Global Threshold
The Global Threshold card covers the two situations where a visual should not be drawn at all: no data left after the filters, and a result that must not be published — a base too small, a period still being collected, an unusable slicer selection.
In both cases the visual erases itself and, optionally, paints a message in its place.
All six visuals — Column, Line, Scatter, Gradient Heatmap, Radar and Pie — expose the card under the name Global Threshold, with the conditional test described below.
Properties
| Property | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Empty Panel | Whether the message is painted when the dataset comes back empty. | On |
| Message | Text drawn when the dataset is empty. Leave it empty for a completely blank panel. Supports conditional formatting (fx). | No Data to display |
| Conditional Message | Text drawn when the test below is met. Leave it empty for a completely blank panel. Supports conditional formatting (fx). | Not enough data to display |
| Test if | Left operand of the test — usually a measure bound through fx: a base, a count of respondents. | 0 |
| Is | Comparison operator: <, = or >. | < |
| To | Right operand of the test. | 0 |
| Horizontal Alignment | Left, center or right. | Center |
| Vertical Alignment | Top, middle or bottom. | Middle |
| Font | Font family, size, and bold / italic / underline. The size supports conditional formatting (fx). | Segoe UI, 14 pt |
| Text Color | Message color. Supports conditional formatting (fx). | #333333 |
| Background Color | Fill painted behind the message. Supports conditional formatting (fx). | #FFFFFF |
| Transparency | Background transparency, 0 % (opaque) to 100 % (invisible). Supports conditional formatting (fx). | 100 % |
Transparency defaults to 100 %, so the panel is transparent out of the box and the report page shows through. Lower it to make Background Color visible.
Empty dataset
When the filters of the page leave no row at all, the visual always erases itself — bars, lines, points, axes, legend, data labels, analytics overlays and tooltips. Drawing a pair of empty axes reads as a broken component, so this is not optional.
Empty Panel only decides whether Message is painted over the blank visual:
- On (default) — the message explains the situation: "Data not available for this period".
- Off — the visual is simply blank, no text at all.
An empty Message gives the same result as switching the toggle off: a truly blank panel — useful to reserve space in a layout, or to hide a chart without leaving a hole marked by an error.
The visual keeps its position and size on the page: the layout does not reflow, the frame stays where it is. Data fields stay bound, so the chart comes straight back as soon as the filters return rows — nothing is lost.
Conditional threshold
The second block replaces the visual when a test holds, on a dataset that does have rows. Its typical use is a confidentiality threshold: a base too small to be published.
The test is Test if Is To — for example Test if [Base] Is < To 30. It
fires on its own: it does not depend on the Empty Panel toggle. When it holds, the chart
is erased exactly as above and Conditional Message is painted instead.
Both operands carry the fx button, so the left one is normally bound to a measure:
Base = COUNTROWS ( Respondents )
Bind [Base] to Test if, leave Is on <, set To to 30, and the visual hides
itself whenever the current filter context leaves fewer than 30 respondents.
Both operands default to 0 with the < operator, a test that is never true — which is why
the conditional message stays off until you actually configure it.
Which one wins
The two cases are exclusive and evaluated in this order:
- Dataset empty → the chart is erased; Message is painted if Empty Panel is on.
- Dataset not empty, test met → the chart is erased; Conditional Message is painted.
- Otherwise → the chart is drawn normally.
The conditional test is only evaluated when there is data: an empty dataset never shows the conditional message.
A whole-visual threshold, not a per-row one
This card hides the entire visual. To hide only the rows whose base is too small — keeping the others, and their category labels, visible — use the per-column thresholds of the Add. Table instead. The two work well together: a per-column critical threshold for the individual rows, this card for the case where the whole visual has nothing publishable left.
The Pie Chart, which has no additional columns to threshold, answers the same need one chart at a time with its Series Threshold card: the smallest base of a small multiple decides whether that chart is flagged, or withdrawn and replaced by a message, while the rest of the grid keeps being drawn.
Notes
- The panel never intercepts clicks: it lets pointer events through, so the report page keeps behaving normally underneath.
- The visual signals to Power BI that rendering is finished as soon as the panel is drawn, so the page stops loading and Export to PDF or Print does not wait on a visual that will never draw.
- The About icon, the settings gear where a visual has one, and the Powered by Socio Data Management watermark of the Free edition all remain visible above the panel. See Licensing.
- The message accepts line breaks and wraps on the width of the visual; text that exceeds the available height is clipped rather than overflowing.