Power BI Filters Skill

Add and manage filters on PBIR report pages and visuals. Filters are stored in the filterConfig section of page.json (page-level) or visual.json (visual-level). No Power BI Desktop connection is needed.

Listing Filters

# List all filters on a page
pbi filters list --page page_abc123

# List filters on a specific visual
pbi filters list --page page_abc123 --visual visual_def456

Returns each filter's name, type, field, and scope (page or visual).

Categorical Filters

Include or exclude specific values from a column:

# Include only East and West regions
pbi filters add-categorical --page page1 \
    --table Sales --column Region \
    --values "East" "West"

The filter appears in the page's filterConfig.filters array. Power BI evaluates it as an IN-list against the specified column.

TopN Filters

Show only the top (or bottom) N items ranked by a measure:

# Top 10 products by revenue
pbi filters add-topn --page page1 \
    --table Product --column Name \
    --n 10 \
    --order-by-table Sales --order-by-column Revenue

# Bottom 5 by quantity (ascending)
pbi filters add-topn --page page1 \
    --table Product --column Name \
    --n 5 \
    --order-by-table Sales --order-by-column Quantity \
    --direction Bottom

The --table and --column define which dimension to filter (the rows you want to keep). The --order-by-table and --order-by-column define the measure used for ranking. These can be different tables -- for example, filtering Product names by Sales revenue.

Direction defaults to Top (descending -- highest N). Use --direction Bottom for ascending (lowest N).

Relative Date Filters

Filter by a rolling window relative to today:

# Last 30 days
pbi filters add-relative-date --page page1 \
    --table Calendar --column Date \
    --period days --count 30 --direction last

# Next 7 days
pbi filters add-relative-date --page page1 \
    --table Calendar --column Date \
    --period days --count 7 --direction next

Period options: days, weeks, months, quarters, years. Direction: last (past) or next (future).

Visual-Level Filters

Add a filter to a specific visual instead of the whole page by including --visual:

pbi filters add-categorical --page page1 --visual vis_abc \
    --table Sales --column Channel \
    --values "Online"

Removing Filters

# Remove a specific filter by name
pbi filters remove --page page1 --name filter_abc123

# Clear ALL filters from a page
pbi filters clear --page page1

Filter names are auto-generated unique IDs. Use pbi filters list to find the name of the filter you want to remove.

Workflow: Set Up Dashboard Filters

# 1. Add a date filter to the overview page
pbi filters add-relative-date --page overview \
    --table Calendar --column Date \
    --period months --count 12 --direction last

# 2. Add a TopN filter to show only top customers
pbi filters add-topn --page overview \
    --table Customer --column Name \
    --n 20 \
    --order-by-table Sales --order-by-column Revenue

# 3. Verify
pbi filters list --page overview

Suppressing Auto-Sync (--no-sync)

By default, every write command automatically syncs Power BI Desktop. When applying filters to multiple pages or visuals in sequence, Desktop reloads after each command.

Use --no-sync on the filters command group to batch all filter changes, then call pbi report reload once at the end:

# Suppress sync while applying filters
pbi filters --no-sync add-categorical --page overview --table "Calendar Lookup" --column "Year" --values "2024"
pbi filters --no-sync add-categorical --page details --table "Product Lookup" --column "Category" --values "Bikes"

# Single reload when all filters are done
pbi report reload

JSON Output

pbi --json filters list --page page1

Gotchas

TopN filter --table/--column is what you KEEP, --order-by-* is what you RANK BY: Swapping the two compiles fine but ranks the wrong dimension — you'll see "top 10 dates" instead of "top 10 products". The CLI cannot catch the mismatch because both pairs are valid Table[Column] references.
Relative date filters anchor to the user's local time in Service, not the model timezone: A "last 7 days" filter shifts at midnight per-viewer. For audit reports this produces different totals for users in different timezones — use an absolute date range instead.
filters clear removes EVERYTHING including the page-level filters set by a previous bookmark: Bookmarks captured against the pre-clear state still reference filter IDs that no longer exist and silently behave as "no filter applied" when activated.
Auto-generated filter names contain GUIDs that change on every TMDL/PBIR re-export: Scripting filters remove --name filter_abc123 against an exported snapshot is fragile. Always re-list before removing in a script, or filter by --table/--column if the CLI supports it.
Visual-level filters override page-level filters silently: A page filter for Region = East plus a visual filter for Region = West yields an empty visual, not a "conflict" warning. Use pbi filters list --page X --visual Y to inspect both scopes when a visual shows no data.
--no-sync plus omitted final pbi report reload leaves Desktop showing stale state: The PBIR files are correct on disk, but Desktop's in-memory model is out of date — the next manual edit there can overwrite your filter changes.

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