Sharing PBI visuals to PowerPoint performance issue

[arca123]

Hello!

My business sends out a pdf of company's financials every month. A pptx is used to create pdf and every month this pptx is manually updated. As data analyst, I offered help that I can create data model in pbi that would update monthly, share the visuals to pptx and they would update alongside. 

This works. There are still some slides that need to be manually updated. The problem is that there are about 60 slides total and about 45 of them have visuals from pbi. To create pdf, you need to view each slide and have the visual load in it. When visuals get loaded, the computer's performance decreases drastically. Lately, my colleague has been struggling with pptx crashing due to all this. 

Do you have some suggestions to increase performance? Maybe there are better, more elegant ways to have pptx update monthly? 

[rohit1991]

Hii @arca123 

PowerPoint becomes slow because each linked Power BI visual refreshes live when you open the slide, so loading 40+ visuals forces PowerPoint to run multiple report queries and kills performance. The better approach is to avoid live-linked visuals and instead use “Export to PowerPoint (Static Images)” or Subscription >> PPTX export, which generates a fresh PowerPoint with static snapshots each month. This removes all live queries, loads instantly, and avoids crashes while still giving you an updated monthly deck.

[arca123]

Thanks!
We did static images previously, but you still have to export them every month, no? Because the static image does not get updated. Or is there a functionality I'm missing?

Subscription is something I had not looked at before. I do have experience with report builder and .rdl files, but I see you can use Subscription to send out pdf and pptx files. Can you guide me where I can find more info on this? I have a pro subscription, so I can't test it out.

[v-aatheeque · Accepted solution]

Hi  @arca123 

With a Power BI Pro license, you can create email subscriptions but exporting reports as PDF or PPTX attachments is only available in Premium or Premium Per User (PPU) workspaces. Here's how to explore and prepare for it.

Please try below things.

1. Instead of embedding live visuals, export them as static images from Power BI. Yes, they won’t auto-refresh, but you can automate the export process .

Use Smaller Data Models: If visuals are slow to load, check if your dataset is large or complex. Aggregating data or using Import mode instead of DirectQuery .

Disable Interactivity in PPT: When embedding, choose the option to insert as an image rather than an interactive visual. This reduces load time drastically.

2. Power BI allows exporting visuals as images or PDFs via:

Power Automate: Create a flow to export report pages as images and drop them into a folder.

Paginated Reports (.rdl): These are for pixel-perfect layouts and can export directly to PDF or PPTX.

Note: In this way you can avoid manually updating each slide, just replace images in the PPT template.

3. Power BI Subscriptions can email PDFs of reports on a schedule. However
With Pro, you can only subscribe to reports/dashboards for yourself or others. Premium adds the ability to send to groups and export to PPTX automatically.

If your company has Premium capacity, you can schedule a subscription to send a PowerPoint file with all visuals. Then add manual slides as needed.

Note: If Premium isn’t available, Automate export of visuals as images using Power Automate. Maintain a PPT template where images are linked (so replacing files updates slides). Use Paginated Reports for the most consistent formatting.

Reference : Email subscriptions for reports and dashboards in the Power BI service - Power BI | Microsoft Learn
Tutorial: Create a Paginated Report and Upload it to the Power BI Service - Power BI | Microsoft Lea...
When to use paginated reports in Power BI - Power BI | Microsoft Learn

Hope this helps !!

Thank You.

[v-aatheeque]

Hi @arca123 

We wanted to follow up to check if you’ve had an opportunity to review the previous responses. If you require further assistance, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

[v-aatheeque]

Hi @arca123 

Following up to confirm if the earlier responses addressed your query. If not, please share your questions and we’ll assist further.

[arca123]

Sorry for not getting back to you earlier. I accepted your response as solution. Thanks for being so thorough and offering multiple options. Great insights, and this will definitely help me with my issue 🙂