Hide Time on a Continuous Date Axis

[jorio]

TL;DR: How can I set a continuous date axis to not display times of day (12AM, 6AM, etc) when it is very zoomed in?

I want to create a visualisation (a column chart, and later a line chart as well) which shows the total value of a metric across many sites for many days. Currently I have about a month's worth of data, and expect it to increase. When all the data is shown together (first image, note that dummy data is used) it works perfectly.

However, I also would like to filter to a single site, and most of these sites only have values for a few days. As a result, when filtered, the graph only shows data for a short span of time, and the continuous date axis takes it upon itself to fill in all that empty space with overly precise timestamps (second image). So instead of just displaying "17 Jun", it shows "17 Jun 12AM", "17 Jun 6am", "17 Jun 12PM" and "17 Jun 6PM". I have received complaints that this behaviour is confusing readers. Does anyone know how to prevent Power BI from doing this? Tips and workarounds to get a similar effect would also be appreciated.

I have tried setting the data type to categorical, in which case every single date is printed in full and the full view is very difficult to read. I have also tried setting the x-axis to always have a min of Jun 1, which only prevents the behaviour from happening by stretching out the axis to be almost entirely empty.

[Hemansi]

@jorio  Have you been able to come up with alternative solution? The same bug is causing problems for me too.

[v-xuding-msft · Accepted solution]

Hi @jorio ,

As stated there isn't a proper way to format or change the values of the axis whilst in continuous mode. To make Power BI better, you can submit your request at Power BI Ideas and vote it up.

Best Regards,

Xue Ding

If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[Anonymous]

Pls can you try removing time part from column and just use date..?

May be create a new column which has only datae part and used that in your graph. I have not thried this but you can try quicly. 

[jorio]

Unfortunately, the date field I used is already of type Date and not Datetime, it does not have a time associated with it. The visualisation is filling in the times because it is set as a continuous time axis.