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.
So let’s start with an example, sample dataset format as below:
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 |
Step-1: Now drag KPI visual to report page > “Actual Sales” to Indicator, “Year” to Trend axis & “Target Sales” to Target goals section.

KPI in Power Bi -1
Understand why it is showing 2600000 & Goal: 2500000 as in default?
By default KPI displayed the current Sale & 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 by 100.

KPI in Power BI – 2
Step-2: Now select any year from slicer & see the KPIs output.
For year 2015 target not completed that’s why it is showing values as in Red color.

KPI in Power BI – 3
How to create a KPI % measure?
KPI % = Var ActualSale= Sum(KPIData[Actual Sales]) Var TargetSale= Sum(KPIData[Target Sales]) Var diff = ActualSale - TargetSale Return DIVIDE(diff, TargetSale)*100
Now drag measure to Table visual.

KPI Percentage Formula
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.
Want to know about other visuals, refer this: Power BI Visualizations
Hope you enjoyed the post. Your valuable feedback, question, or comments about this post are always welcome or you can leave us message on our Contact form , we will revert to you asap.
how do we Calculate KPIs Of GOLY (Current – Last )/ Current and how do we calculate last month same period