Introduction to DAX for Power BI
How much more could you do with Power BI if you could create your own custom calculations? DAX is considered a foundational skill for unlocking advanced analytics and custom reporting in Power BI, according to Microsoft and industry experts. Mastering DAX lets you move beyond basic visuals and deliver data-driven insights your organization can rely on.
Introduction to DAX for Power BI is a two-day, instructor-led course for business users ready to unleash the full power of their data models. You’ll learn practical DAX skills to solve real business problems: write your own calculated columns, measures, and tables; visualize how Power BI computes DAX; and confidently troubleshoot and refine your calculations. The course blends essential theory with hands-on practice, so you’ll understand not just the “how,” but the “why” behind every calculation.
What Is Included
- Expert-led instruction from certified Power BI and DAX professionals
- Digital courseware and step-by-step lab exercises
- 90-day access to class recordings
- Flexible rescheduling
- Free course retake option
- Describe DAX syntax, data types, and errors
- Use DAX to create calculated columns, measures, and tables
- Explain how DAX calculations are evaluated, along with the differences between row context and filter context
- Configure and use Time Intelligence to perform common time-based calculations, for example to-date calculations, year-over-year analysis, moving averages, etc.
- Create calculated columns and measures that use data from multiple tables in the data model
- Write measures that handle error conditions gracefully
- Use DAX to enhance the Power BI user experience
- Use DAX Studio to connect to a Power BI data model and execute simple queries
This course is ideal for business users and analysts who have been using Power BI for reports and dashboards and want to take their analytic solutions to the next level. Learning DAX is a natural next step for experienced Power BI users looking to unlock more advanced data modeling and analysis capabilities.
Introduction to Power BI, Power BI: Hands-On Reports and Dashboards, Power BI: Advanced Data Modeling and Shaping or equivalent working experience.
- Introduction to DAX
- Creating objects with DAX
- Context and rules of evaluation
- Variables, comments, and testing
- Getting started with calculations
- Implicit measures and adding quick measures
- Working with DAX data types and basic math
- Using logic in calculations: IF(), nested IF(), SWITCH(), advanced SWITCH(), logical operators and functions (OR(), AND(), NOT())
- Aggregating and summarizing data with the SUM() function
- Understanding context, data modeling basics, and dimensional modeling
- Relationships and their effect on the evaluation context
- Getting data from other tables: using RELATED(), RELATEDTABLE(), and looking up data without relationships
- Modifying context using CALCULATE()
- DAX iterator functions
- Table manipulation functions
- Performing date calculations and working with date tables
- Generating a date table with CALENDAR()
- Defining custom operating periods
- YTD, QTD, MTD, and custom to-date calculations
- Finding year-over-year change and moving averages
- Controlling measure visibility
- Using what-if parameters and adding banding
- Providing row-level security using DAX