Power BI Data Connectors: Your Gateway to Data Insights

The majority of firms gather data from several sources. There is, therefore, a need for a central place to collect the data. This central place should be able to connect to a variety of sources.

That’s exactly what Power BI connectors do.

Power BI gives you a platform. Power BI data connectors enable the platform to connect to a variety of data sources. This empowers you to garner insights from the data quickly.

In this article, we explore Power BI connectors. We define them and learn how to add connectors to Power BI. We also look at their benefits and how to create a chart using Power BI connectors.

Eventually, we will answer some frequently asked questions.

Table of Content:

1. What are Power BI Connectors?
2. How Do I Add Connectors to Power BI?
3. Benefits of Power BI Connectors
4. Best Practices for Using Power BI Connectors
5. How to Create a Chart Using Power BI Connectors?
6. Wrap Up

What are Power BI Connectors?

Power BI connectors are integral components of Microsoft’s Power BI platform. They are designed to facilitate the seamless integration of various data sources into your Power BI projects.

In essence, these connectors serve as bridges. They enable Power BI to connect to a wide range of:

• data repositories,
• databases,
• cloud services,
• and other data sources,

It allows you to work with data in different formats and in a variety of locations.

There are over 200 connectors available, including:

• SQL server database connectors
• Excel workbook connectors
• CSV/text file connectors
• SharePoint list connectors
• Azure SQL database connectors

How Do I Add Connectors to Power BI?

Power BI comes with over 200 built-in connectors. You can connect to the most common data sources without having to install any additional software.

To use a built-in connector, select it from the Power BI connectors list and follow the instructions.

You can also install third-party connectors to connect to specific data sources. If you have some programming skills, you can even integrate Power BI custom connectors.

Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to install a third-party connector:

• Launch Power BI Desktop.
• Click on the “Home” Tab.
• Select “Get Data.”
• Choose the data source type.
• Select a specific connector.
• Provide connection details (server addresses, database names, authentication credentials, or other relevant information).
• Load or transform data
• Load the data into Power BI
• Visualize and analyze

Benefits of Power BI Connectors

Power BI data connectors offer a number of benefits, including:

• Simplifying data integration. You don’t require technical skills or extensive coding skills to combine data from diverse sources. This is especially true if you’re working with built-in Power BI connectors.
• Supports a wide range of data sources. These include:
• databases (SQL, NoSQL),
• cloud services (Azure, AWS),
• online services (Google Analytics, Salesforce),
• files (Excel, CSV)
• Displaying real-time data. Some connectors support real-time data streams. This enables you to create dashboards and reports that display live data updates.
• Data integrity. Connectors maintain the integrity of data during the extraction and loading processes. This reduces the risk of errors that may arise from manual data handling.
• Unified reporting: Power BI connectors enable you to consolidate data from multiple sources into a single report.
• Scalability. Power BI connectors are capable of scaling to accommodate new sources and increased data volumes.

Best Practices for Using Power BI Connectors

Using Power BI connectors effectively involves adhering to best practices that ensure data accuracy, performance, and maintainability.

Here are some key guidelines to follow when working with Power BI connectors:

Choose the Right Connector

Select the appropriate connector that matches your data source. Power BI offers a wide range of connectors for different types of data sources.

Limit Data Retrieval

Retrieve only the data you need. Avoid bringing in excessive amounts of data that may slow down performance and increase data processing requirements.

Perform Data Transformations Before Loading Data into Your Report

Perform data transformations, cleaning, and shaping within Power BI’s query editor before loading data into your report.

This enhances performance and ensures that your data is in the desired format for analysis.

Schedule Refreshes

Set up scheduled refreshes to keep your reports and data visualizations up to date if data changes frequently.

Use DirectQuery Sparingly

DirectQuery allows for real-time data retrieval from the source. It might, however, affect performance, especially for complex queries.

Use DirectQuery when necessary, and consider importing data for faster performance.

Configure Appropriate Data Privacy Settings

Configure appropriate data privacy settings to ensure sensitive information is protected. This is particularly important when connecting to cloud services and databases that require authentication.

Thoroughly Test Your Connections and Data Retrieval

Before finalizing your report, thoroughly test your connections and data retrieval. Validate that the data displayed in your visualizations accurately reflects the source data.

Document the Details of your Data Connections

Document the details of your data connections, including connection strings, credentials, and any specific settings. This helps maintain data source access when others need to work on the report.

How to Create a Chart Using Power BI Connectors?

This section teaches how to create a chart using Power BI connectors. We’ll use the Sankey Diagram as a Power BI dashboard example.

Stage 1: Logging in to Power BI

• Log in to Power BI.
• Enter your email. Click the “Submit” button.

• Enter your password and click “Sign in”.

• Choose whether to stay signed in.

Stage 2: Creating a Data Set and Selecting the Data Set to Use in Your Sankey Chart

• Click on the “Create” option on the left-side menu.
• Select ”Paste or manually enter data“.

• We’ll use the following 2021 life expectancy at birth data for this example.

Country	Continent	Life Expectancy at Birth (2021)
Afghanistan	Asia	61.9824
Angola	Africa	61.6434
Albania	Europe	76.4626
Andorra	Europe	80.3684
United Arab Emirates	Asia	78.7104
Argentina	America	75.3899
Armenia	Asia	72.0431
Antigua and Barbuda	America	78.4968
Australia	Oceania	84.5265
Austria	Europe	81.5797
Azerbaijan	Asia	69.3658
Burundi	Africa	61.6627
Belgium	Europe	81.8787
Benin	Africa	59.821
Burkina Faso	Africa	59.2696
Bangladesh	Asia	72.3811
Bulgaria	Europe	71.798
Bahrain	Asia	78.7605
Bahamas	America	71.5983

• Paste the above data table into the “Power Query” window.
• Select the “Create a dataset only” option.

• Click on the “Data Hub” option on the left-side menu.
• Power BI populates the data set list. (If you have not created a data set, refer to the Error! Reference source not found section.)
• The data details are shown below:

• Click on the “Create a report” dropdown.
• Select “Start from scratch“.

• Enter “Sankey Diagram for Power BI by ChartExpo” in the highlighted search box.
• You should see the “Sankey Diagram for Power BI by ChartExpo” as shown in the image below.

• Click the highlighted “Add” button.

• Power BI will add the “Sankey Diagram for Power BI by ChartExpo” in the visualization panel.

Stage 4: Drawing a Sankey Diagram with ChartExpo’s Power BI extension

• Select the “Sankey Diagram for Power BI by ChartExpo” icon in the visualization panel.
• The following window opens in the report section of your dashboard:

• You can resize the visual as needed.
• Go to the right-hand side of your Power BI dashboard.

• • Continent
  • Country
  • Life Expectancy after Birth (2021)

• You’ll be asked for a ChartExpo license key or email address.

Stage 5: Activate your ChartExpo Trial or Apply a Subscription Key

• Select the ChartExpo visual. You should see three icons below “Build Visual” in the Visualizations panel.

• Select the middle icon, “Format visual.”
• The visual properties will be populated as shown below.

• If you are a new user,
  • Type in your email under the section titled “Trial Mode”.
  • This should be the email address that you used to subscribe to the ChartExpo add-in. It is where your ChartExpo license key will be sent.
  • Ensure that your email address is valid.
  • Click “Enable Trial“. You’ll get a 7-day trial.

• • You should receive a welcome email from ChartExpo.
  • The Sankey Diagram you create under the 7-day trial contains the ChartExpo watermark (see below).

• If you have obtained a license key:
  • Enter your license key in the “ChartExpo License Key” textbox in the “License Settings” section (see below).
  • Slide the toggle switch next to “Enable License” to “On“.

• • Your Sankey diagram should not have a watermark.
• To add colors, expand the “Level Colors” properties and select a color.
• Do this to change the color of each node.
• All changes are automatically saved.

• Your final chart should look like the one below. If you get a license, the Sankey Chart will not have a watermark.

Insights

• At level 1, Asia had the highest life expectancy at birth at 31.4%. It was followed by Europe (28.5%) and Africa (17.6%). America came in fourth at 16.4%.
• At level 2 (Country), Australia has the greatest birth life expectancy rate at 6.14%. Belgium came in second at 5.94%. Austria was third at 5.92%.

FAQs

What are connectors in Power BI?

In Power BI, connectors are components that allow you to connect to various data sources.

Power BI provides a wide range of built-in connectors. These support connections to various types of data sources, including:

• databases,
• cloud services,
• files

These connectors simplify the process of importing and transforming data in your Power BI reports and dashboards.

How do you use Power BI connectors?

Power BI connectors are used to connect to different data sources. There are connectors available for a wide range of data sources, including

• Relational databases
• Cloud data warehouses
• NoSQL databases
• File shares
• Web APIs
• SaaS applications

To use a Power BI connector, you first need to open the Power BI Desktop. Then, you can follow these steps:

1. Click the “Get Data” button.
2. In the “Get Data” dialog box, select the connector that you want to use.
3. Follow the instructions in the dialog box to connect to the data source.
4. Select the data that you want to import into Power BI.
5. To add the data to Power BI, use the “Load” button.

Once the data is imported into Power BI, you can start creating reports and dashboards.

Wrap-Up

We have explored the dynamic world of Power BI connectors. You are able to collate data from different sources and create visualizations.

We defined Power BI connectors and their different types. We then learned how to add connectors to Power BI.

Built-in connectors are pretty straightforward to work with. There are also third-party connectors that you can use. Check the Power BI connectors list to find the best ones for your use case.

Depending on your use case, you might need to create a custom Power BI connector.

We learned the benefits of using connectors, for example, making data integration easier. We also looked at some best practices to keep in mind when working with connectors. You might want to limit data retrieval, for instance, to ensure optimal performance.

Eventually, we delved into how to create a chart using Power BI Connectors. We used the Sankey Diagram as an example.

We hope that this prepares you to create some connectors of your own.