How to Make a Sunburst Chart in Power BI

Sunburst charts are one of the most effective ways to visualize hierarchical data inside a dashboard. If you need to show how a whole is broken down into its component parts - and then see the component parts of those parts - a sunburst chart is a fantastic choice. This guide will walk you through exactly what a sunburst chart is, when to use one, and how to build your own step-by-step in Power BI.

What Is a Sunburst Chart and When Should You Use One?

Think of a sunburst chart as a multi-layered pie chart. The center circle represents the total, or the top level of your hierarchy. Moving outwards, each subsequent ring breaks down the previous one into its constituent categories. The size of each slice corresponds to its value, providing a quick visual reference for how different components contribute to the whole at every level.

This structure makes it perfect for displaying relationships within hierarchical data. It allows users to instantly see the proportional breakdown of data across different tiers of a category.

The Best (and Worst) Times to Use a Sunburst Chart

Like any visualization, sunburst charts are brilliant for some tasks and less ideal for others. Knowing when to use them is key to creating clear and insightful reports.

Use a sunburst chart when you need to:

• Display Hierarchical Data: This is their primary function. If your data has a clear parent-child relationship (e.g., Region > Country > City), a sunburst chart can show it beautifully.

• Illustrate Part-to-Whole Relationships: They excel at showing the breakdown of a total amount across multiple levels. For example, analyzing website traffic by Source > Medium > Campaign.

• Create Interactive Drill-Downs: In a Power BI report, users can click on a segment in the inner ring to see a more detailed breakdown in the outer rings, making it an engaging and exploratory tool.

• Analyze Resource Allocation: Breaking down a budget by Department > Team > Project is a perfect use case.

Avoid a sunburst chart when you are:

• Comparing Specific Values: The angular slices can make it hard to precisely compare one segment to another, especially if their values are close. A simple bar or column chart is much better for direct comparisons.

• Visualizing Data Over Time: For time-series data, like sales per month, a line chart is the standard and most effective choice.

• Working with Too Many Levels: A sunburst chart with more than 3 or 4 levels can become visually cluttered and difficult to read, defeating its purpose.

• Dealing with Negative Values: Sunburst charts, like pie charts, cannot represent negative values.

Preparing Your Data for a Sunburst Chart

Before you jump into Power BI, make sure your data is structured correctly. For a sunburst chart to work, you need two fundamental things:

1. Clearly defined levels of a hierarchy: Each level should be in its own column.

2. A numerical value: This is the metric that determines the size of each slice.

Imagine you're a marketing manager analyzing campaign performance. Your raw data table might look something like this:

Sample Marketing Campaign Data:

Here, the hierarchy is Channel → Campaign Name → Platform, and the value is Conversions. This structure is perfect for a sunburst chart.

Creating Your Sunburst Chart in Power BI: A Step-by-Step Guide

Ready to build? Let's get started. Unlike bar charts or line charts, the sunburst chart isn't a default visualization in Power BI. You'll need to grab it from Microsoft's AppSource marketplace first - don't worry, it's free and straightforward.

Step 1: Get the Sunburst Custom Visual

In your Power BI Desktop report, look at the Visualizations pane on the right side.

1. Click the three dots (...) at the bottom of the icons.

2. Select "Get more visuals."

3. A new window labeled "Power BI Visuals" will pop up. In the search bar at the top right, type "sunburst" and press Enter.

4. Find the visual named Sunburst by MAQ Software. It's certified by Microsoft, so you know it's reliable. Click "Add" to download it into your Power BI Desktop file.

You will now see a new icon (a small sunburst chart) in your Visualizations pane, ready to use!

Step 2: Add the Sunburst Visual to Your Report

Simply click on the new Sunburst icon you just added. Power BI will drop a blank chart template onto your report canvas. Resize it as you see fit.

Step 3: Add Your Data to the Fields Wells

With the blank chart selected, you’ll see two main data fields in the Visualizations pane:

• Groups: This is where your hierarchy levels go.

• Values: This is for your numerical data.

Using our sample marketing data from earlier, you would drag and drop the fields like this:

1. From the Data pane, drag Channel into the Groups well.

2. Next, drag Campaign Name under Channel in the Groups well.

3. Finally, drag Platform under Campaign Name. The order here is critical, as it defines the hierarchy from the center outwards.

4. Drag your numerical column, Conversions, into the Values well.

Instantly, the visual on your canvas will transform into a fully interactive sunburst chart representing your data!

Making Your Sunburst Chart Shine: Formatting and Customization

A default chart gets the job done, but a well-formatted chart tells a clearer story. Select your sunburst chart, then click the paintbrush icon ("Format your visual") in the Visualizations pane to start customizing.

Data Colors

This is where you can change the colors for your top-level categories. Give each channel a distinct, brand-aligned color to make the chart more intuitive. You can set colors for "Paid Social," "Email," and "Paid Search" individually.

Labels

This section is crucial for readability. You can customize the labels that appear on the slices.

• Show labels: Toggles all labels on or off.

• Label Style: Choose what information the label displays. Options like "Category and data value," "Percent of total," or just "Category" offer great flexibility. Test them to see what communicates your data most effectively.

• Overflow text: Power BI can hide labels if they don't fit. Turning this on will ensure even long category names are visible.

You can also control the font size, color, and positioning to make sure your chart is perfectly legible.

Title

Don't stick with the default title Power BI creates (e.g., "Sum of Conversions by Channel, Campaign Name, and Platform"). Write something descriptive, like "Marketing Conversions by Channel and Campaign." This adds context for anyone viewing your report.

Advanced Tips and Common Traps to Avoid

You've built and styled your chart. Here are a few final pointers to make it as effective as possible.

• Limit Your Levels: It's tempting to cram all your data into one chart, but sunbursts perform best with 2-4 levels of hierarchy. More than that and they turn into an undecipherable rainbow wheel. If you have more levels, consider using a matrix with drill-down or creating a separate, more detailed chart.

• Provide Complementary Visuals: A sunburst chart is great for showing proportions but bad for making precise comparisons. It's often smart to place a bar chart next to it showing the top-level categories. This gives viewers both a sense of proportion and an easy way to compare exact numbers.

• Be Mindful of Misinterpretation: Humans aren't great at comparing angles and arc lengths. A slice that's twice the value of another won't always look perfectly twice as big, especially in the outer rings. Keep this in mind and use data labels with values or percentages to add necessary clarity.

Final Thoughts

You've now learned what a sunburst chart is, how to prepare data for it, and the exact steps to build and format a visually engaging one in Power BI. It's a powerful and interactive tool for revealing the component parts of your business, perfect for anything from sales and marketing analytics to financial budgets.

While mastering specific visuals in tools like Power BI is a valuable skill, we know the process of connecting sources and building reports can still feel manual and time-consuming. We built Graphed to remove that friction completely. Instead of searching for visuals and dragging fields into wells, you can connect your platforms like Google Analytics, Shopify, or Salesforce once and then simply ask for what you need in plain English - like, “Show me a breakdown of Shopify sales by product category and vendor for this year." Graphed generates an entire interactive dashboard for you in seconds, letting you bypass the manual work and get straight to uncovering insights.