We are pleased to announce that improvements to the Export to Excel experience for Power BI table and matrix visuals is now available in public preview. This capability is a significant improvement to the export experience for Power BI visuals ensuring that you are focused on achieving your data goals in Excel rather than spending time on formatting.
With this improvement, you get a new dialog option Data with current layout, that allows the export of data from a table or matrix visual to Excel while preserving the formatting of the visual, including number formatting and grouped (merged or unmerged) dimensions.
Choose How to Export Power BI Data to Excel
With the varied export options for table and matrix visuals, Power BI now enables you to export data to Excel depending on your data needs. The matrix visual below is used to illustrate the different types of output you will get in Excel depending on the export option selected in Power BI.
Data with current layout: When the data in the matrix is exported to Excel using the Data with current layout option, the data structure and format is preserved in Excel. This export option is suitable if you want to save a snapshot of a table or matrix for future comparisons (especially if the Power BI report does not support time analysis) or when dynamic format strings in calculation groups need to be retained in Excel.
Summarized and Underlying Data: With the summarized data and underlying data export options, the data exported to Excel is a flat table of rows and columns of data. Either option might be suitable if you want to add the exported data to a Power Pivot model, include additional rows or columns and create a PivotTable for your analysis, or use the exported data to create your own Power BI dataset directly in Excel and share with others.
We love to learn how you would use the new export to Excel experience in your organization so let us know in the comments. If you have any suggestions on improvements or new features you would like to see for Power BI and Excel, please submit an idea.