How to Turn On Export Underlying Data in Power BI

Ever tried to export data from a Power BI visual only to find the “Underlying data” option frustratingly greyed out? You’re not alone. This quick tutorial explains exactly what this feature does, why it might be disabled, and most importantly, how to turn it on so you can dive deeper into your data.

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What Does "Export Underlying Data" Mean Anyway?

Power BI is brilliant for visualizing high-level summaries of your information. But sometimes, you need to see the raw, detailed rows of data that make up a chart or table. That's where the export feature comes in handy. When you want to export data from a visual, Power BI gives you a few options, and understanding the difference is key.

Three Ways to Export Data from a Power BI Visual

When you click the ellipsis (...) on a specific visual and select "Export data," you'll usually see up to three choices:

• Data with current layout: This option exports the data exactly as you see it displayed in that specific visual, honoring the formatting, layout, and any filters you've applied. It’s useful for when you want a copy of the visual itself in an Excel, CSV, or (for tables/matrices) .pbix format. This option is only available for tables and matrices in the Power BI service.
• Summarized data: This exports the aggregated data used to create the visual. It gives you the numbers that form the bars in your bar chart or the segments in your pie chart, but not the individual records behind them.
• Underlying data: This is the big one. This option exports the detailed, row-level data from the base table or tables that are used in your visual. It gives you access to a much larger set of data, including columns that may not even be displayed in the current visual.

An Example: Summarized vs. Underlying Data

Imagine you have a simple bar chart showing total sales by country.

• Exporting Summarized data would give you a simple table with two columns: Country and Total Sales. You'd get a single row for each country, like:
• Exporting Underlying data would give you all the individual sales transactions that make up those totals. Your spreadsheet would have thousands of rows, with columns for Transaction ID, Customer Name, Product, Quantity, Sale Price, Date, and Country.

This ability to access the granular, underlying data is incredibly powerful for deep-dive analysis, troubleshooting data issues, or moving a subset of data into another program like Excel for further manipulation.

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Why Is the "Underlying Data" Option Greyed Out?

If you’re staring at a greyed-out "Underlying data" option, it almost always comes down to one thing: permissions. Data security is a top priority, and Power BI report creators and administrators have control over who can export detailed information.

The ability to export underlying data is controlled by a specific setting within the Power BI report file itself. By default, this setting is often disabled to prevent users from accidentally or intentionally exporting large, sensitive datasets. It has to be consciously enabled by the person who built the report.

So, if you’re a report consumer, the solution is simple (though not instant): you need to contact the report’s owner or your company's Power BI administrator and ask them to enable this feature for you. If you are the report creator, the rest of this article will show you exactly how to do it.

How to Turn On Export Underlying Data (For Report Creators)

Enabling this feature is a simple change you make in Power BI Desktop before you publish or update your report on the Power BI service. Here’s the step-by-step process.

Step 1: Open Your Report in Power BI Desktop

First things first, you need to open the .pbix file for the report you want to modify on your local machine using Power BI Desktop.

Step 2: Go to Options and Settings

With your report open, look at the top-left menu bar. Click on File, which takes you to the info screen. From there, select Options and settings, and then click on Options in the dropdown menu.

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Step 3: Find the Report Settings

An "Options" window will pop up. This dialogue box contains all the global and current file settings for Power BI.

On the left-hand navigation pane, look under the Current File section and click on Report settings.

Step 4: Enable the Export Setting

Now, look at the options on the right-hand side of the window. Scroll down until you see a section called Export data.

Here you will find the crucial setting. Click the checkbox next to: "Allow end users to export both summarized and underlying data from the Power BI service or Power BI Report Server."

Once you click this, Power BI presents a few more granular choices that an administrator might set, but for most people, simply enabling this master switch is all you need to do. Click OK to save the change.

Step 5: Save and Republish Your Report

Your changes won't take effect until the report is updated in the Power BI Service. Save your .pbix file and then click the Publish button on the Home ribbon to upload the new version to its workspace.

Once it's published, your report's users will now have the ability to export the underlying data from any visual in that report.

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Allowing Exports on a Per-Visual Basis

In some cases, you might not want to enable underlying exports for the entire report, but only for a specific chart or table. Power BI gives you this level of control as well.

Even with the global report setting turned on, you can override it on individual visuals.

1. Select the visual you want to modify in Power BI Desktop.
2. Go to the Visualizations pane.
3. Click on the Format your visual icon (it looks like a paintbrush).
4. Expand the Visual header options.
5. Scroll down and find the Export data toggle. You can specifically disable all exports from this particular visual if needed.

This gives you a great way to protect sensitive data in one chart while allowing detailed exploration in another.

Important Limitations to Keep in Mind

While powerful, there are a few technical limitations and considerations to be aware of when exporting data from Power BI.

• File Size & Row Limits: Power BI isn't meant for massive data dumps. When users export underlying data to Excel (.xlsx), there's a limit of 150,000 rows. For CSV (.csv) files, the limit is much larger at 30 million rows. If your visual relies on unaggregated data in a DirectQuery model, the export limit is 30,000 rows.
• Row-Level Security (RLS) is Respected: Your security settings are always enforced. If a user is part of a role with Row-Level Security applied, they will only be able to export the rows of data that they are permitted to see in the report itself.
• Performance Impact: Especially when using DirectQuery, allowing large data exports can put a strain on your underlying data source (like a SQL server). Each large export is essentially a heavy query running against your database.
• Admin Overrides: A Power BI tenant administrator can disable the ability to export data for the entire organization, which would override any settings you apply at the report level. If you've enabled it in your report but it still doesn't work, this is a possibility to investigate.

Final Thoughts

Enabling the "Export Underlying Data" feature is an easy fix for report creators, located right in the report settings of Power BI Desktop. By toggling this one option, you empower your end-users to go beyond high-level visuals and perform the detailed, row-level analysis needed to find deeper insights or troubleshoot data questions.

While being able to download and work with underlying data in a tool like Excel is valuable, the friction of exporting CSVs and building pivot tables can still slow your team down. That’s why we built Graphed to be the fastest path from data to insight. By securely connecting to your data sources, we allow your entire team to simply ask questions in plain English - like "what were my top 10 products by sales in the UK last month?" - and get instant answers, reports, and dashboards without ever needing to export anything.