POWER BI INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

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8-13 LPA
1. Difference Between Calculated Columns and Measures

Both Calculated Columns and Measures are DAX (Data Analysis Expressions) formulas in Power BI, but
they serve different purposes and behave differently.
Feature Calculated Column Measure
Evaluation Filter Context (evaluated on
Row Context (evaluated row by row)
Context aggregation/filtering)
Stored in memory; adds to the data model Calculated on the fly; does not increase
Storage
size data size
When you need new data columns (e.g., When you need aggregations (e.g.,
Use Case
categorizing sales into segments) total, average, YTD)
Appears as a column in data table and visual Appears in the fields pane but not as a
Visibility
fields table column
Example Profit = Sales[Revenue] - Sales[Cost] Total Sales = SUM(Sales[Revenue])
When to use Calculated Column:
• To create slicers or filters based on new fields.
• To perform row-wise calculations (e.g., Age from DOB).
When to use Measure:
• To calculate KPIs, totals, averages, or percentages.
• For optimized performance in reports and visuals.

2. How Do You Handle Missing Values in Power BI?

Handling missing values ensures data accuracy and meaningful visuals. Here's how it's generally done
in Power BI:
1. Power Query Editor (Pre-processing Stage)
You can handle missing values using the Power Query Editor (Transform Data window):
• Remove Nulls:
Right-click the column → "Remove Empty" or use filter to exclude nulls.
• Replace Nulls:
o Replace with default value: null → 0, Unknown, or Not Available.
o Right-click column → "Replace Values" → Replace null with desired value.
• Fill Down/Up:
Useful for forward or backward filling in grouped data.
Example: If dates are missing in rows, "Fill Down" can propagate previous values.
2. DAX (Calculated Fields or Measures)
Use DAX functions to handle missing values during calculations:
• IF(ISBLANK(...), ..., ...): Handle blanks in logic.
Adjusted Revenue = IF(ISBLANK(Sales[Revenue]), 0, Sales[Revenue])
• COALESCE(): Returns the first non-blank value.
Profit = COALESCE(Sales[Profit], 0)
3. Visual-Level Handling
In visuals:
• Use filters to exclude blank values.
• Use conditional formatting to highlight missing or zero data.

Would you like a sample Power BI use case or visual explanation for either of these topics?

3. Difference Between SUM and SUMX in Power BI

Both SUM and SUMX are DAX functions used to perform addition, but they work differently.
Feature SUM SUMX
Function
Aggregator Iterator
Type
Directly sums up values from a Iterates through a table row by row and sums up the
Purpose
column expression result
Input Single column name Table and expression
Performance Faster for simple column sums Slightly slower due to row-by-row calculation
Usage Example:
SUM Example:
Total Sales = SUM(Sales[Revenue])
• It simply adds up all the values in the Revenue column.
SUMX Example:
Total Revenue = SUMX(Sales, Sales[Quantity] * Sales[Price])
• It first multiplies Quantity * Price for each row and then sums the result — which
SUM cannot do.
When to use SUMX:
• When the values to be summed are derived (like multiplication or conditions).
• When working with related tables and need row-wise calculation.

4. What is DAX? Give an Example. Which DAX Functions Did You Use in
Projects?
What is DAX?
DAX (Data Analysis Expressions) is a formula language used in Power BI, Excel Power Pivot, and SSAS
Tabular models to create calculated columns, measures, and custom tables.
It is similar to Excel formulas but is optimized for relational data models and performs advanced
analytics like filtering, row context, and aggregations.

Simple DAX Example:

Calculated Column:
Profit = Sales[Revenue] - Sales[Cost]
Measure:
Total Sales = SUM(Sales[Revenue])
Conditional Measure:
High Revenue Sales = CALCULATE([Total Sales], Sales[Revenue] > 100000)

DAX Functions Commonly Used in Projects:

Category Functions Used Use Case
Aggregation SUM, AVERAGE, COUNT, DISTINCTCOUNT Total and average KPIs
Row-wise operations (e.g.,
Iterators SUMX, AVERAGEX
dynamic profit margins)
Custom filtering and context
Filter FILTER, CALCULATE, ALL, REMOVEFILTERS
switching
Logical IF, SWITCH, AND, OR Conditional logic for KPIs or flags
DATEADD, SAMEPERIODLASTYEAR, TOTALYTD,
Time Intelligence YTD, MTD, YoY comparisons
DATESINPERIOD
Formatting labels or combining
Text CONCATENATE, LEFT, RIGHT, FORMAT
fields
Handling Missing Replacing or identifying blanks in
ISBLANK, COALESCE
Values visuals

Real-World Example in Projects:

In a sales dashboard, I used CALCULATE with FILTER to create dynamic measures like “High Value
Customers” and “YoY Sales Growth”. I also used SUMX to calculate row-level profitability using
SUMX(Sales, Sales[Qty] * (Sales[Price] - Sales[Cost])).

5. How Do You Disable a Graph That Is Changing Dynamically?

In Power BI, a graph or visual can change dynamically due to interactions with filters, slicers, or other
visuals on the report page. To disable or control this dynamic behavior, you can use Edit Interactions
and other techniques.
Method 1: Use “Edit Interactions”
This is the most common and direct method.
Steps:
1. Click on the visual that is triggering the change (e.g., a slicer or another graph).
2. Go to the "Format" ribbon and select "Edit Interactions".
3. For the visual you want to disable, click on the “None” (circle with a slash) icon.
o This stops it from responding to changes in the triggering visual.
Use Case Example:
• You have a pie chart and a bar chart. Clicking a slice in the pie chart changes the bar chart.
• You want the bar chart to remain static → Use Edit Interactions and disable the link from pie to
 bar.

Method 2: Use Bookmarks and Selection Pane

If you want to hide or disable a graph completely under certain conditions:
• Use Bookmarks to save the visibility state.
• Use the Selection Pane to control which visuals appear with each bookmark.
• Trigger bookmarks using buttons or slicers.

Method 3: Use Conditional Visibility

Power BI doesn’t natively support conditional visibility, but you can mimic it:
• Create a transparent shape that overlays the visual and blocks interaction.
• Use measure-based transparency or visibility in combination with bookmarks.

6. Explain RLS (Row-Level Security) and How Do You Implement It?

What is RLS?
Row-Level Security (RLS) is a feature in Power BI that restricts data access for users based on their
roles. It ensures that users only see the data relevant to them.
For example: A sales manager for Region A should not be able to see sales data for Region B.

How RLS Works:

• You define roles with DAX filters that limit what rows are visible in a table.
• These filters apply at the row level during report interaction or sharing.

Steps to Implement RLS in Power BI:

1. Go to Modeling → Manage Roles
• Create a new role (e.g., RegionManager).
• Apply a DAX filter to the relevant table.
Example:
[Region] = "West"
This ensures the user assigned to this role sees only data where Region = West.

2. Test the Role

• Click on "View as Roles" to test and validate if the filters are applied correctly.

3. Publish to Power BI Service

Once published:
• Go to Power BI Service → Workspace → Dataset → Security.
• Assign email addresses (users) to the defined role.

Advanced RLS with Dynamic Security

Dynamic RLS uses a mapping table (e.g., UserEmail → Region), allowing one report to serve multiple
users with personalized data.
• Example: SalesRegionAccess table
UserEmail Region
 UserEmail Region
[email protected] West
[email protected] East
• DAX Filter:
[Region] IN LOOKUPVALUE(SalesRegionAccess[Region], SalesRegionAccess[UserEmail],
USERPRINCIPALNAME())

Best Practices for RLS:

• Always test roles using "View as Roles".
• Avoid applying RLS on calculated tables or complex relationships if unnecessary.
• Use dynamic RLS for scalability in enterprise-level reports.

7. Types of Filters in Power BI

Power BI offers multiple types of filters to control and customize data views at different levels within a
report. These filters help in slicing the data for specific insights.
1. Visual-Level Filters
• Applied to individual visuals (charts, tables, cards, etc.).
• Affects only that one visual.
• Useful when you want to filter a chart independently from others.
Example: Show only “Product Category = Electronics” in a specific bar chart.

2. Page-Level Filters
• Applied to all visuals on a single report page.
• Does not affect visuals on other pages.
Example: Apply “Country = India” on a page to show only Indian sales data across all visuals.

3. Report-Level Filters
• Applied to all pages and all visuals in the report.
• Great for global filters like Time Period or Brand.
Example: Filter for “Year = 2024” across the entire report.

4. Drillthrough Filters
• Allows users to right-click a data point and navigate to a different page with context-specific
data.
• Applied to the drillthrough page only when a user triggers it.
Example: From a sales summary page, right-click on “West Region” and drillthrough to a page that
shows detailed West Region sales.

5. Slicer Filters
• Visual controls (dropdown, list, etc.) added by the developer.
• Allow end-users to control filtering dynamically.
Example: A date slicer that lets the user select a range and filters all connected visuals accordingly.
 6. Cross Filtering and Cross Highlighting
• Happens when you click a data point in one visual and it automatically filters or highlights
related visuals.
• Controlled using “Edit Interactions”.

7. URL Filters (in Power BI Service)

• Enables filtering a report page through URL query strings.
• Useful for embedding reports or passing filters from external systems.

8. Difference Between Drill Down and Drill Through in Power BI

These are both navigation tools used to explore data at different levels of granularity, but they
function differently:
Feature Drill Down Drill Through
Navigate to lower levels in the same Navigate to a different page with detailed
Purpose
visual (e.g., Year → Month → Day) data
Done by clicking a data point (usually Done by right-clicking a data point and
Interaction
arrows or right-clicking) choosing a drillthrough page
Where It Takes you to a new report page designed
Inside the same visual or report page
Happens for detailed insights
Data Flow Uses hierarchies (e.g., Date, Geography) Uses filters passed between pages
Explore sales over time or breakdowns by Show a customer’s full transaction history
Use Case
category when clicked from summary page

Drill Down Example:

You have a bar chart showing Total Sales by Year. When you drill down, it changes to show Sales by
Quarter, then by Month, and so on.
Hierarchy setup: Year → Quarter → Month → Day

Drill Through Example:

You have a summary report showing Sales by Region. You right-click on "North Region" and select Drill
Through → Region Details. It navigates to a different page showing detailed charts for only the North
Region.
You must configure Drillthrough filters on the target page.

9. Explain the Process of Publishing the Report in Power BI

Publishing a report means taking your Power BI Desktop (.pbix) file and making it available in the
Power BI Service (cloud) for sharing, collaboration, and scheduled refresh.
Step-by-Step Process to Publish a Report:

1. Save Your Report

• File is saved with a .pbix extension in Power BI Desktop.
• Ensure the data model and visuals are finalized.
 2. Sign in to Power BI
• Open Power BI Desktop.
• Click Sign In (top right) using your Power BI account (usually work or school email).

3. Click on Publish
• Go to the “Home” ribbon → Click “Publish”.
• Select the Workspace where you want to publish the report.
Note: Workspaces are like folders in Power BI Service that hold datasets, reports, and dashboards.

4. Publishing Confirmation
• After publishing, a message appears:
“Successfully published to Power BI”.
• Option to open in Power BI Service directly via a link.

5. Post-Publish Tasks (in Power BI Service):

• Set up scheduled refresh (especially for Excel/SQL/dataflow sources).
• Share report via:
o Share button (email invite)
o Embedding in apps/Teams
o Publish to web (for public reports only)
• Create dashboards by pinning visuals from the report.

Best Practices:
• Use gateways for on-premise data refresh.
• Apply Row-Level Security (RLS) before publishing.
• Test performance and access permissions.

10. How Do You Create Relationships in Power BI? What Are the Types of
Cardinality?
What is a Relationship?
Relationships in Power BI define how data in one table relates to data in another. This is essential for
building a proper data model.

How to Create Relationships:

Method 1: Auto-Detect
• Power BI automatically creates relationships based on common column names and data types.
• Appears in the Model View as lines between tables.
Method 2: Manual Creation
1. Go to Model View in Power BI Desktop.
2. Drag a column from one table to another (usually dimension → fact).
3. Or click on “Manage Relationships” → “New”.
4. Define:
o Table and columns
 o Cardinality
o Cross filter direction

Types of Cardinality in Power BI:

Cardinality describes the nature of the relationship between two tables.
Cardinality
Description Example
Type
One-to-Many A single value in one table matches multiple in
One customer → many orders
(1:*) another. Most common.
Many-to-One In reverse, often interpreted same as 1:*
Many orders → one product
(*:1) (depends on drag direction).
Many-to-Many Both sides contain duplicate values; used with Products sold in multiple regions with
(:) care. multiple overlaps
One-to-One Each row in Table A matches only one row in
Employee table ↔ HR details table
(1:1) Table B.

Cross Filter Direction:

• Single: Default. Filters flow from dimension to fact.
• Both: Enables bi-directional filtering. Needed for complex relationships like M:M but should be
used cautiously.

Important Notes:
• Avoid circular dependencies in relationships.
• Always ensure that key columns (like IDs) are unique in the dimension table.
• Review relationships using the Model View to keep the schema clean.

11. How Do You Schedule a Refresh in Power BI?

Scheduled Refresh in Power BI ensures your reports and dashboards stay updated with the latest data
at set intervals. This is done after publishing your report to the Power BI Service.

Steps to Schedule a Refresh:

1. Publish the Report

• First, publish your .pbix file from Power BI Desktop to the Power BI Service.

2. Open Power BI Service

• Go to https://app.powerbi.com
• Navigate to the workspace where your dataset is published.

3. Go to Dataset Settings
• Click on “Datasets + Dataflows”.
• Click the more options (⋮) next to your dataset → choose “Settings”.
 4. Set Up Gateway (if using on-premises data)
• If your data source is on-prem (e.g., SQL Server, Excel), you must install and configure a Power
BI Gateway.
• Choose the appropriate data gateway connection.

5. Configure Credentials
• Under “Data Source Credentials”, click Edit Credentials and choose the correct authentication
method:
o Windows
o Basic
o OAuth2
o Web API

6. Enable Scheduled Refresh

• Scroll down to the Scheduled Refresh section.
• Turn the “Keep data updated” switch ON.
• Set the frequency:
o Daily or Weekly
o Up to 8 times/day for Pro users and 48 times/day for Premium capacity.
• Set time zones, add failure notifications if needed.

7. Save Settings
• Click Apply or Save to complete the refresh setup.

Best Practices:
• Always test manual refresh before scheduling.
• Monitor refresh failures in the Refresh history section.
• Avoid large datasets with heavy transformations in Power Query for smoother refreshes.

12. What Type of Account Did You Use While Working on the Project?
Explain the Features.
Power BI offers different types of user accounts and licenses. Your answer depends on your project
environment, but here’s a structured explanation:

Common Account Types in Power BI:

1. Power BI Free Account

• Used mainly for building reports in Power BI Desktop.
• Cannot share or publish to Power BI Service.
• No access to workspaces, dashboards, or collaboration.
• Suitable for personal use or learning.

2. Power BI Pro Account (Most Common in Projects)

 • Allows full capabilities:
o Publish reports to Power BI Service
o Share dashboards and reports with others
o Create and manage workspaces
o Set up Scheduled Refresh
o Use RLS (Row-Level Security)
o Use Power BI apps
Example Use in Project:
“We used Power BI Pro accounts to build and publish reports to shared workspaces. This allowed
collaboration among stakeholders, automated refreshes, and implementation of RLS for secure
access.”

3. Power BI Premium Per User (PPU)

• Same features as Pro + extra:
o Larger datasets (100 GB)
o 48 refreshes/day
o Paginated reports
o AI capabilities (AutoML, Cognitive Services)
• Used for enterprise-grade performance.

4. Power BI Premium Capacity

• Organizational license, not individual.
• Enables deployment to dedicated capacity.
• Needed for larger deployments, external sharing without Pro licenses for viewers.

Key Features of Power BI Pro Account (commonly used):

Feature Description
Collaboration Create, publish, and share reports in workspaces
Scheduled Refresh Up to 8 refreshes per day
RLS Support Restrict data access at user level
App Workspaces Organize content for teams/projects
Export & Embed Export to PDF/PPT or embed in Teams/SharePoint
Usage Metrics Track report and dashboard usage

13. How Do You Perform Join Operations in Power BI?

In Power BI, join operations are primarily done using:

1. Power Query (M Language) – Merge Queries

Power Query allows you to join tables using the Merge Queries option.
Steps:
1. Go to Home → Transform Data.
2. In the Power Query Editor, click on "Merge Queries".
3. Choose the two tables you want to join.
 4. Select the matching columns from both.
5. Choose the Join Type (explained below).
6. Expand the merged column to include required fields.
Types of Joins:
Join Type Description
Left Outer All rows from the first table, matching rows from the second
Right Outer All rows from the second table, matching rows from the first
Inner Only matching rows from both tables
Full Outer All rows from both tables
Anti Join (Left/Right) Non-matching rows only
Inner Anti Join Opposite of Inner Join

2. Relationships in Data Model

Instead of physically joining tables, Power BI prefers establishing relationships between tables.
Steps:
• Go to Model View.
• Drag a column from one table to another (usually keys).
• Define relationship type and cardinality (e.g., One-to-Many).
• Relationships enable filtering across visuals.

3. DAX Functions for Joins

• Use DAX for calculated tables or columns:
JoinedTable = NATURALINNERJOIN(Table1, Table2)
Or with RELATED() and LOOKUPVALUE() to fetch values from related tables.

14. What Are the Best Practices in Power BI?

Following best practices ensures a high-performance, readable, and maintainable Power BI solution.

Data Modeling Best Practices

• Use star schema: fact + dimension tables.
• Avoid snowflake schema unless necessary.
• Create proper relationships (prefer One-to-Many).
• Avoid bi-directional relationships unless essential.

Data Loading
• Disable auto date/time (in Options → Data Load).
• Remove unnecessary columns/rows in Power Query.
• Use query folding wherever possible.

DAX & Measures

• Prefer measures over calculated columns (memory efficient).
• Use CALCULATE() and FILTER() wisely to avoid performance issues.
 • Name measures clearly (Total Sales, Avg Discount, etc.).

Visual Design
• Avoid overloading reports with too many visuals.
• Maintain consistent color theme.
• Use tooltips and titles for clarity.
• Follow report layout best practices (Z-pattern or top-down logic).

Performance Optimization
• Use aggregated tables where possible.
• Avoid using columns with high cardinality (e.g., GUIDs).
• Optimize DAX code with variables and minimal row context.
• Monitor performance using Performance Analyzer.

Security and Sharing

• Implement Row-Level Security (RLS) as needed.
• Keep sensitive data encrypted or masked.
• Share via Power BI Service Workspaces, not by sending .pbix files.

15. Difference Between Slicer and Filter in Power BI

Both Slicers and Filters are used to restrict data visibility, but they differ in scope, UI, and use cases.

Aspect Slicer Filter

Location Added as a visual on the report canvas Applied through Filter pane
Visibility Always visible to users Can be hidden from report viewers
User Interaction Users can interact directly with slicers Filters may not be interactive for users
Scope Can apply to visual, page, or all pages Can apply to visual, page, or report level
UI Elements Visual controls like dropdowns, list, sliders No visual control, used in pane
Types Basic, hierarchical, relative date, etc. Manual, advanced, top N, relative, etc.

Example Use:
• Use Slicer when you want users to actively select filters (e.g., filter by region).
• Use Filter when you want to limit data silently without user control (e.g., exclude discontinued
products).