to your file, select it, and click Open.
A Navigator window will pop up showing the available tables and sheets in your workbook. Click the name of the table you want to use. You'll see a preview on the right.
Click Load. Power BI will then import your data, and you'll see your fields (your column headers) appear in the Fields pane on the right side of the screen.
If your data is messy (e.g., has blank rows, incorrect data types), you would click Transform Data instead of Load. This opens the Power Query Editor, where you can clean and prepare your data before loading it. For now, we'll assume the data is ready to go.
Step 2: A Quick Tour of the Report View
Now that your data is loaded, you're looking at the Power BI canvas. It might look complex, but you only need to focus on a few key areas for now.
On the right side of your screen, you’ll see three important panes:
Fields Pane: This is a list of all the tables and data columns you just loaded. This is where you'll get the "ingredients" for your graphs.
Visualizations Pane: This is your toolbox. It’s filled with icons for different chart types like bar charts, line charts, pie charts, and more.
Filters Pane: Here you can add filters to your entire page or to a specific visual, such as showing data for only the last quarter.
The big, blank white space in the middle is your canvas. This is where the magic happens and your visualizations come to life.
Step 3: Building Your First Bar Chart
Let's create a common and incredibly useful visual: a bar chart showing sales by product category. This will quickly tell us which products are our best sellers.
Choose your visual: In the Visualizations pane, click the icon for the stacked column chart. It's one of the first icons in the list. An empty box, a placeholder for your chart, will appear on the canvas. You can click and drag its corners to resize it.
Add data to the axes: Click on your empty chart placeholder to make sure it's selected. Now look at the Visualizations pane again. Below the icons, you’ll see fields like "X-axis," "Y-axis," and "Legend." This is where you tell Power BI what data to use. Go to your Fields pane, find your product category column (let’s call it ‘Category’), click it, and drag it into the X-axis well.
Add the values: Now, drag your numerical data - what you want to measure - into the Y-axis well. In our example, find the ‘Sales’ field and drag it over.
And that’s it! Power BI automatically generates a column chart showing your total sales for each product category. You’ve officially made a graph.
Step 4: Customizing Your Graph for Clarity
A basic chart is good, but a well-formatted chart is great. Power BI offers extensive customization options to make your visuals easier to read and more professional-looking.
With your new chart selected, click the paintbrush icon in the Visualizations pane to open the Format your visual tab.
Improving Titles and Labels
Default titles can be clunky (e.g., "Sum of Sales by Category"). Let’s fix that.
Go to Format your visual > General > Title.
Under the "Text" box, change the title to something clear and simple, like "Sales by Product Category."
You can also change the font, text size, and color to match your company's branding.
Next, let's add data labels so viewers can see the exact sales figures without hovering over each bar.
Go to Format your visual > Visual > Data labels.
Toggle the switch to "On." The sales values will now appear on top of each column. You can expand this section to customize the font, position, and units (e.g., show thousands as 'K', millions as 'M').
Adjusting Colors and Sorting
A splash of color can make your report more engaging or draw attention to specific data points.
Go to Format your visual > Visual > Columns.
Click on the default color to open the color picker. You can select a new color for your columns. You can even click "Show all" to set different colors for each category. Use this sparingly - too many colors can be distracting. A single, solid color is often best.
To make the chart even easier to interpret, sort it from the highest-selling category to the lowest.
Click the three dots (...) in the top-right corner of your chart visual.
Select Sort axis > Sales (or your metric's name).
Go back to the same menu and ensure Sort descending is selected. Your chart will now reorder, putting your most successful category first.
Exploring Other Essential Graph Types
Now that you've mastered the column chart, creating other visuals follows the exact same drag-and-drop process. The key is choosing the right chart for the data story you're telling.
Line Charts for Trends Over Time
A line chart is the perfect choice for showing how a value changes over time. Let's say you want to visualize monthly sales revenue.
When to use it: Tracking performance over continuous periods (days, months, years). A line chart connects the data points, clearly showing growth, decline, or seasonality.
How to build it: Click the line chart icon in the Visualizations pane. Drag your date field (e.g., 'OrderDate') to the X-axis and your value (e.g., 'Revenue') to the Y-axis. Power BI will automatically create the time-series plot.
Pie & Donut Charts for Proportions
These charts are used to show parts of a whole, like a regional sales breakdown.
When to use them: Displaying percentages that add up to 100%. Donut charts are generally preferred as they are a bit easier on the eyes.
How to build them: Select the pie or donut chart icon. Drag a category (e.g., 'Region') to the Legend well and the value you're measuring (e.g., 'Sales') to the Values well.
Pro Tip: Avoid using pie charts with more than 5-6 categories. They become cluttered and difficult to read. A bar chart is often a better alternative.
Scatter Charts for Relationships
A scatter chart helps you see if there's a relationship between two different numerical values.
When to use it: Exploring correlation. For example, are we selling more products in areas with a higher population? Or does an increase in ad spend correlate with an increase in sales?
How to build it: Select the scatter chart icon. Drag one numeric field to the X-axis (e.g., 'Ad Spend') and another to the Y-axis (e.g., 'Sales'). Each dot on the chart represents a data point (e.g., a day or a campaign) where those two values intersect.
Final Thoughts
Getting comfortable with Power BI is all about starting simple and building from there. You've now learned the core workflow: connecting to data, choosing a visualization, dragging and dropping your fields, and formatting the output for clarity. Mastering these fundamentals is the foundation for building insightful, interactive dashboards.
While Power BI offers deep customization, sometimes you just need to connect your data and get answers fast without a steep learning curve. We built Graphed for exactly that reason. We skip right to the insights by connecting your sales and marketing tools (like Shopify, Salesforce, or Google Analytics) and letting you ask questions in plain English. Instead of manually dragging fields and formatting visuals, you can just ask, “show me sales by category last month,” and get your answer in seconds.