Default Grow To Fit, Auto-Size Width - October 2025 Release

[generatorsam]

To PBI developers and fellow users,

The new October update bringing Grow to fit as a default has been frustrating to work with. As someone who has used Power BI for the better part of a decade I find it much cleaner and user friendly to manage my column widths instead of arbitrarily assigning widths based on the space of a block. This is how we all have been doing for years.

Per the release notes: https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/power-bi-october-2025-feature-summary/ 

Auto expand table columns

The Grow to fit option distributes extra space across columns for cleaner visuals.

And I'm not the only one: As Kyle puts it, we are frustrated by being forced default options that, in our opinion, degrade user experience.

I encourage making the service easier for new users to drop in things and make it look pretty with minimal effort. But now I have to go into each table and switch this setting each time I want to return to a traditionally auto-sized column.

Please make the default "Fit to Content". Or at least give an option to set a client preference for one or the other.

Thank you,

generatorsam

[MShah86]

I totally get what you mean — but having to use a physical ruler really shouldn’t be the workaround in Power BI. It should be able to handle consistent column sizing without all that extra effort. Hopefully Microsoft improves this soon!

[etane]

auto width size default on is extremely annoying.

i much prefer excel's ability to customize a bunch of columns at once.  i use a see thru ruler to get my columns width to match atm.  and, super annoying when a new month pops up and its column size doesn't match the previous months' width size.

[beachamtresa]

Seconding this. crazy redundant work to make that a default setting on individual visuals and not in the global settings pane.

[ANVS]

Yes right, The Grow to Fit option doesnt look well when there are only two columns required in a table visual and that visual needs to be occupy half space in the Power BI Canvas.

[generatorsam]

Agreed. I'd also mention that the grow to fit has bugs on displaying propertly (scroll bar issue) which they are working on, but all the more reason to allow the user to choose their default settings.

[crockcw]

I don't' understand how these features are rolled out with these issues.  If there was any testing done at all someone should catch this.  Hopefully it's fixed soon. 

[MFelix]

Hi @generatorsam ,

I suggest that you place this comment on the October release blog post or in the issues part of the forum, that way you will get the attention of the MSFT team faster.

Has you can see someone already posted a comment on this feature on the blog post, and was answer by the product team.

Altough unfortunatly has you point out Kyle still did not get an answer.

[generatorsam]

I did see the blog, but I was confused why it was hosted through an entirely different service. Needed to make yet another account to post, bleh. I know there's a good community right here, shoutout amitchandak.

[MFelix]

Hi @generatorsam ,

Has I refered you can always post here on the issues part of the forum since it will be handle in a different way then the posts on the other forums.

[MShah86]

Does this only work on table visuals? I dont see the option for matrix

[generatorsam]

This is only applicable to the simple table visual. The default matrix actually behaves  like the original fit to width option, so I've began to just use matrices instead of tables in many cases. Not ideal but we improvise, adapt, and overcome.