Microsoft Power BI software is a popular platform used by businesses and professionals for daily data visualization and reporting. Even non-specialists can easily utilize the platform, as it is designed to be user-friendly for everyone.

In this article, you will learn more about Power BI, its applications in modern businesses, and the professionals who typically utilize it in this informative article. Additionally, you will learn about some alternative tools that can assist you in utilizing this essential business intelligence tool.

What is Microsoft Power BI Software?

Microsoft’s Power BI is a platform for visualizing business intelligence data. Its dashboard provides a variety of presentation styles, including charts, graphs, scatter plots, and maps. It’s created for business professionals of all levels of data expertise. Using the “AI Insights” feature, Power BI leverages artificial intelligence to help users identify insights from their data sets.

The Power BI platform consists of various tools including Power BI Desktop, Mobile, Embedded, and Report Server. While some tools are free, the Pro and Premium versions offer advanced analytics for paid subscribers.

Microsoft’s Power Platform comprises a range of helpful tools, including Power Apps, Power Pages, Power Automate, and Power Virtual Agents. Additionally, it features Power BI, which assists businesses in analyzing and visualizing data, designing solutions, automating processes, and creating chatbots. These tools were designed with low-code options to ensure ease of use.

What is Power BI Software used for?

Power BI is a platform that provides data-driven insights, regardless of your expertise with data or experience in the business world. It is commonly used for various tasks such as;

Creating reports and dashboards that present data sets in multiple ways using visuals
Transforming data from Excel sheets, onsite data warehouses, and cloud-based storage into actionable business insights.
Transform data into various visualizations including pie charts, decomposition trees, gauge charts, KPIs, combo charts, bar and column charts, and ribbon charts, among other options.
Creating a data-driven work culture by granting company-wide access to data, visualization tools, and insights.

Who uses Power BI?

Power BI users come from diverse business backgrounds and are not limited to data professionals such as data scientists or engineers. The platform is designed to be user-friendly, allowing even non-technical users to generate reports, manipulate data, and perform complex data analysis tasks.

Nevertheless, the following are some of the analyst positions that frequently use the platform:

Data analyst
Business intelligence analysts
Supply chain analysts
Business analysts

How Power BI Software is used in the Real World

Businesses are recognizing the increasing importance of business intelligence platforms that can transform data into insights, reports, and interactive visualizations for day-to-day operations of their products and services.

In an effort to increase the effectiveness of its buildings, a university might, for example, set up a system (similar to a digital twin) to gather real-time data on crucial building systems. In order to identify areas that required improvement, they could then connect these data sources to Power BI.

A marketing firm running a digital marketing campaign can monitor the campaign’s success by combining various data sources with Power BI and building a dashboard that highlights key metrics. Here, marketers could discover more about the most effective ways to connect with their target audience.

Power BI Alternatives

When looking for business intelligence platforms, Microsoft’s Power BI is a popular choice, but it’s not the only one available. As you research BI solutions for your current or future job, consider exploring other popular alternatives to Power BI. Other alternatives include;