Easy Tech TutsHow to Update and Refresh Data in a Power BI Dashboard Easily 2026
By Impran M N
Nothing undermines a team dashboard faster than stale numbers that don't reflect this morning's updates. Power BI gives you both a manual refresh trigger for local development and an automated scheduled refresh pipeline for published dashboards. This guide covers how to set up both so your visuals stay accurate without constant manual work.
01Trigger a manual refresh in Desktop
Use the Refresh button on the Home ribbon in Power BI Desktop to immediately pull updated data and recalculate your visuals while you're actively working on a report.
02Publish your report to the Power BI Service
Once your report is ready, publish it to the cloud service so it can be shared and refreshed independently of your local machine.
03Configure data source credentials
In the Power BI Service, set up secure credentials for each data source your report depends on, which is required before scheduled refresh can run automatically.
04Set up a data gateway if needed
For on-premises data sources, install and configure a gateway so the cloud service can securely reach data that isn't natively cloud-hosted.
05Schedule automatic refresh
Configure a daily or weekly refresh schedule in the dataset settings, and check the refresh history if a scheduled run fails so you can troubleshoot quickly.
Frequently asked questions
How often can I schedule Power BI to refresh automatically?
This depends on your license tier, but scheduled refresh commonly supports multiple refreshes per day on paid plans.
Why is my scheduled refresh failing?
Failures are most often caused by expired or incorrect data source credentials, or a gateway that isn't running, so check the refresh history for specific error details.
Do I need a gateway if all my data is already in the cloud?
No, a gateway is only required when connecting to on-premises or local network data sources.
Does refreshing in Desktop update the published cloud report too?
No, refreshing locally in Desktop only updates what you see there; you need to republish or rely on the cloud's own scheduled refresh to update the published version.
Watch the full walkthrough
The same steps, demonstrated on screen from start to finish.
