Power BI Tooltips: A Step-by-Step Walkthrough

Power BI tooltips display contextual information when users hover over report elements for deeper insights — and that enhances visualization.

This guide shows you some Power BI design ideas and how to use Power BI. It also shows you how to integrate the Power BI datasets into any Power BI data model.

Whether you’re using Power BI for Mac or Power BI Web, this guide will expose you to some Power BI advanced features, like the Power BI connectors and the Power BI report builder.

There are sections in this guide that show you how the Power BI transform data works and how to represent data using the Sankey Diagram in Power BI. And if you’re building a dashboard from scratch, you can draw some inspiration by looking at some Power BI dashboard designs.

What are Power BI Tooltips?

Definition: Power BI tooltips are small, interactive pop-up boxes that appear when you hover a visual or data point in a Power BI report. Tooltips show specific data values, additional measures (or dimensions), and custom visuals.

Why is the Tooltip in Power BI Useful?

• Provides Instant Context

The tooltip showcases relevant information when users hover over a data point or visual. This helps the user to get a good grasp of the story behind the data without switching views or navigating away from the main dashboard.

• Saves Space on the Report Page

Instead of cluttering a dashboard with extra text boxes or visuals, you can insert detailed metrics in the tooltip. This keeps the report clean and focused.

• Improves Data Exploration

Users can dig deeper into the data by simply hovering. This encourages self-service analytics and helps users explore insights independently.

• Enhances User Engagement

Tooltips guide users through complex dashboards and offer hints or data highlights. This improves usability and engagement. It also makes the dashboards more interactive and intuitive for non-technical users.

How Do You Customize the Tooltip in Power BI?

• Use Built-in Tooltip Fields

Select the visual you want to customize. Navigate to the visualizations pane and find the Tooltip section.

Drag fields into the tooltip well to display specific measures (or dimensions). When you hover over the visual, the tooltip will show the fields.

• Create a Report Page Tooltip

Navigate to the “New Page” option and create a new page. In the Page Information section (under the Format pane), turn on “Tooltip.” You can resize the page to a smaller size (like 320×240 px) under Page Size > Type > Tooltip.

Design your page with charts, KPIs, or text relevant to the main report visuals. You should also format it to match your report’s theme and layout.

• Assign the Custom Tooltip to a Visual

Navigate to the main report page, select a visual, and go to the Format pane > Tooltip. Change the Type to Report Page, and choose the tooltip page you created from the Page dropdown.

• Test Your Tooltip

To see the customized tooltip in action, hover over the visual. You can also use filters and slicers on the tooltip page for dynamic, data-driven responses.

How Does Power BI Custom Tooltip Work?

• Create a Tooltip Page

Create a new report page and turn it into a tooltip. Navigate to the Format pane, switch on the “Tooltip” toggle under Page Information, and change the page size to Tooltip under Page Size settings.

• Design the Tooltip

Add charts, images, KPIs, and other visuals relevant to the main data point. Use fields and filters to make the tooltip dynamic — the data shown will change based on where the user hovers.

• Link Tooltip to a Visual

To activate the tooltip, select the visual on your main report. In the Format > Tooltip section, you’ll have to choose “Report Page” as the type. After that, select your custom tooltip page from the dropdown.

• Display the Tooltip

When users hover over the visual, Power BI automatically displays the custom tooltip, which shows the relevant filtered data. All these give room for cleaner reports with rich, drill-down insights available on demand.

How Do You Enable Tooltips for Visuals in Power BI?

Here are the steps to enable Tooltips:

• Select the Visual: Click on the visual (like a line graph or bar chart) where you want to enable the tooltip.
• Open the Format Pane: In the Visualizations pane, navigate to the Format section.
• Expand the Tooltip Section: Toggle the Tooltip option to “On.”
• Add Tooltip Fields (Optional): To customize what appears when hovering, drag additional fields into the Tooltip bucket.
• Use Custom Tooltip Page (Optional): For advanced tooltips, create a tooltip report page, and assign it by selecting Type. You can choose the custom page from the dropdown.

How to Create Multiple Tooltips in Power BI?

• First, you’ll have to turn on the “Tooltips” option. To do that, navigate to the Format pane —> Properties —> Tooltips:

• Open a separate page and name it Tooltip Profit. On this page, you’ll have to create the auxiliary Pie chart of total profit against segments. After that, click on the Pie chart visual to format the page. In the Format pane, navigate to the Page information and change the Page type to Tooltip.
• Also, in the Format pane, navigate to the Canvas settings > Type and select Tooltip.

• Go back to the main matrix and click on the visual to specify the Pie Chart as the custom tooltip. You can do that by selecting Format pane —> Properties —> Tooltips —> Options. You can change “Type” from “Default” to “Report Page,” and select the page “Tooltip Profit.”

There’s the Pie Chart on page “Tooltip Profit” as a custom tooltip.

Multiple Tooltips:

• Here’s a breakdown of “Sales” by “Discount Band,” and a breakdown of “Unit Sold” by “Product,” when hovering over “Sales” and “Product,” respectively.
• Create a Clustered Bar Chart “Sales by Discount Band” on the new page “Tooltip Sales,” and a Pie Chart “Units Sold by Product” on another new page named “Tooltip Units.”
• You’ll have to create each of these pages as new pages, and not duplicate an existing page. Otherwise, you won’t be able to link tooltip pages to the main visual correctly. For the new pages, select Format pane — Page information —> Page type and Tooltip.
• You can also navigate to the Format pane —> Canvas settings —> Type and select Tooltip.
• For the main matrix visual, you’ll have to select the page “Tooltip Profit” in the Format pane —> Properties —> Tooltips —> Options to have the first Pie chart as a custom tooltip. To include multiple visuals as custom tooltips, you’ll have to select “Auto” instead of a specific page.

How to Use Tooltips in a Power BI for Analysis?

• Stage 1: Log in to Power BI, enter your email, and click the “Submit” button.

• Enter your password, and click “Sign in.”

• You can opt to stay signed in.

• Stage 2: The data table below will be used for this illustration.

• To add the data to your report, click on the “Paste data into a blank report.”

• Paste the data table above into the blank table, name it, and click on the “Load” button.

• To see the chart metrics, click on “Expand All.” You can check the dimensions and metrics.

• Click on “Get more visuals.”

• Search ChartExpo and select the Multi-Axis Line Chart.

• Click on the “Add” button.

• After that, you’ll see the Multi-Axis Line Chart in the visuals list.

• To add this visual in the report, click on the chart icon and choose the dimension and measures as shown below.

• To rename metric names, right-click on “Rename for this visual.” After renaming the metrics, an image similar to the one below will be displayed on your screen.

• In the Visualization’s properties, click on License Settings and add the key.

• After adding the key, you’ll see the Multi-Axis Line Chart.

• From the chart, you’ll notice the months on the x-axis are not in a specific order. To make data in sorted order from Jan to Jun, you’ll have to follow the steps below:
• • Create a new table.

• • You have to manually enter the data, name it, and click on the “Load” button.

• • A new data table named “Sort Order” will be created, and a relationship will be created between the two tables as shown below.

• Open “Table View,” select the “Sort Order” table, select the “Month Column,” and set the sorting order column.

• At this point, use the “Month” column from the “Sort Order” table, instead of the “Marginal Cost vs Predicted Cost” table’s “Month” Column.

• The Chart should be created with a custom sorting order on the x-axis.

• Add the Header text on top of the chart.

• The chart should look as follows.

• You can prepend the “$” sign with y-axis values as prefixes. You should also set the same property for “Y-Axis Properties 2.”

• You can see the “$” sign in the chart with the y-axis.

• You can change the data representation in the chart. “Marginal Cost” as “Data Representation 1” will show with bars, and “Predicted Cost” as “Data Representation 2” will show with area.

• Here’s what the chart looks like.

• You can change the color of the bars and area, and you can also change the shape of the legend. For bars, you can change to “Column” and for area, it will remain the same “Box.”

• You can enable/disable the tooltip of the chart.

• After enabling the tooltip, the mouse moves over any data point. The tooltip will show on hover.

• Here’s the final look at the Multi-Axis Line Chart in Power BI.

Insights

The chart compares Marginal Cost (bar chart) with Predicted Cost (area chart) over six months (Jan-Jun):

• Increasing Trend: Both Marginal and Predicted Costs increase over time.
• Gap Between Costs: Predicted Cost starts lower but grows steadily, subsequently approaching the Marginal Cost.
• Fluctuations in Marginal Cost: There are fluctuations in the Marginal Cost, but the general trend is upward.

Best Practices for Power BI Tooltips

• Keep it concise: To avoid overwhelming users, display only the most relevant and actionable data.
• Maintain consistent design: Match tooltip fonts, colors, and styles with the main report for a cohesive look.
• Avoid clutter: Focus on key insights. Don’t overcrowd tooltips with too many metrics or visuals.
• Minimize load time: To keep tooltips responsive, use lightweight visuals and limit complex calculations.

FAQs

How do I add a tooltip to the Power BI chart?

Select the visual, navigate to the Format pane, enable Tooltip, and assign fields (or a custom report page) as the tooltip.

What is a dynamic tooltip in Power BI?

A dynamic tooltip in Power BI shows context-sensitive data that changes based on the data point hovered over, and that provides tailored insights using filters (or field values) from the main visual.

How do I add multiple tooltips in Power BI?

Use custom tooltip pages with different visuals, assign them to various report elements by selecting each visual, and link the appropriate tooltip page.

Wrap Up

Power BI tooltips are hover-over pop-ups that display contextual data. They help offer instant insights, enhance interactivity, save space, and help users explore detailed information without cluttering reports.

To get the most out of the Power BI tooltips, you have to keep it concise, avoid clutter, and test responsiveness. Showcase only the most relevant and actionable data to avoid overwhelming users.

Focus on key insights and don’t overcrowd tooltips with too many visuals (or metrics). You should also check how tooltips behave on different screen sizes and in Power BI Service.

Now you know the importance of Power BI tooltips, how will you integrate them into your data visualization process?