---
title: "Thin reports: Report level measures and data model measures"
description: Learn more about report level measures - what they are, when and why we need them, and how we create them.
image: https://www.datavizioner.com/hubfs/thinreports.png
---
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Analysis
# Thin reports: Report level measures and data model measures
Learn more about report level measures - what they are, when and why we need them, and how we create them.
[Earlier we discussed the concept of thin reports](https://www.datavizioner.com/resources/thin-reports-what-are-they-and-why-should-i-care-and-how-can-i-create-them), why we should care and how we can create them. This post focuses on a more specific topic, Report Level Measures. We discuss what report-level measures are, when and why we need them and how we create them.
### What are report level measures?
Report level measures are the measures created by the report writers within a Thin Report. Hence, the report level measures are available within the hosting Thin Report only which means the report level measures are not written back to the underlying dataset and hence they are not available to any other reports.
### Why and when do we need report level measures?
It is a common situation in real-world scenarios when the business requires a report urgently, but the nuts and bolts of the report are not being created on the underlying dataset yet. For instance, the business requires to present a report to the board showing year-to-date sales analysis but the year-to-date sales measure hasn’t been created in the dataset yet. The business analyst approaches the Power BI developers to add the measure, but they are under the pump to deliver some other functionalities which adding a new measure is not even in their project delivery plan. It is perhaps too late if we wait for the developers to plan for creating the required measure, go through the release process, and make it available for us in the dataset. Here is when the report level measures come to the rescue. We can simply create the missing measure in the Thin Report itself, where we can later share it with the developers to implement it as a dataset measure.
### How do we create report level measures?
Currently, we can create report level measures only in Power BI Desktop when **[Connect Live](https://www.biinsight.com/demystifying-dirctquery-and-connect-live/)** to either a [Power BI](https://www.biinsight.com/business-intelligence-components-and-how-they-relate-to-power-bi#semantic-layer)dataset, an SSAS Tabular model (on-premises), or Azure Analysis Services (AAS). For this blog post, I Connect Live to a Power BI dataset. Open Power BI Desktop first and follow these steps.
1. Click the **Data hub** dropdown button from the **Home** tab
2. Click the **Power BI datasets**
3. Select the desired dataset
4. Click **Connect**
Connecting Live to a Power BI dataset from Power BI Desktop
1. Right-click the table that you’d like to host the report level measure and select **New measure**
Creating a new report level measure in Power BI Desktop
1. Type your DAX expressions as usual and press enter
Typing DAX expressions to create report level measures
A new measure (**Avg Unit Price**) is now created on the **Internet Sales** table. As explained earlier, the new measure is only available in the current report and not at the dataset level and that is why this type of measure is the so-called **Report Level Measure**. All other measures are dataset level measures, therefore, they are available on the current report and any other thin reports we create in the future on top of the same dataset.
We can now use the **Avg Unit Price** as usual in our data visualisation.
Using report level measures in visuals in Power BI Desktop
As perhaps have noticed already, we can also create report level measures using the **[Quick Measures](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/transform-model/desktop-quick-measures?WT.mc_id=DP-MVP-5003466)** capability.
As a side note, you can also see the underlying data model by clicking the **Model** view tab as shown in the following image:
Model view tab in Power BI Desktop when connected live to a Power BI dataset
Have you used this capability? What challenges have you faced in using Report Level Measures? Talk to us about how Power BI Documenter can help you manage measures more effectively.
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1 July 2022
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