Power BI vs. Excel: It’s Time To Shift Your Reporting

 The importance of data analysis has increased dramatically over the past few years but there is still a vast amount of data is ignored or not analyzed. Data is everywhere. Companies are embracing data analytics and data intelligence capabilities to uncover hidden insights that can help companies make data-driven decisions.

To date, Microsoft Excel has been preferred data management and visualization tool. It is one of the widely-used and popular spreadsheet applications in the business world. With data playing a vital role to remodel businesses from scratch, new tools and technologies are introduced day-by-day to reap the benefits of big data.

Power BI, a popular self-service data visualization tool from Microsoft, has made it easy for businesses to extract intelligence from various data sources with ease. It offers business analytics and intelligence services that are interactive, easy-to-use, and secure.

To get in-Depth knowledge on Power BI you can enroll for a live demo on power bi online training

It is quite obvious to consider that Power BI is equipped with modern data intelligence features and delivers better insights than Excel.

Let’s compare the traditional reporting tool and modern Power BI in detail.

This post explains key reasons behind Power BI’s suitability over Excel for reporting and why we advocate Power BI consulting for better, forward-looking results using data.

Power BI vs Microsoft Excel

Collect And Access Data Flexibility? Accessibility? Or Both? Who Is Better?

Excel 2013 provides a wide range of Power BI features and functionalities to turn data into meaningful information. This includes support for external data sources such as SQL tables, cubes, Microsoft Azure Data, and more.

When it comes to Power BI, you can select any type of data you want including data from any app or services, reports, cloud-based sources, workbooks, CSV files, Excel, or databases. It also has a powerful compression algorithm that makes larger data files easily accessible, analyzed, and stored. Companies with consistent and larger data flow are using Power BI to get a 360-degree view of products/services they’re offering. It offers a comprehensive set of data connectors.Learn more from power bi online course

Excel, on the other side, makes it difficult to work on larger datasets. It will be difficult to add more sales data or datasets to the current one, taking more time and effort to get an overall scenario.

Whenever new data is discovered, it can be integrated with Power BI without linking or reopening everything. This flexibility of adding and linking datasets reduces overhead as the software will automatically perform data refreshes (you can also schedule data refresh) and remember data patterns

Reporting And Dashboarding: Is Power BI A Winner?

On the other side, Excel has a tabular data format and also allows displaying data in various chart formats. But, with the larger datasets, it lacks clarity and flexibility. It is more suitable for simple and structured data models and has limited scope for datasets and reports.

Visualization: Transform Data Into Insights, Rapidly

Why Power BI For Better Visualization?

No matter what size is, you can analyze a vast amount of data with clarity and ease. You can try various experiments and attributes to get precise results. Analyzing data from various dimensions at different times and with a range of factors help an analyst to predict faster and get into a broader picture of data..

Alerts

Power BI helps analysts to set alerts based on KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). These alerts can notify you when any change in a dashboard or value exceeds the limits you set.

Here’s the step-by-step video from the Power BI community to help you set alerts.

 

A Wide Range of Charts:

With built-in, self-service, and AI-driven Business Intelligence Solutions, Power BI’s powerful algorithms help convert data into smart insights. It offers various charts like:

  • Bar and column charts
  • Line charts
  • Pie charts
  • Tables
  • Area charts
  • Doughnut charts
  • Gauge charts
  • Funnel charts
  • Scatter charts
  • Multi-row cards
  • Single number cards
  • Maps
  • Tree maps
  • Combination chart

Templates and Themes: User Experience Is A Key

Make Working Together Easier

Excel also offers visualization options such as tables, line charts, bar charts, pie charts, column charts, and so on. Being a traditional spreadsheet program, it has limited scopes for integration, collaboration, functions, and formats. Although, with a rich set of mathematical formulas and pivot tables, organizing complex data structures and setting KPIs are easy with Excel (advanced versions).

Data Security Is A Mission-Critical Priority

In Excel, you can restrict access for a particular file, worksheet, or even workbook. You can also lock files to hide visibility or grant read-only access to prevent modification or editing.

Mobile Is A Way Forward:

Moreover, Power BI’s custom visualization and effortless integration with other apps are added advantages.

Power BI or Excel: Time To Shift Data Reporting To Power BI From Excel

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