Power BI September 2026 Feature Summary
As the Power BI, Microsoft Fabric, data, and analytics community gathers in Barcelona for the European Microsoft Fabric + SQL Community Conference, this month is packed with news. From new Copilot and AI experiences to reporting, modeling, data connectivity, developer enhancements, and mobile updates, we're sharing the latest innovations designed to help you build, analyze, and act on your data more effectively. Whether you're joining us in person or following along from afar, this roundup is your guide to everything new across Power BI this month. General Deprecation of Old File Picker experience in Power BI Desktop In April we deprecated the old file picker experience in Power BI Desktop. Starting in October, users using versions of Power BI Desktop from March 2026 or earlier will no longer be able to save and share Power BI files to OneDrive and SharePoint. Please ensure you update Power BI Desktop to keep using this functionality. Copilot and AI Power BI Agentic Experiences (Generally Available) Agentic development in Power BI is real, and it is already delivering value: whether you are starting from scratch with greenfield projects or building upon existing solutions in brownfield scenarios, BI developers can delegate the work to an agent, review the result, and refine it rather than starting from scratch every time. What makes this work is tools and context. Through Work IQ and Fabric IQ, the agent grounds its work in your business context—your data, your semantics, and the way your organization operates. Through skills—published by Microsoft in skills-for-fabric, shared by the community, or personalized by your own team—it also picks up your development context: the modeling and reporting practices, conventions, and workflows your team expects. Through tools such as the Power BI Authoring MCP server and the Power BI Desktop Bridge CLI, the agent can act on that context: reading and changing semantic models and reports directly, reloading its edits in Power BI tools, and reviewing its own work. Point an agent at a requirements document or a screenshot of the layout you want, describe what you need, and the agent can help accelerate the initial authoring pass, which you can then review and refine. rt authoring skills. What's available today The powerbi-authoring plugin in microsoft/skills-for-fabric bundling the semantic modeling and reporting agent skills and tools. It was recently updated to support report authoring for remote semantic models in Power BI service and an expanded range of supported report visuals, including custom visuals. To learn more, refer to the Power BI skills documentation. The local Power BI Authoring MCP server allows the agent to edit semantic models in Power BI Desktop. To learn more, refer to the Power BI Authoring MCP documentation. Power BI Desktop Bridge lets an agent reload changes in a running instance of Power BI Desktop and capture screenshots to check its own work. To learn more, refer to the Power BI Desktop Bridge documentation. Browser-based validation for remote report editing, so the agent can validate a report using a headless browser (an automated browser that runs without a visible user interface). Removing the local Power BI Desktop dependency allows the full authoring loop to run without Power BI Desktop, extending the agentic experience to Mac users and others who do not rely on a local installation. To learn more and get started, refer to the Power BI agentic documentation. Microsoft 365 Copilot is coming to Power BI (Preview) Copilot experiences have emerged across the applications people use every day, bringing AI closer to the work happening in each product. But this can also feel fragmented, with different entry points, separate conversations, and uncertainty about which Copilot agent to use. Our goal is to create a consistent Copilot experience that is available wherever people work. People should not have to leave the application they are using to find it. Microsoft 365 Copilot should be available within their experience, carry relevant context across experiences, and connect to the specialized intelligence of each product. We’re taking an important step toward that goal with a preview of Microsoft 365 Copilot integrated directly into Power BI and Microsoft Fabric. This integration gives users a familiar place to bring together business context and trusted data. Shared conversation history lets them continue a discussion as they move between Microsoft 365 Copilot experiences instead of starting over in each application. ower BI experience, including integration with Work IQ. In Power BI, a question no longer has to stop with the numbers in a report. A sales leader could use Fabric IQ to identify which regions are behind plan, then use Work IQ to connect the results with customer emails, meetings, account plans, and documents. They could summarize the complete picture and even kick off actions and tasks in Cowork, all from inside Power BI. This work context and ability to move directly from insight to action were not available in the standalone Power BI Copilot experience. the Cowork integration into the Power BI experience, highlighting the full Microsoft 365 experience embedded into Power BI. A new setting in the Fabric admin portal will determine whether this integration is available by enabling or disabling its entry point in the navigation pane. It will be off by default, giving administrators time to evaluate the experience before introducing it to their organization. Administrators can enable it when they are ready and disable it if they need to pause access. This setting is independent of the existing setting for standalone Power BI Copilot. If both settings are enabled, users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license will see entry points for both experiences, and standalone Power BI Copilot will continue to appear on Home. If standalone Power BI Copilot is disabled and Microsoft 365 Copilot is enabled, users will see only the Microsoft 365 Copilot entry point. During the initial preview, the integrated experience is available only to users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license. These users receive the full Copilot Chat experience in Power BI and Fabric, bringing together Fabric data through Fabric IQ and relevant Microsoft 365 context through Work IQ. Existing permissions and governance controls continue to determine which content each user can access. Support for a broader Fabric audience will follow. This expansion will give Fabric users without a Microsoft 365 Copilot license access to an integrated Copilot experience tailored to their available capabilities. The experience may differ from the full licensed offering, but it will extend Fabric IQ and conversational data experiences to more types of Fabric users. The preview will roll out with the setting turned off by default, with administrators choosing when to enable it for their organization. This is an important step toward one Copilot that meets people wherever they work, connecting the context surrounding each decision with trusted business data. To learn more, refer to the Copilot in Power BI documentation. Power BI data answers in Microsoft Copilot Chat (Generally Available) Users can find and ask questions about Power BI reports and semantic models directly from Microsoft 365 Copilot. They can search for relevant Power BI content, attach a report or provide a link, and ask questions in natural language. Powered by Fabric IQ, the experience uses the data, measures, relationships, and business logic already defined in Power BI to provide grounded answers. Users can also bring Power BI insights into conversations that include their Microsoft 365 work context, such as emails, meetings, and documents. Microsoft 365 Copilot now supports Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies and information protection controls for this experience. This helps organizations adopt conversational analytics while applying their existing policies for identifying, classifying, and protecting sensitive data. The experience continues to respect existing Power BI permissions and Microsoft 365 governance controls. Users can only access Power BI content they are authorized to view, and administrators retain control over whether Fabric data is available in Microsoft 365 Copilot. Organizations can use Power BI data answering in Microsoft 365 Copilot with production support and service commitments. This milestone makes it easier for users to bring trusted business data into the flow of work without leaving Microsoft 365 Copilot or creating a separate agent. To learn more, refer to the Fabric IQ in Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat (Frontier) documentation. Fabric IQ Plugin in Microsoft 365 Copilot Cowork (Generally Available) Power BI data is available where multi-step work happens, so a business question, the analysis behind it, and the follow-up it triggers stay in one place. To ground a task in Power BI, users can search for relevant content, attach a report, or paste a link to a report or semantic model. Questions are answered using the data, measures, relationships, and business logic already defined in the semantic model. Coverage now extends to reports published through organizational apps, with improvements to content discovery, large model handling, schema selection, Verified Answers, and row-level value search. The plugin also carries forward the governance controls organizations rely on in Power BI: Existing access controls: Power BI permissions and row-level security determine which reports and semantic models each user can reach. Citations and sensitivity labels: Responses cite the Power BI content behind an answer and surface the Microsoft Purview Information Protection label applied to it, so users can see where a number came from and how it is classified. From insight to action: With Fabric IQ, users can analyze Power BI reports using natural language, uncover key findings, and put those findings to work right away in Cowork. Whether they are summarizing business performance, investigating a trend, or answering a data question, Fabric IQ turns trusted organizational data into outcomes. To learn more about supported scenarios, setup, and current considerations, refer to the Fabric IQ in Microsoft 365 Copilot Cowork documentation. For licensing and pricing information, refer to Microsoft 365 Copilot plans and pricing. Build Fabric Apps more easily in GitHub Copilot App (Preview) Fabric Apps were introduced in June as an AI-first way to build custom web apps with Microsoft Fabric as the backend. This month we’re excited to share that building these Fabric Apps on your governed data has become even easier with the GitHub Copilot App, which gives you a natural language chat interface instead of a command-line interface. . To try it out, start by downloading the GitHub Copilot App. Then navigate to Customize > Plugins > Rayfin, and select Install to enable our dedicated plugin: Rayfin plugin in GitHub Copilot App. Once the plugin is enabled, simply start a new chat and work with Copilot to help plan your Fabric data app. After you review and approve the plan, ask the agent to execute it and specify the workspace where you want to deploy the app. . We look forward to seeing the amazing apps you build! Check out our community gallery for inspiration. Enhanced Report Consumption Copilot with Fabric IQ When viewing a Power BI report, you can enable Fabric IQ from the Copilot pane to better answer complex questions about your data. This enhancement merges existing Fabric IQ capabilities into Power BI Copilot report viewing mode, allowing Copilot to use a multi-step approach to evaluate data in the semantic model and refine its approach when generating a response. . With Fabric IQ enabled, Copilot can: Provide better answers to questions about your data based on detailed reasoning capabilities directly into the report viewing experience. Show reasoning steps to help you understand how Copilot provided an answer. Generate Fabric visuals to help you further analyze your data. Answers can include column, bar, stacked, line, area, pie, donut, scatter visuals. Provide the underlying DAX query and data table used to generate a response. . To learn more, refer to the Ask Copilot questions about your data documentation. New control for Copilot access to semantic models Power BI now provides semantic model editors with greater control over how Copilot can be used with their data. Users with write permissions can block read-only users from accessing a semantic model through Copilot and Microsoft’s remote MCP tools, supporting governance, compliance, and access-control requirements. The setting applies across Copilot experiences that query the semantic model, including Power BI Copilot experiences; Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat and Cowork; and data agents, remote Fabric MCP servers, and Power BI MCP servers. When disabled, users with read-only access won't be able to access that semantic model through these experiences. By default, the setting remains enabled to preserve the current behavior. This setting appears in the Copilot section with the following description: “Allow any person with read-only access to use AI (i.e. Copilot, Microsoft’s MCP tools) on the model and its related reports.” Setting that allows people with read-only permission to use AI experiences with the semantic model and its related reports. This update gives organizations a clear and enforceable way to control AI access to semantic model data while maintaining flexibility for semantic model editors. To learn more, refer to the Use Copilot with Semantic Models in Power BI documentation. Remote Power BI Authoring MCP Server (Preview) The Power BI Authoring MCP enables AI applications to create and modify semantic models in Fabric workspaces, without installing or maintaining anything local. This release also unblocks Mac users that want to use the Power BI Authoring MCP, because the server runs remotely and does not require local binaries. Use the following endpoint in AI applications such as GitHub Copilot App: https://api.fabric.microsoft.com/v1/mcp/powerbi/authoring The local Power BI Authoring MCP server, released in November 2025, remains generally available. It remains an option when an agent needs to work with Power BI Desktop, Power BI Project (PBIP) or TMDL files on disk. The local and remote servers support the same authoring capabilities. We recommend using the remote server when local development is not required, such as when creating a Direct Lake semantic model in a Fabric workspace. In the following example, the AI agent uses one tool call to create a Direct Lake semantic model connected to a Fabric Lakehouse: To learn more, refer to the Power BI Authoring MCP server documentation. Reporting New Report Ribbon on the web (Preview) The Report ribbon is now available on the web, providing a consistent experience for report consumption and authoring that more closely matches Power BI Desktop. The ribbon organizes commands into clear, easy-to-navigate tabs, making it easier for users to discover features, interact with reports, and complete editing and authoring tasks directly in the browser. It also introduces the new Design ribbon and additional capabilities that were previously unavailable on the web, such as Format Painter. This milestone brings greater consistency to Power BI report-authoring experiences and marks an important step toward a seamless, end-to-end reporting workflow on the web. As web authoring capabilities continue to expand, users will be able to accomplish more of their reporting tasks directly in the browser, enabling a more streamlined, productive workflow. Enable the Try the new ribbon (preview) at the top of the page to explore the new experience. You can disable the setting to return to the previous ribbon. To learn more, refer to the Report Ribbon on the web documentation. Live Visual Sharing in Outlook on the web (Preview) For years, sharing data through email has been stagnant. You could send a screenshot, but it immediately became stale. You could attach a report link, but recipients had to leave their workflow to find the context they needed. And every follow-up question often meant another screenshot, another export, or another email thread. Now, we're bringing a new way to share Power BI insights directly in the flow of work with Live Visual Sharing in Outlook. With Live Visual Sharing, you can insert a Power BI visual into Outlook on the web and share it as a live, interactive experience. Recipients can view and interact with the visual directly in Outlook while staying connected to the latest underlying data. When a live visual is shared, Outlook renders an interactive version of the Power BI visual. Rather than embedding a static image, the experience remains connected to the source report and retrieves current data when viewed. Recipients can: Interact with the visual directly in Outlook on the web. Access tooltips and explore data points. See filters and slicers applied at the time of sharing. View refresh information and data context. Navigate back to the source report when deeper analysis is needed. The result is a richer conversation around data, directly within Outlook. Sharing a live visual is simple: Open a Power BI report in the service. Select a visual to share, then select More options in the upper-right corner. Select Share. Select Link to this visual. A pop-up will appear asking if you want to use the current view (apply existing filters and slicers) or not. After selecting Create Link, the link is copied to your clipboard. Open Outlook on the web. This experience is not available in the Outlook desktop app. Create a new email. Paste the link in the email. The visual renders in loop after a few seconds! You can also share the same link in a Loop page, and the visual will also be rendered. By combining Power BI, Outlook, and Loop-powered experiences, we're bringing data closer to where collaboration happens. Live Visual Sharing can support more informed, data-driven conversations in Outlook. To learn more about Live Visual Sharing in Outlook, refer to the Share live Power BI visuals documentation. More control and context in Power BI Home (Generally Available) Power BI Home now provides additional context and personalization options to help users discover the right content more efficiently. With new freshness indicators and customizable list views, you can quickly identify the most relevant reports and semantic models, prioritize the metadata that matters most, and tailor the experience to fit your workflow. Find the right content more easily Discover the right content more easily with new Data Refreshed and Modified Date columns in Power BI Home. By bringing the freshness signals already familiar from workspace list views into Home, users can more easily spot recently updated reports and semantic models, distinguish between similar items, and quickly find the content that matters most. Whether you're checking for the latest business updates or deciding which refreshed report to open, you can navigate with greater confidence and less guesswork. Customize your Home list view Not every user, team, or organization relies on the same signals to discover content. With Column Options, you can show or hide metadata, drag and reorder columns to prioritize the information you use most, and reset to the default view at any time. Whether you rely on freshness signals, endorsements, sensitivity labels, or location information, you can tailor Home to match your workflow. To learn more, refer to the Power BI Home documentation. Set and reset column widths in table and matrix (Generally Available) You can now right-click a column header in a table or matrix and select Set column width to specify its width in pixels. This option helps report viewers improve readability and fit the information they need within the available space, without changing the report author’s design or affecting other viewers. Changes made by viewers last only for the current viewing session. To restore the width defined by the report author, right-click the column header and select Reset column width. To learn more, refer to the Adjust column width in Power BI tables documentation. Visual calculations for small multiples (Generally Available) You can now use visual calculations in visuals with small multiples. Create calculations such as moving averages and compare trends across categories without adding separate measures to the semantic model. In the visual matrix, the field in the small multiples field well appears on the ROWPAGES axis. You can select ROWPAGES by itself or combine them with ROWS and COLUMNS to control how the calculation moves through the visual. e: Create a moving average visual calculation for a line chart divided into small multiples by country. To learn more, refer to the Visual calculations overview documentation. Design ribbon for Power BI reports (Generally Available) The new Design ribbon brings report styling tools together in one location. Apply a built-in or organizational theme, open the Theme pane to customize report-wide defaults, or import and download theme files directly from the ribbon. You can also quickly open Page size, Page background, and Wallpaper settings for the current page. Two new built-in themes, Dark and Soft dark, use the new Versa color palette and styling that closely follows the Fluent 2 base theme. These themes let you design against a dark report canvas and return to the default light theme before publishing if needed. To learn more, refer to the Use the Design ribbon in Power BI documentation. Slider color options for Slicer visual (Generally Available) Match your slicer's slider to your report design. The Slicer visual's Between, Before, After, and Date picker settings include a Slider format section where you can turn the slider on or off, set the handle style, and choose colors for the handles, selected range, and track. Handle options adjust based on the Responsive layout toggle (General > Properties > Advanced options). When Responsive is on, handles appear as circles with Fill color, Border, and Size. When Responsive is off, handles appear as rectangular bars with Border, Width, and Height. To learn more, refer to the Slicer visual in Power BI documentation. Translytical task flows show user date function (UDF) information in button action (Generally Available) The formatting pane now displays the Workspace, Function set, and Data function assigned to a data function button. These read-only details help you confirm that the button references the intended function without reopening the OneLake catalog. This information is especially useful when you review or troubleshoot reports that use several functions or connect to functions across multiple workspaces. To learn how to configure data function buttons, refer to Create a data function button in Power BI. Format pane headers stay visible as you scroll (Generally Available) Expanded section headers now remain visible at the top of the Format visual pane as you scroll through their settings. This update helps you keep track of the section you’re editing, especially when a section contains many formatting options. For example, when you scroll through color settings, the Colors and Data colors headers remain visible for context. To learn more about formatting visuals, refer to Get started formatting report visualizations. Pick the axis initial scroll position (Generally Available) Categorical axes—like month, year, or product name—show a scrollbar when there are more categories than fit in the visual. Until now, the scrollbar always started at the beginning of the data, so the oldest values displayed first. This month, you can set Initial scroll position to End on the axis Layout section, and the visual loads with the most recent data in view. Users can still scroll back to see earlier history. The option is available on stacked, clustered, and 100% stacked bar and column charts; line, area, stacked area, and 100% stacked area charts; line and stacked column and line and clustered column charts; ribbon, waterfall, and scatter charts with a categorical X-axis. Initial scroll positionset toEndon the X-axis. The scrollbar is positioned on the right, showing the most recent months first. To learn more, refer to the Customize x-axis and y-axis properties documentation. Azure Maps geocoding improvements (Generally Available) Large reference layers now render correctly when you filter your report. Reference layers add geographic context using points, lines, and polygons, such as locations, routes, postal codes, sales territories, and administrative regions. The Azure Maps visual renders up to 30,000 reference-layer features at a time. Previously, when a reference layer exceeded this limit, features excluded from the initial view could remain missing even after a report filter narrowed the data to a smaller area. . . . Now, Azure Maps re-evaluates the reference-layer features whenever report filters are applied. The unfiltered view is still limited to 30,000 features, but a filtered view accurately displays the relevant features, up to that limit. On-object interaction improvements (Preview) Based on your feedback during preview, we're introducing the first in a series of on-object interaction improvements, designed to make quick edits to your visuals easier. This month we're refining how you add data and manage some visual elements. The Build flyout now opens only when you select Add data, helping you stay focused when dragging and dropping data directly onto a visual or into the Build pane. We’ve also separated Title and Subtitle in the Add to your visual flyout, so you can manage them independently. In addition, title and subtitle are now turned off by default for matrix, table, and card visuals in reports that use the latest base theme. New reports automatically use the latest base theme. For existing reports, select Update theme in the Theme pane to apply this change. You can turn either element back on when needed. to your visual menu. To learn more, refer to the using on-object interaction with visuals and updating to the latest base theme documentation. Support for Fabric Apps in Org apps (Coming Soon) Soon, users will be able to include generative Fabric Apps alongside the reports, dashboards, notebooks, and other content in your Org Apps. For example, imagine you want people to rate the content in an Org App and share feedback about what would make it more useful. You can create a Fabric App for that experience and add it directly to the Org App. Whether you’re helping people explore what could happen next, act on an insight, or complete a specialized workflow, Fabric Apps give you a flexible new way to build for your audience without sending them somewhere else. Together, organizational apps and Fabric Apps provide a way to bring enterprise reporting, content, and tailored experiences together for your organization. Learn more about org apps and item types supported, including Fabric Apps. Changes to Power BI subscription email delivery Power BI is updating the platform used to deliver subscription emails as part of ongoing improvements to delivery reliability and long-term service health. As eligible subscriptions move to the updated platform, customers may notice changes to the sender identity and email formatting. Each subscription transfers automatically when it moves. Customers do not need to recreate it or change its schedule or recipients. After selecting Subscribe for an item, an information icon identifies a subscription that has moved to the updated email delivery platform. Learn more about changes to Power BI subscription emails. Increased Export to Excel row limits (Coming Soon) Many users export Power BI data to Excel for further analysis. This month, we're increasing the maximum number of rows that can be exported from table visuals using Data with current layout from 150,000 to 500,000. This increase helps you analyze larger datasets in Excel with fewer export operations. s. To learn more about exporting data from Power BI visuals, refer to Export data from a Power BI visualization. Value selection in Narrative visual We are replacing the Q&A natural language experience for creating dynamic values in the Narrative visual and text box with a more deterministic UI. This is due to the ongoing deprecation of the Q&A tool, and also based on feedback that it was hard to deterministically pick exact values through the Q&A experience. Authors can now create and edit custom values through a direct, deterministic UI: select a column or measure, apply any valid summarization, and add any type of filter. Auto-generated values are unchanged, and values previously authored with Q&A remain available as read-only. To learn more, refer to the Create Smart Narrative documentation. Modeling Create and edit DirectQuery semantic models in the Power BI service DirectQuery semantic models can now be created and edited directly in the Power BI service, eliminating the need to download and use Power BI Desktop. Previously, building models that query data sources in real time meant downloading Desktop, authoring the model, and publishing it to the web. Now, web-based modeling gives your team the freedom to: Work from any device: Mac, Linux and Windows users can now author DirectQuery models straight from the browser. Collaborate in real time: Multiple team members can work on the same semantic model simultaneously. Ditch the desktop loop: Skip the download-edit-republish cycle and update your models instantly in the service. Capabilities on the web Start from scratch: Connect to a supported data source and choose DirectQuery mode. Figure: Power Query interface displaying data source connection settings, with DirectQuery selected as the data connectivity mode. Full modeling control: Open existing DirectQuery models to manage relationships, write DAX and tweak table/column properties. : Model View in Power BI Service showing tables, relationships, and the properties panel for editing a DirectQuery semantic model. Flexible storage modes: Easily switch table storage modes from DirectQuery to Import or Dual if needed. : Properties pane that allows user to switch table storage modes from DirectQuery to Import or Dual. Thanks to this new capability, composite models are also available on the web! Head to the Power BI service and open one of your DirectQuery semantic models or create a brand-new one. We'd love to hear what you think! Learn more in the DirectQuery documentation. Approximate Distinct Count comes to Import and Direct Lake (Preview) Distinct count is one of the most resource-intensive operations in any analytical engine. As data cardinality grows, so do CPU and memory usage, often slowing down your interactive reports. APPROXIMATEDISTINCTCOUNT already offered a faster alternative for DirectQuery sources such as Azure SQL, Synapse, BigQuery, Databricks, and Snowflake. This month we're extending support to Import, Direct Lake on OneLake, and Direct Lake on SQL semantic models. DAX = APPROXIMATEDISTINCTCOUNT(<columnName>) : Model View in Power BI Service showing tables, relationships, and the properties panel for editing a DirectQuery semantic model. How it works and when to use it Instead of scanning every single unique value, APPROXIMATEDISTINCTCOUNT calculates a highly accurate estimate of unique values with a standard error rate of ~1.6%. In return, you get faster query execution times. Best for high-cardinality columns: Use it on columns with millions of unique values (such as transaction IDs, user IDs, or timestamps) where an approximate result can reduce the resources required to calculate distinct values. Keep standard DISTINCTCOUNT for low-cardinality data: Stick to exact counts for smaller attributes like Country, Category, or Status, where standard calculation is already fast, or for financial metrics where absolute precision is required. Swap APPROXIMATEDISTINCTCOUNT into your heaviest measures today and let us know how much speed you gain on your models! Learn more in the APPROXIMATEDISTINCTCOUNT documentation. Accelerate text searches in your semantic models with String Indexing (Preview) String Indexing for Power BI semantic models is coming soon! If your reports rely heavily on text fields, such as product names, customer comments, or long descriptions, you’ve likely faced slow performance when users search or filter on large semantic models. String Indexing is designed to improve text-search performance in supported semantic models. Why String Indexing? Common text operations like DAX functions (SEARCH(), CONTAINSSTRING()) and advanced text slicers in reports traditionally scan data row-by-row. As datasets grow, these scans slow down query times. String Indexing builds specialized indexes so the engine can locate matching text more efficiently, which can improve report responsiveness for both Import and Direct Lake semantic models. Indexing modes You can configure String Indexing via model metadata to fit your workload needs: Auto Mode: Automatically builds the index on the first query execution for a qualifying column. The index does not persist in storage; it remains in memory only while the column is loaded and will be rebuilt on subsequent queries if evicted. Ideal for smaller models. Full Mode: Builds and persists the index during scheduled data refreshes. While refresh times and model size may slightly increase, users enjoy consistently fast query performance right out of the box. Get started String Indexing requires a semantic model running at 1707 compatibility level. During this initial preview phase, indexing can be configured through TMDL on the web or XMLA metadata. Desktop support and a dedicated UI experience within Power BI are planned for a future release to simplify setup. Check out the String Indexing documentation for setting up instructions, prerequisites, and guidance on choosing the right indexing mode for your models. We look forward to seeing how this feature helps make text-heavy reporting experiences faster and more responsive! Introducing Full-Text Search in Power BI Semantic Models (Preview) Full-Text Indexing for Power BI semantic models is coming soon! While traditional string searches look for exact character matches, Full-Text Indexing enables a more intelligent search experience based on the meaning of words and natural language concepts. This capability powers two new DAX functions, TEXTCONTAINS() and TEXTSIMILARITY(), making it easier than ever to analyze large volumes of textual data directly in your semantic models. Why Full-Text Indexing? Business data increasingly contains rich text content such as customer feedback, support tickets, product descriptions, incident summaries, and knowledge articles. Searching this data using traditional string matching often requires exact matches and can miss relevant results due to differences in spelling, word forms, or phrasing. Full-Text Indexing builds a specialized search index at the column level, allowing semantic models to understand words rather than just character sequences. This enables advanced search experiences such as: Finding related words through linguistic analysis (for example, run, running, and runs) Matching singular and plural variations automatically Ignoring common stop words such as "the" or "and" Supporting phrase-based searches Tolerating minor spelling mistakes through fuzzy matching Enabling semantic similarity search scenarios Getting Started FTS Indexing requires a semantic model running at 1708 compatibility level. During this initial preview phase, indexing can be configured through TMDL on the web or XMLA metadata. Desktop support and a dedicated UI experience within Power BI are planned for a future release to simplify setup. New DAX functions Full-Text Indexing is required for two new DAX functions: TEXTCONTAINS() Returns TRUE when a text value matches a search expression using full-text search semantics rather than simple substring matching. It supports multiple search modes, including keyword matching, phrase matching, and fuzzy matching for typo tolerance TextContains(<WithinTextColumn>, <SearchText>, [MatchMode]) Example: "Show me all reviews that mention spa." The review either matches or it doesn't. TEXTSIMILARITY() Returns a relevance score indicating how well the text in <WithinTextColumn> matches <SearchText>. It enables similarity-based text comparisons, helping identify records that are semantically related even when they do not contain the exact same words. TextSimilarity(<WithinTextColumn>, <SearchText> [, <MatchMode>]) Example: "Show me the 10 reviews most relevant to 'good breakfast'." Reviews mentioning both terms prominently rank higher than reviews that only partially match. Learn more about these two new DAX functions (TEXTCONTAINS, TEXTSIMILARITY) in our documentation. Full-Text Indexing is supported for both Import and Direct Lake models, with Full mode recommended (during Preview) for the best out-of-the-box performance and user experience. Refer to the Full Text Indexing documentation to learn more about prerequisites, configuration options, and setup instructions. Data connectivity New Power Query editor (Preview) Since May of this year, the modern Get Data experience has been available in preview inside Power BI Desktop; the feedback we've gathered from that rollout has directly shaped what comes next. Your reports of friction points, missing capabilities, and rough edges between the legacy and modern interfaces went straight into the backlog, and this month that work pays off: the full modern Power Query Editor experience moves into preview. It's the same trusted engine, wrapped in a completely refreshed editing surface — and we're still closing the remaining gaps with the legacy UI as we go. Let's explore six key reasons to enable and try this feature. Modern Get Data - The same connector browsing and search experience you already know from Fabric Dataflow Gen2 — now in Desktop. Searchable, categorized, and designed to make connectors easier to find and navigate than the legacy dialog. Try it: Connect to a new data source and browse the OneLake catalog. To learn more, refer to the Data sources in Power BI Desktop documentation. Dark theme, end to end - No more jarring light-mode panes breaking your flow. The legacy editor only partially supported dark theme. The modern editor applies it consistently across the preview grid, dialogs, and other parts of the editing surface. Folding visibility - Stop guessing whether your query folds. Step folding indicators mark each step as folding or not, and the new query plan shows exactly how the engine intends to evaluate your query — and where folding breaks down. Try it: Open the query plan on a query with several steps and find where folding stops. To learn more, refer to the Understanding Query Evaluation and Query Folding in Power Query documentation. Diagram view - See how your queries relate to each other visually, instead of reverse-engineering it from names. A gamechanger for files you've inherited or models with long reference/merge chains. Try it: Open a file with referenced queries and trace a merge visually. To learn more, refer to the Diagram view documentation. New capabilities, now on Desktop - Features that used to live only on the web are now here: rank column, cluster values, schema view, query script view, plus upgrades to transforms you already use daily. Try it: Add a rank column or cluster values on a messy text column. To learn more, refer to the Rank column and Use Schema View documentation. Export a Power Query template - Capture your solution at a point in time and take it with you. Export a template from Desktop and import it straight into a Dataflow Gen2 — queries, steps, and structure intact. Try it: Export a template from a multi-query file and import it into a Dataflow Gen2 to compare. Figure: Screenshot of the Export template experience in the Power Query editor. To learn more, refer to the Power Query template documentation. Ready to try it? Enabling the modern Power Query experience takes just a few seconds — no restart required: Open Power BI Desktop. Locate: File > Options and settings > Options. Under Preview features, check New Power Query experience. Open (or reopen) the Power Query Editor — you're now in the modern experience. Once you've had a chance to explore this new user interface and its experiences, we want to hear from you. Share your thoughts on the new Power Query experience in the Fabric Community — what's working, what's missing, and what would make it a compelling alternative from the legacy editor. Every comment helps shape what ships next. Microsoft Outlook Mail connector (Preview) We're introducing the new Microsoft Outlook Mail connector (Preview) for Power BI Desktop. Built on the Microsoft Graph API, it lets you read your mailbox data — folders, messages, and attachments — using an organizational account. This is the first in a set of new connectors we'll be releasing as a modern alternative to the Exchange Online connector. The initial preview is scoped to Mail in Power BI Desktop. Additional connectors for Calendar Events, Contacts, and Tasks are on the roadmap, along with Excel and Power BI service / Fabric Dataflows Gen2 support. Scheduled refresh isn't supported yet — this applies to both the Power BI service and refreshes routed through the on-premises data gateway. To try it, enable the Microsoft Outlook Mail preview feature under Options in Power BI Desktop, then open Get Data → Online Services → Microsoft Outlook Mail and sign in with your organizational account. To learn more, refer to the Microsoft Outlook Mail connector documentation. More flexible Data Privacy Firewall query patterns in Power BI Desktop (Preview) Power BI Desktop now allows Data Privacy Firewall partitions that reference other partitions also access data sources when the privacy levels of the involved data sources are compatible. Introduced in the July 2026 release and enabled by default, this preview setting aligns Power BI Desktop with Power Query Online, gateways, and the Power BI service. This change supports common query patterns in which one query returns a value that another query uses to build a web request, SQL statement, file path, or other data source request. These patterns can now run without refactoring queries or duplicating logic solely to satisfy the previous partition restriction. The Data Privacy Firewall remains active. Power Query continues to evaluate the privacy levels of the involved data sources before combining data, helping authors use more flexible query designs while preserving privacy protections. To learn more, refer to the Allow data privacy firewall partitions that reference other partitions to also access data sources documentation. Mobile Mobile page indicator (Generally Available) Know immediately which report pages are mobile-ready, without clicking through them. Each page that has a mobile layout shows an icon on its page tab in the footer, so you can spot your mobile coverage instantly. Pages without a mobile layout stay unmarked, making it easy to see what's left to optimize. The icon is coming soon to both Power BI Desktop and the Power BI service. In Power BI Desktop, it appears in both desktop layout view and mobile layout view, so you can track mobile coverage right where you work. In the Power BI service, it appears in mobile layout view. Page tabs marked with an icon to show which pages have a mobile layout. To learn how to build mobile-optimized reports, refer to the Mobile-optimized Power BI reports overview documentation. Contact details in Info drawer (Generally Available) We’re making it easier to connect with the right people from the Power BI Mobile app. You can now find contact details in the Info drawer for reports, apps, and dashboards, and email the relevant contact directly from your phone. To learn more about Power BI in mobile, refer to the What Are the Power BI Mobile Apps? documentation. Developers and APIs Power BI Projects (PBIP) (Generally Available) Since entering preview in 2023, PBIP has changed how developers build and manage Power BI content. It stores report and semantic model definitions as human-readable text files, turning a Power BI solution into a codebase. Developers can search these files, track changes in Git, review diffs in pull requests, automate updates with scripts and pipelines, and use AI agents to work with models and reports. Changes remain visible and reversible, which makes team development easier and safer. Recent improvements have made the workflow more practical. These include opening a project directly in Visual Studio Code and detecting external file changes in Power BI Desktop. New underlying formats capabilities: Tabular Model Definition Language (TMDL) for semantic models. Power BI Enhanced Report Format (PBIR) for reports. PBIR is now the default report format for PBIX and PBIP files. New reports use it from the start. When you edit a report that uses the legacy format, Power BI tools automatically convert it to PBIR. To learn more, refer to the Power BI Projects documentation. New Purge Data option for Fabric APIs The new Purge Data option for Fabric APIs gives developers and administrators greater control over programmatic semantic model deployments. This capability allows users to explicitly approve deployments that may require removing existing data, helping unblock scenarios such as schema or data type changes that previously failed validation checks. Designed with both safety and automation in mind, purgeData keeps data protection safeguards enabled by default while giving developers the flexibility they need to manage complex deployment scenarios at scale. To learn more, refer to the Purge Data documentation. Other Data updated and sensitivity fields of Power BI report in Microsoft Teams preview card (Coming Soon) Power BI report previews in Microsoft Teams will soon surface the report's last refresh date and sensitivity label. These additional signals will help users quickly assess the freshness, relevance, and classification of a report before opening it. To learn how Power BI content is displayed in Microsoft Teams, refer to the Link preview cards in Microsoft Teams chats and channels documentation. Artifact info header for Power BI tabs in Microsoft Teams (Generally Available) Power BI content in Microsoft Teams tabs now includes the artifact info header, giving users the context they need without leaving their flow of work. Available for reports, apps, organizational apps, dashboards, and scorecards, the header brings key artifact information and actions together in one place. The new header displays the artifact name and sensitivity label and provides an entry point to artifact metadata. You can open the artifact in the Power BI personal app in Teams, open it in a browser, and refresh the tab. Tab owners can control their experience with the new Show info header setting on the tab settings page. The setting is 'on’ by default and can be turned off when a more compact tab experience is preferred. To learn how to add Power BI content as a tab in Microsoft Teams, refer to the Embed Power BI reports in Microsoft Teams documentation. Third-party custom visuals graphomate matrix The graphomate chartrix is a brand-new charting visual, and it offers various improvements over graphomate charts. First and probably most obvious is the new interactive user interface which enables users to define most elements of the chart layout directly on the visual. To keep this interface effective and uncluttered it focuses on the most important parameters of your chart. Users can now create combination charts which were simply not possible before. There are also new chart types like the variance waterfall, which automatically renders from one measure and two dimensions. Of course, the graphomate chartrix is IBCS® certified. With the latest release an XFL editor has been introduced, which helps you write scripts to format the chartrix far beyond the possibilities of the regular option set. XFL scripts also provide a way to conditionally format the visualization, dynamically changing properties in relation to the actual data. This new visual is provided free of charge to existing customers of the graphomate charts. All development efforts will be focused on making the graphomate chartrix the best IBCS® charting visual there is. Video Link: graphomate chartrix for Microsoft Power BI AppSource Link: graphomate chartrix Sample Report Link Drill Down Bubble PRO by ZoomCharts Drill Down Bubble PRO is a Power BI visual designed for exploring relationships, trends, and outliers across multiple dimensions of data. It adds richer exploration, selection, and analytical capabilities directly inside the visual. Key features include: Multi-level drill down to explore data hierarchies from a high-level overview to detailed insights. Pan and zoom controls to navigate dense datasets and focus on specific clusters or individual data points. Area and lasso selection to quickly isolate groups of bubbles and use selections for interactive analysis and filtering. Dynamic regression lines that recalculate as the displayed data changes, making trends and relationships easier to identify. Line and area thresholds to highlight targets, ranges, exceptions, or other important business benchmarks. Area shading to visually group and compare selected segments of data. 200+ formatting settings to tailor the chart to different reporting and branding needs. Figure: Drill Down Bubble PRO demonstrates multi-level drill down, panning, and zoom controls for exploring data from high-level patterns to detailed points. These capabilities make Drill Down Bubble PRO especially useful for customer segmentation, sales analysis, portfolio analysis, performance monitoring, and other scenarios where users need to actively explore patterns rather than simply display them. Get on Markeplace Commenting in view mode: introducing Zebra BI Tables+ & Charts+ It's month-end. A regional manager opens the report, spots a variance in their region, and knows exactly why it happened. But the report isn't theirs to edit, so the explanation ends up where it always does: a screenshot pasted into PowerPoint, emailed around, detached from the number that prompted it. That's the collaboration gap. Your report shows what happened; the why and the what next leave the report and get lost. Meet Zebra BI Tables+ and Charts+: two new visuals that keep everything existing Zebra BI Tables and Charts offer and add a built-in collaboration layer. Report viewers can add comments directly on a data point, in view mode, with no Power BI edit access. Each comment is anchored to the exact figure and stored in your own SharePoint file. Zebra BI stores nothing. ting files from SharePoint, and collaborate directly in view mode. So instead of screenshotting insights into PowerPoint or maintaining a custom workaround, the whole team explains and decides right on the report. Instead of slides or emails, the next steps can be defined directly on the spot. Stop losing good decisions to a missing context. Start making them on the report. Try Zebra BI Tables+ and Charts+ free for 14 days on AppSource. Network Graph by Powerviz The Powerviz Network Graph is a visual representation of Nodes and the relationships or connections between them. Its primary purpose is to illustrate how different entities are related or interact with one another. Key Features Line Options: Customise node links with different styles and colors. Node Shape: Choose from various shapes, icons, or upload your own. Labels: Display categories, values, and percentage labels. Data Colors: Access 30+ color palettes, including color-blind-safe options. Fill Patterns: Highlight nodes with patterns or upload your own. Conditional Formatting: Highlight outliers based on measures or category rules. Clusters: Group related nodes to reveal patterns. Relationships: Analyze node connections at a glance. Animation: Add pop-ups and highlight effects. Import/Export: Save and reuse themes easily. Toolbars: Gain advanced control over the graph. Other features included are Sorting, Ranking, Lasso / Reverse Lasso, Grid View and more. Business Use Cases Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Supply Chain Optimization, Social Network Analysis (SNA). Resources Try Network Graph visual for FREE from AppSource Check out all features of the visual Step-by-step instructions YouTube Video Learn more about visuals Follow Powerviz on LinkedIn Hierarchical Bar Chart New, exciting changes were made to Hierarchical Bar Chart. Bubble Matrix for stacks - The visual now provides the option to show stacks as bubbles below the bars. lues into bar-and-bubble matrix layouts for clearer comparison of category totals and component contributions. Display Stacks as Clustered Columns - From the format pane settings, you can choose to display stacks as clustered column chart. Filter using legends - You can click on a stack legend to filter out other stacks. On mouse hover relevant stack gets highlighted. Stack ribbons and %age of total - You can now choose to connect stacks with ribbon and show percentage of total for each stack. Resources Check out the Hierarchical Bar Chart Update YouTube video. Download the visual from APPSOURCE Download a sample pbix file For more information refer to Hierarchical Bar Chart or contact us. That’s a wrap! The European Microsoft Fabric + SQL Community Conference is just getting started, and there's never been a more exciting time to be part of the Power BI community. We hope these updates help you discover new capabilities, streamline your workflows, and get even more value from your data. Be sure to explore the links throughout this post for deeper technical guidance and follow along with the latest announcements and sessions from Barcelona.Power BI July 2026 Feature Summary
Welcome to the July 2026 Power BI update! This month, we're introducing new capabilities across reporting, modeling, mobile, and embedded analytics. Highlights include expanded modern visual defaults, conditional formatting improvements for line charts and legends, new org app capabilities and APIs, Model Options in the Power BI Service, and TMDL View on the web. Let's take a look at what's new this month. Download Power BI Desktop Events and Announcements Your Road to the Power BI DataViz World Championships Round Two of the Power BI DataViz World Championships is now open, with Round Three still ahead. Plus, one wildcard finalist will be selected from standout submissions across all stages of the championship. Is this your moment? The only way to find out is to enter. Every submission is a chance to learn something new, connect with the community, and showcase your creativity. You might surprise yourself along the way and earn a place in the finals. Join now. Data Days Goes Through August 7th Looking for your next Power BI breakthrough? Data Days brings together the best of data, AI, and analytics in free live sessions. Learn new skills, get inspired, and connect with the community. Learn more. Will we see you in Barcelona? The European Microsoft Fabric and SQL Community Conference take place September 28 to October 1 in Barcelona, Spain, bringing together Microsoft experts and community leaders for exclusive content, live demos, and key announcements, along with more than 130 sessions spanning Fabric, Azure AI, Databases, Power BI, and Microsoft Purview. And of course, the live Dataviz World Championships finale! The most recent event in Atlanta sold out. Don’t miss out and register for the Barcelona event with code FABCMTY200 to save €200. General Deprecation of Old File Picker experience in Power BI Desktop In April we deprecated the old file picker experience in Power BI Desktop. Starting in October, users still utilizing versions of Power BI desktop from March 2026 or earlier will no longer be able to save and share Power BI files to One Drive and SharePoint. Please ensure you update Power BI desktop to keep using this functionality. Note: No action is required from users as part of this deprecation; this is simply an informational announcement. Reporting Update your report defaults and use color palettes with the modern visual defaults (Preview) We've expanded the Modern Visual Defaults preview with a new Customize current theme experience directly in the Format pane. You can now adjust report-wide defaults that apply to all visuals on every page—without manually styling each one. Choose from color palettes to change your report's colors while preserving other customizations or use the expanded visual-level options to style or toggle elements like background, border, header icons, tooltips and shadow on or off across your entire report. You can also fine-tune border thickness, corner radius, and default padding. Every new visual you add automatically inherits your styling, so your report stays consistent as you build. Beyond visuals, you can update page size, background color, and wallpaper across all pages at once, and apply filter pane formatting to current and new pages. These customizations create a custom theme layered on top of your base theme. Styling applied to individual pages or visuals takes precedence, and you can reset any setting to re-enforce the theme defaults. When you're finished, export your custom theme to use in other reports or add it to your organizational themes so others can create uniformly styled reports. To get started, enable the Modern visual defaults and customize theme improvements preview in Options, then when nothing is selected on the page, choose the Customize current theme option in the Format pane. Visit our documentation to learn more about visual defaults in Power BI reports. Conditional formatting for line charts and legends (Generally Available) One of the highly requested features from the Power BI community is here: conditional formatting now extends to line charts and visuals with legends. This update applies to bar charts, column charts, pie charts, donut charts, and line charts—when these visuals have a legend, you can conditionally format their colors. For line charts, format line colors using a gradient based on the total value of each line, or by the category it represents. For example, when overlaying multiple years by month, apply a gradient that displays the most recent year in blue while older years fade to lighter shades of grey. Markers and series labels automatically inherit the conditional formatting until you choose to color them differently. For visuals with category legends, you can ensure consistent colors across your entire report. If multiple visuals use Segment as their legend, color each segment using a single DAX measure. Every visual displays the same color for the same category. When you need to change a segment's color, update the measure once and all visuals reflect the new color instantly. Add data-driven colors to your reports today! Learn more about how to use conditional formatting in other places at Conditional formatting in Power BI visuals. Report page tab navigation improvements (Generally Available) Managing reports with many pages is now easier. Previously, when you dragged a page tab to reorder it, you couldn't move it past the visible tabs, making it difficult to move a page from the end of your report to the beginning. Now, when you drag a page tab toward the edge of the tab bar, the tabs continue to scroll until you reach the position where you want to place it. The arrow buttons that page through report tabs are also more precise, ensuring you see each report page tab as you navigate. These improvements make it faster to organize and navigate reports with dozens of pages. Learn more about working with report pages in Report View in Power BI Desktop. Simplified title spacing for visuals We've streamlined how spacing works in the title area of your visuals. The spacing properties now use a consistent "space above" approach—Space above subtitle, Space above divider, and Space above plot area—instead of the previous "space below" settings. This makes it easier to understand and control the gaps between title elements, and ensures visuals look consistent even when they have different combinations of subtitle and divider. Your existing reports and themes automatically adjust to the new settings without any change to their appearance. If you've configured title spacing in a custom theme, we recommend updating it to use the new "space above" properties for clarity and consistency going forward. Learn more about customizing visualization titles. Visuals calculations LOOKUP function now supports INFERRED mode for associated columns The LOOKUP function in visual calculations now accepts an optional AssociatedColumnsBehavior parameter with two values: EXPLICIT (default) and INFERRED. When you use INFERRED, the engine automatically identifies which axis columns are functionally determined by the coordinates you supply and fills them in before evaluating the lookup. This means a lookup that specifies Year, Quarter, and Month can return a value across all rows in the matrix, rather than only on the row where the current context exactly matches. When the parameter is omitted, LOOKUP behaves exactly as it does today—existing expressions continue to work without changes. When you explicitly supply a value for a column that would have been inferred, LOOKUP validates your value against the inferred value and returns BLANK if they conflict, providing consistent error handling across both modes. Org apps with audiences (Generally Available) With support for audiences, app creators can deliver different content experiences to different groups of users within the same app, making it easier to personalize content while managing a single app experience. Learn more in these blog posts, Org apps with audiences for Power BI and Fabric (Generally Available) or learn more about how org apps and audiences work. Bookmarks support for reports in org apps Users can now access bookmarks when viewing interactive reports in org apps. This includes both report bookmarks created by report authors and personal bookmarks users create for themselves, making it easy to return to saved report views with the filters, selections, and visual state they care about most. To learn more about bookmarks in the Power BI service, refer to the documentation. Storytelling (PowerPoint embed) support for reports and visuals in org apps Reports in org apps now support Storytelling in PowerPoint, allowing users to add live report pages and visuals from org app content into PowerPoint presentations. This extends the existing Storytelling experience to reports distributed through org apps, making it easier to present and share curated content across your organization. Learn more about how you can enhance your data storytelling in PowerPoint with live, interactive Power BI data. CRUD APIs (REST) for org apps and audiences Developers and administrators can now programmatically manage org apps and audiences using Microsoft Fabric REST APIs. New APIs support create, read, update, delete, and list operations for both org app items and audience items, enabling automation, deployment, and management scenarios at scale. Learn more about the org app item definition and org app audience item definition. CRUD APIs (REST) for paginated reports Paginated reports can now be managed through Microsoft Fabric REST APIs. New support for create, read, update, delete, and list operations enables developers and administrators to automate report lifecycle management, deployment workflows, and administrative processes. Learn more about the paginated report APIs and the paginated report definition. Modeling Measure descriptions in line with triple-slash (///) comments Good descriptions make a semantic model self-documenting. Until now, adding them was a two-step process: you authored your measures in DAX query view, then switched over to Model Explorer just to type the description in. Yet with the latest Desktop release, you can now add measure descriptions right where you write your measures, using the same triple-slash (///) syntax that TMDL already supports for both measure and function descriptions. Add one or more /// comment lines directly above your MEASURE definition, select “Update model with changes”, and the description is written straight into the model along with the measure definition. DEFINE /// Year-over-year sales growth, as a percentage. /// Returns BLANK when there is no prior-year value. MEASURE Sales[YoY Growth %] = ... Once it’s saved, the description travels with the measure: hover over the measure in DAX query view, in Model Explorer, or in the Data pane, and the description shows up in the tooltip next to the measure name, and it carries through to the quick queries DAX query view generates. Specifically, when you right-click a measure and choose Quick queries, and then select Define and evaluate (or any other Define option), Power BI generates a DEFINE MEASURE statement in DAX Query View that includes the description as /// comments above the measure definition, as in the following screenshot. It’s a small addition with a nice payoff — descriptions become part of the authoring flow, consistent across measures and UDFs. And it’s non-breaking: if you already use /// inside a measure body, nothing changes there. This is specifically about the comment lines above the MEASURE definition. Try it out in the July release of Power BI Desktop. For more details about how to work with measures in DAX query view, refer to Work with DAX query view in Power BI documentation. Model Options now available in Power BI Service We’re continuing to bring more semantic modeling capabilities to the web! With this update, the Model options dialog will now be available directly in web modeling, giving you greater control over key modeling-level settings, without needing to switch back to Power BI Desktop. The new Options dialog enables you to configure important behaviors and metadata that are defined at the model level (current file) in a centralized experience. The new Model Options dialog in web modeling includes the following settings: Type detection: enable/disable automatic detection of column types and headers for unstructured sources. Relationships: configure auto-detection behavior for relationships in the model. Time intelligence: enable/disable automatic creation of hidden date tables. Parallel loading of tables: set the concurrency mode used when loading tables. Locale for import: set the regional settings used to interpret numbers, dates and time in imported text. DirectQuery connections to this semantic model: Toggle whether other semantic models can connect to this semantic model using DirectQuery. When enabled, this model cannot be used as a DirectQuery source. (Direct Query only) Maximum connections per data source: limit how many concurrent DirectQuery connections can be opened to a single data source. For more details, refer to the Model Options in Power BI Service documentation. New: The semantic model settings pane becomes the default (Preview) Starting in August, when you open the settings for a semantic model in the Power BI Service, they open in the new settings pane instead of the full settings page. This change updates the default experience: the settings pane opens beside your content, so you can update refresh schedules, credentials, and other options without leaving your workspace or losing your current work context. Everything you manage on the settings page today is available in the pane, so the settings are fully configurable. If you'd rather keep using the legacy settings page, you can switch back at any time from within the pane. The settings pane first arrived in preview in May. Refer to the original semantic model settings pane announcement to learn what it offers and to review how semantic model settings work, refer to Edit Semantic Models In The Power BI Service. TMDL View on the Web Now, developers can script, modify, and apply changes to model objects directly in a code editor using Tabular Model Definition Language (TMDL), without switching to Desktop or downloading model files. This experience provides immediate, code‑level visibility into all semantic model metadata (tables, measures, relationships, and more), enabling bulk edits, automation of repetitive tasks, and the reuse of definitions to improve consistency and productivity. For more details about TMDL view and the full list of capabilities in this release, refer to the documentation: Use Tabular Model Definition Language (TMDL) view in Power BI Desktop. Mobile Org app audiences are now in mobile apps Org app audiences in the Power BI mobile app extend a tailored org app experience from Power BI Service to users on iOS and Android. With this update, mobile and tablet users can open an org app and see and navigate content based on their assigned audience, so they can quickly find the reports, dashboards, and Power BI content most relevant to their role while on the go. Audiences in org apps help organizations deliver the right content to the right people from a single governed app experience. Instead of creating and managing multiple apps, app creators can define multiple audiences, control which items each audience sees, and tailor navigation for each group. On mobile, this results in a cleaner, more focused experience on smaller screens. Executives, managers, frontline workers, and department teams can each land in an app experience curated for their needs while still benefiting from centralized management of a single org app. This update helps close a key gap for customers adopting org apps. Org apps are the recommended way to package and distribute Power BI and Fabric content, and mobile access is essential for users who rely on Power BI away from their desks or in frontline scenarios. Organizations that use audiences to personalize org app content can now extend those tailored experiences to Power BI mobile apps. To learn more about org apps and audiences, refer to the org apps blog, Org apps with audiences for Power BI and Fabric. Third-party custom visuals Need more visual options for your report? Power BI reports support custom visuals built to fit your exact needs. Browse hundreds of options in AppSource, also available directly from Power BI Desktop, or develop your own and add it to a single report, share it across your organization, or publish it to AppSource for the community. You can even develop a custom visual tailored to your specific requirements with AI coding tools like GitHub Copilot Free. These are some updates from the community-based custom visuals you can use in your reports today. Drill Down Scatter PRO by ZoomCharts Drill Down Scatter PRO brings a new level of interactivity to scatter chart analysis in Power BI. Users can seamlessly drill down through multiple hierarchy levels, zoom into dense data clusters, and pan across large datasets to investigate trends, outliers, and relationships with precision. The visual helps consumers report from high-level summaries to detailed insights without leaving the report. Advanced features such as dynamic regression lines, area and threshold highlighting, area selection, and lasso selection make it easier to identify patterns, compare segments, and focus on the most relevant data points. With over 200 formatting options, authors can tailor the visual to match business requirements and branding while creating highly engaging analytical experiences. Drill Down Scatter PRO is ideal for customer segmentation, sales performance analysis, operational monitoring, and any scenario where users need to explore large volumes of data interactively. By combining powerful analytics with intuitive navigation, the visual enables faster discovery of actionable insights directly within Power BI. To get started, download it now. Neutral variance color in Zebra BI Tables You're reviewing a Revenue vs Plan report. Anything within ±5% is considered fine, but Actuals are 3% below plan and everything flashes red. The whole dashboard looks alarming. Sound familiar? This is the fix. With Neutral variance color in Zebra BI Tables and Charts, you can now define a tolerance zone where small swings stay neutral. Variances beyond your set limits still turn red or green, so you instantly see where real action is needed. Where it helps: Revenue vs. Plan: "Set ±5% tolerance. Q4 revenue at -3%? Stays neutral. Drops to -7%? Turns red." Spend vs. Budget: Could we keep the current detail level but add context: "Department at 95% of budget? Neutral. Hits 115% or drops to 85%? Both turn red - overspend wastes money, underspend may signal delivery issues." On-time Delivery or HR KPIs: Could we pick one specific example - may be HR? Something like the below? Employee Turnover: "Annual target 12% ±2%. At 13.5%? Neutral. At 15%? Red alert." Now your dashboards reflect reality: not every variance needs a red alert. Instead, you can: Focus on what matters: Stop investigating variances within acceptable limits. Align with business rules: Your CFO says ±5% is fine, your dashboard should too. Achieve faster executive reviews: Leadership can scan dashboards and immediately spot true outliers. Try it now in Zebra BI Tables and Charts. Heatmap by Powerviz The Powerviz Heatmap visualizes data density and value distribution using color gradients, transforming complex datasets into an intuitive matrix format. It is ideal for identifying patterns, correlations, and outliers, aiding data-driven decision-making. Key Features: Shapes: Choose from Default, Fixed, or Diverging built-in shapes. Data Colors: Offers 30+ palettes, color-blind mode, and custom color options. Data Labels: Select from different styles available or add custom labels with formatting. Grid Lines: Improve data readability with visual grid lines. Reference Lines: Highlight key points using X-axis and Y-axis lines. Totals: Display row and column totals with advanced bar customization. Null Values: Customize null values (Blank /NA / Null/ ”0”) and their styling. Small Multiples: Split visuals into smaller ones using selected fields. Conditional Formatting: Spot outliers with Value/ Percentage/ Ranking based rules. Ranking: Filter Top/Bottom N rows or columns. Other features included Axis Settings, Grid View, Sorting, Show Condition and more. Resources Try Heatmap visual for FREE from App Source Check out all features of the visual Step-by-step instructions YouTube Video Learn more about visuals Follow Powerviz on LinkedIn Gantt by Profitbase Reviewing a project plan, stakeholders rely on color to quickly identify at-risk tasks, and owner-specific highlights. Version 3.1 of Gantt by Profitbase lets you apply conditional formatting rules independently to specific levels of your hierarchy. The new version also includes: Expand and collapse rows based on a condition, so the right level of detail opens automatically based on the rules added. A default scroll position at the start of the chart. Include the last day in duration calculations For more feature details, refer to the Gantt by Profitbase v3.1 release notes. Additional capabilities for Gantt by Profitbase: Unlimited hierarchy Format hierarchy levels individually Supports additional columns Supports multiple milestones per task Apply expansion styles Zoom in/out using zoom buttons Apply highlighting curtains to important periods Sort, Filter and Search for any information across all columns Use theming templates to set formatting Ragged Hierarchy Dynamic event markers from data Resources Version 3.1 Youtube video Gantt by Profitbase wiki Power BI Visuals YouTube Playlist Support Forum Learn more and download the visual on AppSource Until next month That’s a wrap for July! This month’s enhancements continue our focus on making Power BI easier to build, manage, and scale across your organization. From report-wide formatting improvements and expanded org app capabilities to new web modeling experiences and developer APIs, these updates help streamline both the authoring and consumption experience. We hope you enjoy trying out these new capabilities and, as always, we welcome your feedback as we continue to improve Power BI. Download Power BI Desktop
Databricks ADBC connector for Power BI and Microsoft Fabric (Generally Available)
This release is part of the broader ODBC-to-ADBC transition for Power Query connectors described in the Transition from ODBC to ADBC drivers in Power BI and Microsoft Fabric documentation. What’s new Existing connections in your semantic models, dataflows, and paginated reports continue to work unchanged — the migration path is currently opt-in per connection, per workspace, or per tenant. Highlights: Improved security - ADBC drivers incorporate security enhancements, such as memory safety and garbage collection. No changes to existing behavior - This transition moves away from the embedded ODBC drivers that ship with Power BI. It does not change behavior for the ODBC connector when you use a separately installed ODBC driver. Efficient large dataset support - ADBC provides a set of standard interfaces for interacting with Arrow data, which is especially efficient at fetching large datasets with minimal overhead and no serialization or copying. Supported authentication - Databricks ADBC supports OAuth (user), OAuth (M2M / Client Credentials), and Microsoft Entra ID. Connectors covered by this release Connector Previous driver New driver (GA) Databricks Simba Spark ODBC Databricks ADBC Azure Databricks Simba Spark ODBC Databricks ADBC How to try it You can test the ADBC driver now. We suggest you start soon to help ensure the eventual deprecation of ODBC and migration to ADBC runs smoothly. There are three ways to begin validating ADBC, ordered by how much control you want. 1. Opt in per connection using Implementation="2.0" The fastest way to compare ADBC and ODBC for a specific report or dataset. Add the Implementation="2.0" option to the source step in your Power Query expression: Source = Databricks.Catalogs("adb-1234567890.1.azuredatabricks.net", "/sql/1.0/warehouses/<warehouse-id>", [Implementation="2.0"]) Refresh the dataset and compare row counts, column types, and totals against your production baseline. If you want to force a side-by-side comparison against ODBC, use Implementation="1.0" . 2. Override the default for a validation workspace If you want to validate several reports together, a workspace admin can turn ADBC on for a single workspace while the rest of the tenant continues to use the legacy driver. Publish the reports you want to test into that workspace and run your normal refresh schedule. 3. Enable ADBC by default at the tenant level When you’re confident with the results, the tenant admin can enable Users can connect to data sources by using Apache Arrow database connectivity (ADBC) in the Admin portal. New connections across the tenant will use the ADBC driver by default, and Desktop and the service stay aligned on the same driver. What to expect during validation The ADBC driver is designed as a compatibility-preserving replacement for the Simba Spark ODBC driver. Validate your key reports in Desktop before enabling ADBC at the tenant level and report any regressions to [email protected]. Explore Transition from ODBC to ADBC drivers in Power BI and Microsoft Fabric for more information. What’s next The Power BI service will move from ODBC to ADBC through the first quarter of 2027. We recommend that you start validating today, so the tenant-level move is a non-event when it lands. We’d love your feedback Try the new Databricks ADBC driver. If anything looks different from what you'd expect — a refresh that fails, a total that changed, a performance regression — send the tenant ID, connector, M expression, and what you observed to [email protected]. Get started this week: Read the Databricks connector documentation. Install the latest Power BI Desktop. Pick one production report on Databricks and add Implementation="2.0" to its source step. Compare row counts, column data types, and key totals against your production baseline. Report anything unexpected to [email protected].T-SQL language enhancements in Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse (Preview)
Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse is expanding its T-SQL capabilities with four language enhancements in preview. GROUP BY ALL, ORDER BY ALL, the QUALIFY clause, and the FROM ... SELECT query format help SQL developers and data professionals reduce repetitive code, simplify query maintenance, and make analytical logic easier to understand. What’s new Four T-SQL language enhancements are available in preview: GROUP BY ALL — automatically groups by every non-aggregate expression in the SELECT list, reducing duplication between SELECT and GROUP BY clauses. ORDER BY ALL — sorts results by each column in the SELECT list, using the same column order, so developers do not need to repeat every sort expression. QUALIFY — filters rows after window functions are evaluated, so common ranking and top-N patterns no longer require an additional subquery or common table expression. FROM ... SELECT — provides an alternative query format that begins with the data source and defines the selected columns later, allowing developers to write complex queries in a source-first sequence. These additions reduce repetitive code and make query intent easier to understand. They are especially valuable when queries include many grouping or sorting columns, when analytical results require filtering, or when a source-first structure makes complex logic easier to follow and maintain. Together, these enhancements make queries easier to adapt as requirements change. Developers can add or remove projected columns with less rework, filter analytical results without an extra query layer, and organize complex queries in the sequence that best matches how they reason about the data. New capabilities: Write shorter queries with less repeated code. Make grouping, ordering, and analytical filtering easier to understand. Reduce maintenance when projected columns change. Express source-first query logic in a clear, natural sequence. Use familiar T-SQL capabilities directly in Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse. Conclusion These T-SQL language enhancements make everyday query development in Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse more concise and expressive. Whether you are summarizing data, sorting wide result sets, filtering window-function results, or organizing complex query flows, the new syntax helps you focus on analytical intent instead of repetitive code. For syntax, supported options, and examples, refer to the documentation for QUALIFY, GROUP BY ALL, ORDER BY ALL, and FROM ... SELECT. As you evaluate these preview capabilities, share your scenarios and feedback with the Microsoft Fabric community on Reddit.New analytical functions in Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse (Preview)
Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse and the SQL analytics endpoint now support new analytical functions in preview. SQL developers and data professionals can calculate medians, quantiles, and percentiles with concise, maintainable T-SQL queries. What’s new in preview MEDIAN — returns the middle value in a dataset. QUANTILE — returns the value at a specified point in a distribution. APPROX_MEDIAN — estimates the median for large datasets. APPROX_QUANTILE — estimates a specified quantile for large datasets. PERCENTILE_CONT and PERCETILE_DISC — The existing PERCENTILE_CONT and PERCENTILE_DISC analytical functions now also support aggregate syntax, complementing their window forms for continuous and discrete percentile analysis. With these functions, you can calculate distribution metrics without writing multi-step workarounds. For example, you can compare a transaction with the median for its customer segment, identify quantile thresholds, summarize performance, and explore distributions across large datasets. The following query shows the four new functions and the enhanced aggregate syntax for PERCENTILE_CONT and PERCENTILE_DISC in a Fabric Data Warehouse T-SQL workload. distribution metrics in Fabric Data Warehouse. You can use each function as an aggregate to return one result for a dataset or group, or as a window function to add the analytical result to each row while preserving the result set. Why it matters These capabilities simplify common distribution analysis: Write shorter, easier-to-maintain analytical queries. Analyze data directly in the warehouse. Choose exact calculations when precision is the priority, or approximate calculations when you need faster results across large datasets. Use the same analytical patterns across Fabric Data Warehouse and the SQL analytics endpoint. Conclusion The new functions make it easier to perform common distribution analysis directly in Fabric Data Warehouse and the SQL analytics endpoint. You can choose exact calculations when precision is the priority or approximate calculations when faster results at scale are more important, then use aggregate or window syntax to fit the analysis. This reduces custom query logic and keeps statistical analysis close to the data. For syntax, supported options, and examples, refer to the Aggregate functions (Transact-SQL) documentation. As you evaluate the preview, share your scenarios and feedback in the Microsoft Fabric community on Reddit.Fabric Data Warehouse integration with Fabric User Data Functions (Preview)
Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse now integrates with Fabric User Data Functions in preview, so you can extend T-SQL with custom Python logic without building separate applications or pipelines. Use the integration to send email or Teams messages, retrieve parameters and secrets from Fabric variable libraries or Azure Key Vault, and access data across OneLake. These capabilities are now available directly from T-SQL queries in your Warehouse. You can create T-SQL external functions in Fabric Data Warehouse that reference Python functions in a Fabric User Data Functions item. You can then invoke those functions from familiar statements such as SELECT, INSERT, and UPDATE. When an external function is called, Data Warehouse delegates its execution to the Fabric User Data Functions runtime. This integration enables scenarios such as: Calling Fabric or external APIs and sending email, Teams messages, or notifications. Reading Excel, XML, PDF, and other file formats through Python. Accessing data in OneLake and reading from or writing to Fabric databases, Azure Cosmos DB, and warehouses across workspaces. Retrieving secrets and configuration values from Azure Key Vault or Fabric variable libraries to parameterize custom logic. Encrypting, decrypting, or masking sensitive columns with custom Python logic and organization-managed keys. Enriching and validating data by geocoding addresses, verifying VAT or IBAN numbers, or scoring records with a machine learning model. Example: Use Python to classify IPv6 network events from T-SQL Classifying IPv6 events by network prefix can support security analysis, but the required parsing and binary arithmetic are complex in T-SQL. Python provides a purpose-built standard library for this task, allowing warehouses that store network and security telemetry to organize events into consistent network ranges for analysis. In this example, Python’s ipaddress function accepts an IPv6 address and prefix length and returns the corresponding network in CIDR notation. Persisting this value as an analytics column lets downstream queries group events into consistent network ranges without repeating calculation. import ipaddress import fabric.functions as fn udf = fn.UserDataFunctions() @udf.function() def getIpv6Network(address: str, prefixLength: int) -> str: interface = ipaddress.ip_interface(f"{address}/{prefixLength}") return str(interface.network) The published Python function is mapped to a T-SQL external function that accepts an IPv6 address and prefix length and returns the corresponding network prefix in CIDR notation. CREATE FUNCTION ipv6.get_network AS EXTERNAL FUNCTION utilities.getIpv6Network; You can then calculate and persist a /48 network prefix for each event: UPDATE dbo.NetworkEvents SET NetworkPrefix = ipv6.get_network(SourceIp, 48) WHERE NetworkPrefix IS NULL; Each call to ipv6.get_network delegates execution to the Fabric User Data Function runtime. After the result is stored in NetworkPrefix column, downstream queries can use it without recalculating the prefix. Conclusion Fabric User Data Functions let teams continue working in T-SQL while using Python to address scenarios that traditionally require separate applications or pipelines. Explore the preview and start extending your Fabric Data Warehouse solutions with custom logic today. You learn how to use the User Data Functions in Fabric Data Warehouse in the documentation. Try this feature during the preview and share your feedback with the Microsoft Fabric community on Reddit.
My workspace governance improvements (Generally Available)
My workspace governance features, which give administrators governance controls over their users' personal My workspaces, are now generally available. As My workspaces continue to be used for business-critical content, organizations need governance capabilities that scale with their environment. These enhancements give administrators greater flexibility to access, manage, and recover content when needed, while enabling automation that reduces operational overhead and improves consistency across the tenant. These enhanced tenant administrator controls for My workspace are also available in government clouds. What's new Two new admin REST APIs make temporary admin access to a personal workspace fully programmable: Grant Admin Temporary Access: grants a Fabric administrator 24-hour access to a user's My workspace. Remove Admin Temporary Access: revokes that access before the 24-hour window ends. Both can be called by a Fabric administrator or by a service principal. The service principal identity must be enabled for Admin API access in your tenant settings. SPN support and these new APIs allow tenant administrators to automate management of tenant users’ My workspaces contents instead of doing it by hand in the Admin Portal. Reminder: Restoring orphaned My workspaces When a user is hard deleted in Microsoft Entra, their My workspace becomes orphaned and moves to a Deleted state, with contents retained for 30 days. During that window, you can restore it with the Restore Workspace API. Important: new workspace name is required when restoring a former My workspace, and you assign a new admin to own the recovered content. Try the Admin controls and new APIs and let us know what you think in the comment section.
A new look and new capabilities in the Capacity Metrics App (Preview)
As announced at FabCon 2026 in Barcelona, we're releasing meaningful enhancements to the Capacity Metrics app in preview, designed to accelerate time to insight. This includes new and enhanced visuals and metrics across the health, compute, and storage pages—alongside improved navigation and a refreshed user interface design. A new item details page builds on the existing item history page, providing key insights for individual items running on the capacity. The aim is to support key user journeys, including: Identifying issues as they happen. Reviewing issues that have occurred over the last two weeks. Identifying risks before they result in throttling. Improved experiences An admin can now land on the health page and quickly identify capacities most in need of review. New metrics introduce easily understandable concepts like percentage of time spent in throttling, which can be compared across capacities and time periods. zation, and various types of throttling – providing the capacity admin a view across capacities to help them keep operations smooth. Once a capacity is identified for further review, the new compute page provides rich detail on the health state of the capacity and the biggest items impacting the capacity for the selected period. Key new visuals include: An updated utilization graph which expresses capacity unit (CU) consumption in CU seconds rather than a percentage, making it easy to see if your capacity has been scaled up or down, while also showing the current throttling state through conditional formatting. A new heat map visual that shows the capacities most utilized/overutilized state for each hour, making it easy to spot daily or hourly patterns. A new CU consumption table, which shows the item impacting the time window being reviewed (to a granularity of 1 hour). The visual shows smoothed CU consumption, meaning this truly reflects the highest impact items for the time being reviewed. on, all within a specified date range. Once an item is identified as a possible cause of high utilization, or if the user just wants to see additional detail on the item, the new item details page provides a 14-day history. The page has been designed from the ground up to give detailed insights which were previously unavailable. One key visual is the new CU utilization chart which shows the impact the selected item had on the overall capacity. Given the new experiences include changes to the existing metrics, it is being released as a preview alongside the existing app generally available experience, allowing time for you to adapt to the new app while still having access to the existing version. When you install the new version of the app, you will see the new preview as an additional option alongside the existing generally available versions of the reports. Getting started To support adoption of the new experience, explore the following resources for each new page: Existing Fabric Capacity Metrics app users will be notified when an update is available. Select Get it from the notification to update your current installation or install the latest version in a new workspace. Alternatively, you can install the app directly from the Microsoft Marketplace. Technical documentation with embedded video guidance: Health page Compute page Storage page Item details page User journey documentation, which explains how the app can be used in different situations. We're excited to put these new capabilities into your hands and look forward to your feedback as we continue evolving the Capacity Metrics experience to help you better understand, manage, and optimize your Fabric capacities.Custom SQL Pools in Fabric Data Warehouse (Generally Available)
Custom SQL Pools in Microsoft Fabric Data Warehouse are now generally available, along with statement type classification. Custom SQL Pools give administrators more control over how compute resources are allocated across different workloads in a Fabric workspace. You can isolate workloads into separate pools, set maximum resource allocation percentages, and help ensure that one workload doesn’t consume resources intended for another. For example, you can create separate pools for data ingestion, reporting, and ad hoc analysis, then configure the maximum percentage of compute resources each pool can consume. Custom SQL Pools complement the autonomous workload-management capabilities built into Fabric Data Warehouse while giving organizations additional control for predictable and business-critical workloads. Classify workloads by statement type Statement type classification provides a simple way to separate read and write workloads. When configuring Custom SQL Pools, you can classify distributed SQL requests into two categories: SELECT for read queries. NONSELECT for statements such as data loading and modification operations. Fabric creates separate pools for the two statement categories, with an initial maximum allocation of 50% for each pool. Administrators can adjust these percentages based on workload requirements, provided their combined maximum allocation doesn’t exceed 100%. Statement type classification is useful when organizations want to protect interactive reporting capacity from intensive ingestion or data-transformation workloads without relying on application names or connection properties. Custom SQL Pools also support application-based classification using an exact application name or a regular expression. Administrators can select the classification model that best reflects how workloads connect to and use their Fabric workspace. Get started To learn about Custom SQL Pools, supported classifiers, resource allocation, and workload behavior, review the Custom SQL Pools documentation. For instructions to create and configure pools in the Fabric portal, review the Configure Custom SQL Pools in the Fabric Portal documentation.
