Publishing paginated reports in Power BI - Real Business Scenario

Scenario Mode

👤 Your Role: You are a business intelligence analyst at a retail company.

📋 Request: Your manager wants you to create and publish a detailed sales report that can be printed or shared as a PDF with consistent formatting across pages.

📊 Data: You have monthly sales data by region, product category, and sales amount for the past year.

🎯 Deliverable: A paginated report published to the Power BI service that shows sales details with page headers, footers, and page numbers.

Sample Data

Month	Region	Category	Sales Amount
January	North	Electronics	12000
January	South	Furniture	8500
February	North	Electronics	15000
February	East	Clothing	7000
March	West	Furniture	9000
March	South	Clothing	6500
April	East	Electronics	11000
April	North	Furniture	8000
May	West	Clothing	7200
May	South	Electronics	13000

1

Step 1: Open Power BI Report Builder and create a new paginated report.

Start a new report using the 'Blank Report' template.

Expected Result

A blank paginated report canvas is ready for design.

2

Step 2: Connect the report to your sales data source.

Create a new data source pointing to your sales database or dataset in Power BI service.

Expected Result

Data source connection is established successfully.

3

Step 3: Create a dataset to retrieve Month, Region, Category, and Sales Amount.

Write a query or select fields from the data source to include Month, Region, Category, Sales Amount.

Expected Result

Dataset returns all sales records with the required columns.

4

Step 4: Add a table to the report body and drag the dataset fields into the table columns.

Insert a table and assign Month, Region, Category, Sales Amount to columns respectively.

Expected Result

Table displays sales data rows grouped by month and region.

5

Step 5: Add a page header with the report title and a page footer with page numbers.

Insert a header with text 'Monthly Sales Report' and a footer with expression =Globals!PageNumber.

Expected Result

Each page shows the report title on top and page number at the bottom.

6

Step 6: Format the table for readability: bold headers, borders, and alternating row colors.

Set header row font to bold, add borders to cells, and use background color expression for alternate rows.

Expected Result

Table is easy to read with clear headers and row distinction.

7

Step 7: Preview the report to check pagination and layout.

Use the Preview tab to see how the report pages break and display data.

Expected Result

Report pages show consistent formatting and correct page breaks.

8

Step 8: Save the report file (.rdl) and publish it to the Power BI service workspace.

Use 'Publish' option in Report Builder to upload the report to your Power BI workspace.

Expected Result

Paginated report is available in Power BI service for users to view or export.

9

Step 9: Share the report link with your manager and confirm accessibility.

Send the Power BI service report URL and verify manager can open and export the report.

Expected Result

Manager can access the paginated report and export it as PDF or print.

Final Result

-----------------------------------------
| Monthly Sales Report                   |
-----------------------------------------
| Month   | Region | Category   | Sales |
|---------|--------|------------|-------|
| January | North  | Electronics| 12000 |
| January | South  | Furniture  |  8500 |
| February| North  | Electronics| 15000 |
| February| East   | Clothing   |  7000 |
| ...     | ...    | ...        |  ...  |
-----------------------------------------
Page 1

[Report continues on next pages with same header and page numbers]

✓Sales vary by region and category each month.

✓Electronics generally have higher sales amounts.

✓The paginated report format ensures consistent printing and sharing.

Bonus Challenge

Add interactive parameters to filter the report by Region and Month before publishing.

Show Hint

Use report parameters in Report Builder and modify the dataset query to filter based on parameter values.