How to Create a Gantt Chart in Power BI: Step-by-Step Guide

What Do You Need to Create a Gantt Chart in Power BI?

Have Power BI Desktop ready, along with an Excel workbook containing your project tasks. For this walkthrough, you'll use the Microsoft Gantt custom visual, which you add to your report through Get more visuals.

For each row in the example, you'll need a task name, a start date, and an end date. If your source uses durations instead of end dates, you can use that configuration too. Keep owner and completion columns if you want to see who is responsible and how far each task has progressed.

Before installing the visual, check its publisher. Several products have “Gantt” in their names, and their fields and settings differ. Your organization may also provide approved visuals under My organization.

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How to Create a Gantt Chart in Power BI

Step 1: Prepare Your Project Data

Copy this sample website project into Excel, starting at cell A1. The completion figures are practice values, so you can see how different progress levels appear on the chart.

Select the range, choose Insert > Table, and confirm that your table has headers. Name it ProjectTasks under Table Design, then save your workbook. Keep one row per task. If you later combine projects with repeated names such as “Testing,” add a project name or task ID to the task label so you can tell them apart.

Step 2: Import the Data into Power BI

Open the Power BI Desktop app and click on Home > Get data > Excel workbook. Import the necessary file by choosing ProjectTasks in the Navigator and clicking Transform data. In Power Query, make sure that the data type icon on each column is correct: use Text for Task and Owner, Date for both date columns, and Decimal Number for Completion. Click Close & Apply when you are done.

Check the dates and their formatting. For example, the first task should start on 09/01 and end on 09/04. If your own workbook uses 04/09/2026 as the date format, make sure that it is not September 4 but April 9. Load the Excel data into Power BI using Change Type > Using Locale in Power Query.

Step 3: Add the Microsoft Gantt Visual

In the Visualizations pane, click on the three dots next to Visuals and select Get more visuals. Search for Gantt and open the result provided by Microsoft Corporation. Click Add and sign in with your work or school account if needed. When the icon appears, click it to add an empty chart to the report canvas.

Make sure the chart is wide enough to show the September timeline. If you cannot see the visual, consult your organization’s gallery of approved Power BI visuals or ask your Power BI administrator whether Microsoft visuals are disabled for your account. Note that selecting a chart offered by another publisher means following different setup instructions.

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Step 4: Map Your Task and Date Fields

Select the empty chart and drag your columns into the fields below. Start with Task, Start Date, and End Date; add the last two once you can see the bars.

For Start Date, choose the date column itself rather than Date Hierarchy. Leave Duration blank if you're using End Date. If you're using durations, leave End Date blank, fill in Duration, and make sure the duration unit matches the visual's duration unit and your data.

Step 5: Formatting the Timeline and Task Bars

With your chart selected, wpen Format visual and adjust the timeline's date scale so you can see the September dates, and check the task labels. You may need to widen the label area if the names are getting cut off or make the font smaller. Label formatting might vary depending on which version of the visual you've used, so look for the date, task, and label formatting options in the visual's formatting options.

Make sure that you're using color to answer a question, for instance, to show owners, you could add Owner to Legend as well as to Resource. You can also use a category such as department or type of task if your dataset has one. Don't use a palette that's so large that you need to constantly refer back to the legend to remember what the various colors mean. Microsoft Visual can handle category-based bar colors and resource labels.

Step 6: Seeing Progress and Adding a Slicer

We'll go to the Design page layouts. Its Completion value is 0.50, so we should be able to see that it's represented as 50% complete. You'll notice that the values are kept between 0 and 1, so entering 50 would not give you 50% in the Microsoft visual. You could format the source column as a percentage to make it more readable without changing the decimal value.

To focus on one person's tasks, add an owner slicer:

1. Click a blank area of the report canvas.
2. Select the Slicer visual.
3. Add Owner to the slicer's field.
4. Select Anika. With the sample data, your chart should show Confirm requirements and Test website.
5. Clear the selection to bring back all six tasks.

If the chart does not respond, select the slicer and check Format > Edit interactions. Set its interaction with the Gantt chart to Filter. You can configure interactions separately for each visual.

Step 7: Save and Publish Your Report

Save your report as a .pbix file. Before sharing it, clear your slicer selection and hover over several bars to compare their dates with your spreadsheet. Check that you can account for all six tasks and that no label hides the information your reader needs.

When you're ready, select Home > Publish, sign in, and choose a workspace where you have permission to publish. Open the report in the Power BI service and check it again before sharing. Your ability to share, and your colleagues' ability to view, depend on licenses, permissions, and workspace capacity. Installing a visual does not grant report-sharing rights.

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Troubleshooting Your Power BI Gantt Chart

If something looks wrong, compare the chart with a small set of source rows first. You'll have an easier time finding a bad date or field mapping with six tasks than with several hundred.

If your imported Excel data looks correct but the report shows an earlier version, refresh it after saving the workbook. For a published report, you also need a working refresh setup for its source; a locally saved workbook will not keep the service report current on its own.

Can You Show Milestones and Dependencies in a Power BI Gantt Chart?

You can find a Milestones field in the Microsoft visual, but keep milestone data separate from ordinary task data when planning your chart. You use a milestone to mark an event, such as approval, rather than a period of work. Before adding it to a larger report, check the visual's sample report so you can match its expected layout. Microsoft provides sample reports through AppSource.

For dependencies, distinguish the information you display from the behavior you need. Putting “Design approval” next to a development task can show what it depends on. It does not create a dependency connector or automatically move development when approval runs late. The Microsoft visual's published field list has no dedicated predecessor field. If you need linked tasks or scheduling calculations, check those capabilities explicitly before choosing a visual.

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Conclusion

Once your Gantt chart works, replace the sample rows with your project data and check the dates before adjusting the design. Keep task names clear, update completion values at the source, and use filters when the full schedule becomes difficult to read. You'll then have a report you can bring to a project review and use to discuss specific tasks, owners, and deadlines.

FAQs

1. Can you create a Gantt chart in Power BI without a custom visual?

Yes. You can approximate one with a stacked bar chart using a numeric start offset and duration, then hide the offset series. You'll need extra work to present calendar dates and add Gantt-specific features.

2. Can your Power BI Gantt chart exclude weekends and holidays?

That depends on your visual's calendar features. Calculating working days in your data does not automatically remove weekends from the displayed timeline; check both working-day calculations and axis behavior.

3. Can you edit task dates directly in the Microsoft Gantt visual?

Update dates in your source and refresh the report. The Microsoft Gantt visual does not provide a task-editing or writeback interface; dragging its bars is not a substitute for updating your schedule.