Power BI Dashboard Design Video Course

This course is not a Power BI tutorial. It is focused on visualization principles. This course was recorded in 2017. The visuals may look a little outdated, but the concepts are valid as of today. 

Designing dashboards seems like a simple task, thanks to modern BI tools. In reality, designing dashboards that bring value and that people want to use is not that easy. A good dashboard must follow specific rules and design concepts.

The Power BI Dashboard Design video course:

  • Explains how to design beautiful dashboards that people can use every day.
  • Is a high-level reference guide that you can come back to later. Software updates will not impact the concepts that you learn here.
  • Is not just theory; it shows real examples and comparisons between great dashboards and dashboards that are poorly designed.
  • Can help more people than just the designers! Anyone who creates dashboards can benefit from this course. Designers will learn usability tips that many tend to underestimate.

This course is for day-to-day users of Power BI who do not use DAX but create reports by using the Power BI visuals. It is not a fit for people who have never used Power BI, and it does not expose the underlying technical mechanics of a Power BI dashboard.

The video course is divided in four parts:

  • First, an explanation of what a dashboard actually is…
  • Second, a brief introduction to the features of Power BI, as a reminder for users of the tool;
  • Third and most important, the design concepts. We include 15 rules to design a perfect dashboard;
  • Last, the chart reference. Use it to pick the right charts based on the kind of data you have to display.

The course includes several samples and resources, and additional written material to further explain the topics discussed by the teachers.

Students have access to a private discussion area where they can interact with the instructors asking questions related to the lectures and the exercises.

The content of this training was realized by Daniele Perilli.

 

Power BI Visuals Reference

The last section of the course classifies the visuals available in Power BI. This classification is also displayed in a single PDF that you can download for free. You can print or display this document to support your decision in choosing the right visuals for your dashboards.

Collapse allCurriculum

  • Presentation of Power BI Dashboard Design Course

    • Presentation of Power BI Dashboard Design Course
      FREE
    • Slides of the video course
    • Sample Rules
    • Sample Chart Reference
    • Dashboard design checklist
    • The Visuals Reference
    • The 15 Rules Reference
  • What people think a dashboard is and what it really is

    • What people think a dashboard is and what it really is
      FREE
    • What is a dashboard?
      FREE
    • Examples of bad dashboards
      FREE
    • A good dashboard
    • Recap
      FREE
    • Personal Finance dashboard
  • Introducing Power BI

    • Introducing Power BI
      FREE
    • What is Power BI?
    • Power BI in action
    • Are you starting from scratch?
    • Recap
  • The 15 rules to design a perfect dashboard

    • The 15 rules to design a perfect dashboard
      FREE
    • Introduction to rules
      FREE
  • Design for a target

    • Rule 1 - Design for a target
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Keep everything at a glance

    • Rule 2 - Keep everything at a glance
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Choosing the right page size
    • Resizing pictures
    • Using charts with hierarchical data
    • Recap
  • Keep it simple

    • Rule 3 - Keep it simple
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
      FREE
    • All art is quite useless
      FREE
    • Avoiding dark backgrounds
      FREE
    • Recap
      FREE
  • Align elements

    • Rule 4 - Align elements
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Prototyping with Chart Placeholder by OKViz
    • Recap
  • Be consistent

    • Rule 5 - Be consistent
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Highlight the most relevant information

    • Rule 6 - Highlight the most relevant information
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Be clear

    • Rule 7 - Be clear
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Start from zero

    • Rule 8 - Start from zero
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Highlighting a change in a time interval
    • Using Dot Plot by OKViz
    • Recap
  • Shorten the numbers

    • Rule 9 - Shorten the numbers
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Show the context

    • Rule 10 - Show the context
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Choose the right colors

    • Rule 11 - Choose the right colors
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Using colors that people can confuse
    • Introducing Color Helper by OKViz
    • Recap
  • Design dashboards, not reports

    • Rule 12 - Design dashboards, not reports
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Show variations

    • Rule 13 - Show variations
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Leave the noise off

    • Rule 14 - Leave the noise off
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • Pick the right charts

    • Rule 15 - Pick the right charts
      FREE
    • Explanation and demo
    • Recap
  • In conclusion

    • In conclusion
  • The chart reference

    • The chart reference
      FREE
    • Bar/Column charts
    • Bar/Column: express a trend
    • Bar/Column: sorting
    • Bar/Column: clustered vs. stacked
    • Bar/Column: coloring
    • Bar/Column: intervals
    • Gauge
    • Bullet Chart by OKViz
      FREE
    • Dot Plot by OKViz
    • Radar Chart
    • Line Chart
    • Area Chart
    • Sparkline by OKViz
      FREE
    • Candlestick by OKViz
    • KPI
    • Card with States by OKViz
      FREE
    • Treemap
    • Pie/Donut charts
    • Waterfall Chart
    • Funnel
    • Maps
    • Synoptic Panel by OKViz
      FREE
    • Histogram
    • Box & Whisker
    • Scatter Chart
    • Line & Column charts
    • Infographic Designer
    • 3D charts
    • Other charts
    • Custom visuals
Student Rating
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Student Reviews (145)
  • Erika van der Spuy (Dec 18, 2020)

    Brilliant presentation. Found the chart reference very good as summary.

  • James L. Herman (Dec 10, 2020)

    Excellent course! Very informative - of course now I have to redo most of my dashboards because I used too many pie charts...

  • Irshad Kuttoor Illam (Nov 30, 2020)

    Thank you Marco Russo, Alberto Ferrari & Sqlbi team for your efforts. Very nice course for those who are having limited knowledge of designing, choosing proper visuals and presenting data in a better way.

  • Diego Perez (Nov 22, 2020)

    Thanks for the course. I like it too much.

  • Farit Rakhmangulov (Oct 17, 2020)

    It was incredible journey. While this course I re-build my dashboards many times. At first look I thought that rules are boring. Actually each section of this course is important. This course is a treasure and I tried to take all of these knowledge.

  • Tim Schierer (Oct 8, 2020)

    This is an outstanding course. I've been designing charts for over 30 years and I still learned a lot of useful information. The downloadable dashboard data model and the chart cheat sheets were very helpful.

  • David Bianconi (Sep 24, 2020)

    Very interesting and brilliant course, full of contents, explanations and examples

  • Vyacheslav Ilnytskyy (Aug 14, 2020)

    Great course. Great balance of fun and ideas. During this course I wrote about 15 new ideas for my project and pretty sure I will have more after going through it again some time later. Just wonder why, even though, it was mentioned in this course the pdf reference will be updated regularly, it does not happen, since the last version is 2 years old.

    • Thanks for the feedback! We are going to update the PDF reference by the end of 2020. We realized it's a huge task to keep it updated regularly, the increase in number of components made it hard to use the same format, and in the next iteration, we have to make a major change.
      Reply by SQLBI (Aug 14, 2020)
  • ed hansberry (Jul 22, 2020)

    Excellent overview, especially for an Excel nerd that thinks the Matrix is the best visual! Good rules to consider. I've printed off the rules and will use it for all dashboards going forward.

  • Igor Poleshchuk (Jul 10, 2020)

    Great course!

  • Ricardo felippe ramos (Jul 9, 2020)

    This course helped me boost my job in a powerful way. Your directions and tips were great..thanks

  • Chang Li (Jun 24, 2020)

    Great Video Courses, very clear about the goal of the great Dashboard and detail explanation of the reason why we should design the dashboard like this.

  • Robin Neven (May 29, 2020)

    Very nice! Although there is not a lot of practical application, but I guess people can do that with their own dashboards/reports.

  • José Javier Santos (May 12, 2020)

    The course was not what I was expecting at all. Course is only concentrated in designing concepts but what I needed is to learn how to create visuals and set them up… chart, tables, cards, conditional formatting, learn other features and so on… Months ago I enrolled the Power Pivot and DAX course and it was amazing!!!

  • Luis Felipe Valenzuela Calderara (May 9, 2020)

    I really enjoy your classes, makes a lot of sense and make improve mi dashboards. Now, to the next course of DAX! Thanks for sharing your wisdom! Greetings from Chile!