Introduction to Power BI Bookmarks
Power BI Bookmarks can significantly boost the interactivity of your reports. A bookmark is an efficient feature that captures the current appearance of a report-including selected visuals, filters, and slicers-and saves it as a "bookmark." Users can then quickly access this specific state of the report. For instance, you can enable users to toggle between various views of the same page just by clicking a button.
Adding a Power BI Bookmark
Let’s walk through the process of creating a bookmark. For this example, we’ll use a sales report. Here, the sales data is displayed using both a bar chart and a pie chart. You can save each of these representations as Power BI bookmarks, allowing quick transitions between the two views with simple button clicks.
To create a view with a bookmark for the pie chart:
Open your report and navigate to the view tab.
In the “Visualizations” section of the ribbon, click “Bookmarks.”
On the right side of the screen, click the “Add” button in the Bookmarks pane.
Enter a descriptive name for your bookmark in the “Name” field, which helps you remember what the bookmark captures. Click the add button to finalize the bookmark.
The PieChartView bookmark is now created and visible in your bookmarks section. You can use the same procedure to establish a bookmark for the bar chart view.
> Note: Remember that bookmarks are tied to the current view displayed on your screen. Make sure to select the desired view before saving a bookmark. Be cautious not to overwrite an existing bookmark unintentionally.
Connecting a Power BI Bookmark to a Button
Once a bookmark has been created, you can connect it to a button for easy navigation. When users click the button, Power BI will direct them to the associated bookmark.
To create a navigation bar in your report, use one of the following methods:
Using Individual Buttons
You can insert blank buttons into your report and assign bookmarks to each button via its actions. Here’s how to set it up:
1. Click on the “Insert” tab in the top ribbon, and then select “Button” in the “Visualizations” area. 2. After creating a button, you can adjust its formatting:
Modify the size of the button
Add text and background color
Set colors for each button state (for example, light blue when inactive and dark blue when pressed).
Next, you’ll assign an action to a button. For instance, when pressed, the button can link users to the BarChartView bookmark. You can create a second button and configure it for the PieChartView bookmark, copying these buttons to all pages for seamless navigation.
In Power BI Desktop, use Control+Click to navigate, whereas a simple click works in Power BI Service. > Note: While we’ve used blank buttons for navigation, images or various icons can also serve this purpose.
Using the Bookmark Navigator
In November 2021, Power BI introduced a convenient feature that allows users to navigate between bookmarks quickly. This feature creates button sets corresponding to your bookmarks, facilitating a variety of formatting options without the need for manual configuration. To set up a bookmark navigator in your report:
Click on the insert tab in the top ribbon and select buttons.
Scroll down to the navigator section and choose “Bookmark Navigator.” This will automatically generate buttons linked to the bookmarks present in your report.
After the buttons are created, you can format them to suit your preferences, including changes to shape, color, and style options.
Adjusting Power BI Bookmarks
Once a bookmark is created, you have the flexibility to adjust it through updating, renaming, deleting, or grouping.
Update Bookmark
This action allows you to refresh an existing bookmark with the current view. It’s helpful when you have a bookmark but wish to modify certain visuals. For instance, if your PieChartView currently shows a trend chart, and you want to remove it, follow these steps:
Select the PieChartView bookmark.
Remove the trend chart from the view.
Right-click on the bookmark and select update.
This will save the view without the trend chart.
Rename Bookmark
To change a bookmark’s name, simply double-click on its current name or click on the three dots to access the rename option.
Delete Bookmark
If a bookmark is no longer needed, hover over its name and click the three dots to reveal the delete option. Keep in mind that if the deleted bookmark was used elsewhere in the report, it might affect certain functionalities. Always check the report after deletion.
Group Bookmarks
This feature enables you to group bookmarks together or ungroup them as necessary. Grouping helps in organizing your bookmarks for easy identification and navigation. For instance, if you have numerous bookmarks, grouping related ones, such as “Chart Based Bookmarks,” can simplify future reference. Select the bookmarks you wish to group and click “group.” You can rename the group as required.
Once a group is established, you can add more bookmarks by dragging them into the group. Similarly, ungroup bookmarks by removing them from their existing group.
Power BI Bookmark Customization Options
Data
This option allows you to manage which filters and slicer selections are applied when switching between bookmarks. If you see a tick next to “data” for your bookmark, it indicates that Power BI remembers the filter selections applied when the bookmark was saved. Consequently, these selections will automatically apply each time the bookmark is accessed.
If no tick appears next to “data,” Power BI will utilize the most recent filter selection made by the user. Let’s look at an example: In this scenario, the data tab is checked in the bookmark settings. We select Canada from the Country slicer in the BarChartView Bookmark, which displays the relevant information. When navigating to the PieChartView, it shows data for all countries. This indicates the slicer selection from BarChartView is not retained when switching to PieChartView.
If we uncheck the “data” option for our bookmarks, Power BI will remember the last selection, which was “Canada,” and apply that selection to the PieChartView bookmark.
Display
This customization option controls which elements are visible in the report. It’s useful for dynamically hiding or revealing specific elements. For example: Create two new bookmarks to demonstrate the display property. The BarChartSpot bookmark will capture the view with the spotlight enabled on the bar chart, while the BarChartSpotDisplayOff bookmark will capture the same view without the display option enabled.
When you click on BarChartSpot, you’ll see the spotlight is active. However, choosing BarChartSpotDisplayOff will show the equivalent view without the spotlight since the display option was turned off.
It’s advisable to use display enabled options when working with bookmarks.
Current Page
Enabling the “Current Page” option facilitates jumping from one page to another. If the feature is not activated, Power BI will navigate to the bookmark but won’t transition to a different page. For example, with two bookmarks, BarChartView and PieChartView:
| BarChartView | PieChartView |
|---|
Assuming another page (MapView) contains navigation buttons tied to specific bookmarks, when the current page property is enabled, clicking these buttons works as intended. For instance, clicking the BarChartView button in MapView leads to the correct bookmark.
Conversely, if this property is disabled for PieChartView, clicking its button will not change the page.
All Visuals
This option allows you to save and restore the status of all components on the page. When selected, Power BI retains all filter pane selections, including whether the filter pane is collapsed or expanded. This feature is active by default when creating a bookmark.
Selected Visual
If enabled, this option saves only the current state of selected visuals in a bookmark. You can select multiple items by holding the Ctrl key while clicking them in the selection panel. For illustration: if you have a region slicer set to “Canada,” you can select it in the selection pane and name this bookmark “BarChartViewCanadaSel” while enabling the “Selected Visual” property.
Remember to select the chart or slicer when creating this bookmark to utilize the Selected Visual property effectively.
Conclusion
Bookmarks are invaluable snapshots of your report. They allow you to save the current state-including slicer and filter selections, along with the condition of visuals. After saving a specific view, you can connect it to a button, so clicking that button will navigate users to that bookmark.
