How to Add Header and Footer in Power BI

Adding a professional header and footer to your Power BI report can transform it from a simple data dump into a polished, branded document that's easy to navigate and understand. This guide will walk you through the most effective methods to create clear and consistent headers and footers for your reports.

Why a Good Header and Footer Matter

Before jumping into the "how," it's worth understanding the "why." A well-designed header and footer aren't just about aesthetics, they serve critical functions that enhance the user experience:

• Branding: Consistently display your company's logo and color scheme, reinforcing brand identity.
• Context: Provide essential information at a glance, such as the report title, the date the data was last refreshed, and the current page name.
• Clarity: A descriptive title in the header immediately tells viewers what they're looking at, preventing confusion.
• Navigation: An interactive header can act as a navigation menu, allowing users to easily jump between different report pages.
• Professionalism: Polished reports build trust and show attention to detail, making your insights more impactful.

Method 1: The Classic Manual Build with Shapes and Text Boxes

This is the most common and flexible method for creating headers and footers directly within Power BI. It gives you full control over every element. While it can be a bit manual, the results are worth it, especially once you learn how to group and reuse your components.

Step 1: Create the Header Background

First, you need a container or a background for your header elements. A simple rectangle shape is perfect for this.

1. Navigate to the Insert tab in the Power BI Desktop ribbon.
2. Click on Shapes and select Rectangle.
3. Drag the rectangle to the top of your report canvas and resize it to form a horizontal bar across the full width. You can adjust its height to fit your content.
4. With the rectangle selected, go to the Format pane. Under Style, you can change the Fill color to match your company's branding and remove the Border if you don’t need it.

Pro Tip: To make the header feel like part of the page, send it to the back. Select the shape, go to the Format tab, click Send backward, and then Send to back.

Step 2: Add Your Report Title and Logo

Now you can layer your key information on top of the background shape.

For the Title:

1. On the Insert tab, click Text box.
2. Type your report title, like "Quarterly Sales Performance" or "Marketing Campaign Analysis."
3. Drag this text box on top of your header rectangle.
4. Style the text using the formatting bar that appears. Adjust the font, size, and color. To remove the text box background, go to the Format pane, expand the Effects section, and turn off the Background.

For the Logo:

1. On the Insert tab, click Image and select your logo file from your computer.
2. Resize and position the logo on your header, typically in a top corner.

Step 3: Add Dynamic Information (Like Last Refresh Date)

A static header is good, but a dynamic one is better. Showing when the data was last refreshed is crucial for building user trust. You can't just type this in, you need to create a simple measure that updates automatically.

1. First, you need a DAX measure. Go to the Home tab and click New measure.
2. In the formula bar, enter the following DAX formula and hit Enter:

Last Refreshed = "Data last refreshed on " & FORMAT(MAX('YourTableName'[YourDateColumn]), "MM/DD/YYYY HH:MM")

Note: Replace 'YourTableName'[YourDateColumn] with a real date column from one of your tables. Any date column will work.

1. Now, insert a Card visual onto your canvas (from the Visualizations pane).
2. Drag your newly created [Last Refreshed] measure into the "Fields" area of the Card visual.
3. Style the card to make it look like simple text. In the Format pane:
4. Finally, drag and resize this "text" card onto your header or footer.

Step 4: Group and Copy Your Header

Recreating this on every page is tedious. Instead, group all the elements together so you can copy and paste the entire header in one go.

1. Hold the Ctrl key and click on each element of your header (the background shape, the title text box, the logo image, and the refresh date card). You'll see bounding boxes appear around all selected items.
2. Right-click on one of the selected items, go to Group, and select Group.
3. Now your header is a single object! You can copy it (Ctrl+C) and paste it (Ctrl+V) onto every other page in your report for perfect consistency.

You can use this exact same process to create a footer with information like "Page 1 of 5" or "Confidential & Proprietary."

Method 2: Using a Page Background Image for Consistency

If you have a complex header or want absolute consistency with zero chance of elements getting nudged out of place, you can design your header and footer in an external tool like PowerPoint or Canva and set it as a background image.

Step 1: Design The Background

1. Open a tool like PowerPoint. Create a blank slide.
2. Set the slide dimensions to match your Power BI canvas (the default is 16:9, or 1280x720 pixels).
3. Design your full report frame, including the header and footer bars, a logo, and any static text. Leave blank space in the middle for your Power BI visuals.
4. Once you're happy with the design, save the slide as an image file (PNG or JPG).

Step 2: Apply the Background in Power BI

1. In Power BI Desktop, click on a blank area of the report canvas to ensure no visuals are selected.
2. Go to the Format pane and expand the Canvas background section.
3. Click the Browse button and select the image file you just created.
4. By default, the Image fit is set to "Normal." Change this to Fit to ensure it scales correctly to the page size.
5. Set the Transparency to 0% so the image is fully visible.

Now you have a perfectly consistent header and footer on your page. You can right-click the page tab at the bottom and select "Duplicate Page" to create new pages with the same background already applied.

The trade-off: This method is fast and perfectly consistent, but any text in the image is static. You can't add dynamic elements like the "Last Refreshed" date directly into the image. However, you can still layer dynamic visuals (like the Card visual from Method 1) on top of the background image.

Method 3: Creating an Interactive Header with Navigation Buttons

Modern dashboards often use the header as the primary navigation tool, disabling the default Power BI page tabs at the bottom. This creates a clean, app-like experience for the user.

Step 1: Set Up Your Header Background

Follow Step 1 from the manual build method to create a rectangle shape for your header bar, and add your title and logo.

Step 2: Add Navigation Buttons

1. Go to the Insert tab, click Buttons, and select a button type (a Blank button offers the most flexibility).
2. Place the button on your header where you want your navigation to be.
3. With the button selected, go to the Format pane to style it. Under Style > Text, add the name of the page it will link to, like "Overview" or "Sales Details." Style the font and color as needed.
4. Make sure to style the button for its different states (Default, On hover, On press) to give users clear visual feedback.

Step 3: Configure the Button Action

1. This is where the magic happens. With the button selected, go to the Format pane and toggle the Action setting to On.
2. Expand the Action section. For Type, select Page navigation.
3. For Destination, select the report page you want the button to link to from the dropdown menu.
4. Add a helpful Tooltip that says something like "Click to go to the Overview page."

Repeat this process for each page you want in your navigation menu. Once complete, you can group them with your header and copy the group to your other pages. For the ultimate clean look, you can hide the default page tabs by going to File > Options and settings > Options > Current File > Report settings and unchecking "Show page tabs". Your header is now the only way for users to navigate the report.

Final Thoughts

Mastering headers and footers is a simple way to significantly improve the quality and usability of your Power BI reports. By using shapes and text boxes for custom builds, page backgrounds for ultimate consistency, or buttons for modern navigation, you can create a professional-grade experience that makes your data much easier for stakeholders to digest.

While perfecting every detail in a report builder is a valuable skill, it's often the most time-consuming part of the analysis process. Manually building reports, writing formulas, and ensuring everything looks just right can take hours away from finding the actual insights. We built Graphed to short-circuit this entire process. You can connect your marketing and sales data sources in seconds, then simply describe the dashboard you want in plain English. Graphed builds the interactive, real-time reports for you, letting you get straight to the insights without getting stuck in the weeds of report design.