Where Are Power BI Themes Stored?

Trying to find where Power BI stores its theme files can feel like a bit of a scavenger hunt, but it's simpler than you think. Understanding where these files live and how they work is the key to creating consistent, beautifully branded reports efficiently. This article will show you exactly where to find Power BI's built-in themes and, more importantly, how to manage, store, and share your own custom theme files.

What is a Power BI Theme, Anyway?

Before we go hunting for files, let's quickly clarify what a Power BI theme is. In short, it's a JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) file that tells Power BI how your reports should look by default. Think of it as a style guide for your data visualizations.

A theme file can define a whole range of design elements, including:

Your brand's color palette (so you don't have to enter hex codes over and over)
Font families, sizes, and colors for titles, labels, and cards
Properties for visuals like backgrounds, borders, and transparency
The appearance of page and wallpaper backgrounds
Styles for elements like slicers, buttons, and the filter pane

Using themes is a game-changer for two main reasons: constancy and efficiency. It ensures every report your team produces has the same professional look and feel, and it saves you countless hours of manual formatting.

Where to Find Power BI's Built-in Themes

Power BI Desktop comes with a selection of pre-built themes you can apply with a single click. These files are stored locally on your computer as part of the application's installation files. This makes them great for learning how theme files are structured.

You can typically find them in the following directory on a Windows machine:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Power BI Desktop\bin\Report Themes

If you installed Power BI from the Microsoft Store, the path might be a bit more complex and located within the "WindowsApps" folder.

Inside this folder, you'll see a collection of JSON files, each corresponding to a theme in the Power BI interface, like "Classroom.json", "Innovate.json", and "Tidal.json". You can open these files in a simple text editor (like Notepad) or a code editor (like Visual Studio Code) to see how Microsoft has structured them.

A word of caution: While it’s useful to look at these files for inspiration or to learn the syntax, you should never edit the default theme files directly. Any changes you make could be reset or overwritten the next time Power BI updates. It's always better to use them as a starting point and save your modified version as a new custom file elsewhere.

The Real Question: Where Are Custom Themes Stored?

This is where new users often get confused. Unlike the built-in themes, Power BI doesn't have a single, dedicated "My Themes" folder on your computer where all your custom creations are saved automatically. Instead, you store your custom theme's .json file wherever you like, and then import it into your Power BI report.

Once you import a custom theme, its settings are embedded directly within your .pbix file. This means the report is self-contained, you can send the .pbix file to a colleague, and they will see the report with your custom theme applied, even if they don't have your .json theme file on their computer.

The workflow looks like this:

Create or download a custom theme .json file.
Save it in an organized folder on your computer or a shared network drive.
In Power BI Desktop, go to the View tab.
Click the dropdown arrow in the Themes section.
Select Browse for themes and navigate to your saved .json file.

Once you select the file, Power BI will apply all the predefined formatting to your report instantly.

Best Practices for Storing and Managing Your Custom Themes

Because Power BI doesn't manage your custom theme files for you, it's crucial to establish a good system. A little organization upfront will save you and your team major headaches down the road.

1. Create a Central Theme Library

The single most important step is to create one central location to store all of your .json theme files. Don't just save them to your Downloads or Desktop folder. Create a dedicated directory, ideally on a shared location that your whole team can access.

For individuals: A dedicated folder in your Documents is a great start (e.g., "Documents\Power BI\Themes").
For teams: Use a cloud-synced service like SharePoint, OneDrive, Google Drive, or a shared network drive. This ensures that everyone is using the latest, most up-to-date version of your brand's theme.

2. Use Clear Naming Conventions

Naming files "theme1.json" or "final_theme_new.json" is a recipe for disaster. Be descriptive and consistent with your naming.

Consider a structure like "Company_ThemeName_Version.json". Examples:

AcmeCorp_Brand_Primary_v2.1.json
AcmeCorp_Marketing_DarkMode_v1.0.json
AcmeCorp_Finance_ColorblindFriendly_v1.2.json

This makes it immediately clear what each file is for and whether you're using the most current version.

3. Version Control is Your Friend

As you tweak and update your themes, keeping track of versions is important. If you just overwrite the same file, you can't go back if you make a mistake. A simple version number in the file name (as shown above) is usually enough. For more complex projects, you could even use a version control system like Git.

4. Document Your Themes

Alongside your .json files in your central library, consider keeping a simple "README.txt" file or a short document. This file can explain:

The purpose of each theme (e.g., "Primary brand theme for external reports")
A summary of the color palette and what each color should be used for
The names of the font families used
Who to contact with questions about the theme

This helps new team members get up to speed quickly and ensures consistent usage across the organization.

Troubleshooting Common Power BI Theme Issues

Sometimes, themes don't behave exactly as you expect. Here are a couple of the most common issues and how to fix them.

"My theme colors aren't applying to a specific chart."

This is the most frequent problem. You import a theme, but one of your bar charts stubbornly stays the wrong color. This happens because themes only set the default styles. If you have ever manually changed a setting on a visual — like picking a specific color for data bars — that manual setting will override the theme.

The Fix: Click on the visual that's not updating, go to the Format visual pane, click the three-dot menu at the top, and select Reset to default. This will remove any manual overrides and allow the theme's styles to take over.

"Power BI gives me an error when I try to import my theme file."

If you've edited a JSON file by hand and it won't import, it's almost certainly because of a syntax error. JSON has a very strict structure, and a single missing comma, misplaced bracket, or extra quote mark will cause it to fail.

The Fix: The easiest way to find the error is to use an online JSON validator. Simply copy the entire text from your theme file, paste it into a validator website, and it will pinpoint exactly where the error is so you can fix it.

Final Thoughts

To sum it up, Power BI's built-in themes are stored in its installation folder, but custom themes are entirely managed by you. By embedding them into individual .pbix reports upon import, Power BI offers flexibility, but it's on you to create an organized library for your .json theme files on a shared drive for team consistency.

Creating branded, consistent reports is essential for making data look professional, but the process of building the dashboards and pulling the data from all your sources can still feel like a drag. For this, we built Graphed to be your AI data analyst. It securely connects to sources like Google Analytics, Shopify, and Salesforce, allowing you to build real-time, professional dashboards just by describing what you want to see in plain English. You can stop wrestling with themes and settings and get back to finding the insights that grow your business.