In this blog you will understand “How to use KPI visual in Power BI and How KPI % works?”.
The key Performance indicator (KPI) is a very good way to track your current value movement against defined Target.
The intention of the KPI is to help you evaluate the current value and status of a metric against a defined target.
A KPI visual requires a base measure that evaluates to a value, a target measure or value, and a threshold or goal.
Let’s get started-
Import below sample dataset into your Power BI Desktop
Table: Sales
Year | Actual Sales | Target Sales |
2014 | 200000 | 1300000 |
2015 | 245000 | 1300000 |
2016 | 1020000 | 1000000 |
2017 | 1300000 | 1300000 |
2018 | 700000 | 1600000 |
2019 | 200000 | 1000000 |
2020 | 2600000 | 2500000 |
Following these steps-
Step-1: Add KPI visual into Power BI report canvas, and drag some columns-
Indicator: Actual Sales, Trend axis: Year, Target goals: Target Sales

KPI Visual
Step-2: By default KPI displayed the current Sales & Target values. Explanation as below:-
- Current – Actual Sales: 2600000
- Target Sales: 2500000
- Target achieved by: +100000
- Green Color: Indicate Target achieved successfully, otherwise it will show the values in Red color.
- Percentage Formula: (Actual Sale – Target Sale) / Target Sale, then multiply by100.

KPI Power BI
Step-3: Now select any year from slicer-
For year-2018 Target not achieved, that’s why it is showing values as in Red color.

KPI Visual in Power BI
How to create a KPI % measure?
Create a measure with below DAX code-
KPI % = VAR ActualSale= SUM(Sales[Actual Sales]) VAR TargetSale= SUM(Sales[Target Sales]) VAR Diff = ActualSale - TargetSale RETURN DIVIDE(Diff, TargetSale)*100
Now add measure into Table visual, and see the KPI % result-

Power BI KPI visual
Formatting KPI visual-
General: Allows you to set X & Y-axis, width & height of column chart.
Indicator: Set display unit, font size, font family, horizontal & vertical alignment for Actual sales.
Trend axis: Enable/ Disable graph for KPI.
Goals: Provides below options-
- Goal: Enable/ Disable Target values.
- Label: Assign name for Target.
- Set Font color, font size & font family.
- Distance: Display difference of Target & sales. Also you can select value & percentage from Label dropdown.
- Distance direction: Manage Increase/ Decrease direction for positive.
Color coding: Set color for Good, Neutral & Bad.
Date: Set font size, text & color for date.
Title: Specified the Title name for KPI.
Refer more Power BI visuals- Power BI Visuals
Hope you enjoyed the post. Your valuable feedback, question, or comments about this post are always welcome.