Read our blogs, tips and tutorials
Try our exercises or test your skills
Watch our tutorial videos or shorts
Take a self-paced course
Read our recent newsletters
License our courseware
Book expert consultancy
Buy our publications
Get help in using our site
473 attributed reviews in the last 3 years
Refreshingly small course sizes
Outstandingly good courseware
Whizzy online classrooms
Wise Owl trainers only (no freelancers)
Almost no cancellations
We have genuine integrity
We invoice after training
Review 30+ years of Wise Owl
View our top 100 clients
Search our website
We also send out useful tips in a monthly email newsletter ...
In this tip
Drill down lets your user switch between levels within a visual's hierarchy.
You can add multiple fields into your visual's X-axis in Power BI to create a hierarchy.
Here we are using a location hierarchy in the X-axis of a column chart.
To drill between the levels, right-click a data point and choose Drill down from the list.
This will switch the x-axis to the level below (Town) and apply this data point (Region London) as a filter.
This method works but returns a cluttered list and requires your user to right click.
You can instead set Drill down to appear as a tooltip. To do this, from the ribbon choose File | Options and settings | Options.
In the dialog box which appears, select the Preview features page in the GLOBAL section. Choose Modern visual tooltips and then click OK.
Preview features are still in development, Modern visual tooltips has been here since May 2021!
Turning on or off Preview features requires restarting Power BI Desktop.
Make sure you save the report before closing it!
Now when you hover over a column the tooltip will have the Drill down option.
If you have drill-through enabled it will also appear in the tooltip.
You can learn more about this topic on the following Wise Owl courses:
Kingsmoor House
Railway Street
GLOSSOP
SK13 2AA
Landmark Offices
99 Bishopsgate
LONDON
EC2M 3XD
Holiday Inn
25 Aytoun Street
MANCHESTER
M1 3AE
© Wise Owl Business Solutions Ltd 2025. All Rights Reserved.