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The October 2026 Power BI update includes custom visual authoring with agent skills, a Gantt chart preview, dropdown list slicers, chart formatting controls, and continuous capacity usage reporting for semantic models. Additional updates identify mobile-ready report pages and display content information in Microsoft Teams tabs.
For a quick summary of October features, read on. For details, see the Power BI October 2026 Feature Summary.
Download the October 2026 version of Power BI Desktop.
To stay up to date on bug fixes and improvements as they're announced, visit the change log for Power BI Desktop.
Copilot and AI
| Feature | Description | Currently in preview |
|---|---|---|
| Create reports with custom visuals using Skills for Fabric (Generally Available) | The Power BI Report skill can add supported custom visuals, bind them to report data, apply formatting, and validate the result. It can use visuals already imported into a report or help identify an AppSource visual. For more information, see Power BI Report skill and Install Skills for Fabric. |
Reporting
| Feature | Description | Currently in preview |
|---|---|---|
| Gantt chart (Preview) | A new core visual displays task durations, progress, and milestones on a time axis. Configure axis ranges, category colors, additional task columns, and a zoom axis; enable the visual under Preview features in Desktop and restart Desktop to try it. For more information, see Gantt visual. | ✔️ |
| List slicer with dropdown option (Preview) | List slicers support dropdown mode with dismissible selection pills, configurable drawer dimensions, and search formatting. Use Show selected first in list and button slicers to pin active selections to the top. For more information, see Create and use a list slicer. | ✔️ |
| Chart plot area background color (Generally Available) | Bar, column, line, area, combo, ribbon, waterfall, and scatter charts support a solid plot area fill and conditional formatting based on a measure or field value. For more information, see Format report visualizations. | |
| Auto-expand hierarchy axis with field parameters (Generally Available) | Bar, column, and line charts can automatically expand hierarchy axes when multiple columns are selected, including columns supplied by field parameters. Report viewers can switch axis fields through a slicer or Personalize this visual. For more information, see Customize x-axis and y-axis properties and Create field parameters. | |
| Personal bookmarks preserve column widths (Generally Available) | Personal bookmarks now preserve resized and reordered columns in tables and matrices, so applying a bookmark restores your saved layout. For more information, see Personal bookmarks in Power BI. |
Modeling
| Feature | Description | Currently in preview |
|---|---|---|
| Continuous capacity usage reporting for surge protection | Semantic models report capacity unit usage continuously during long-running background operations instead of primarily at completion. Surge protection can respond to in-progress usage with earlier rejection or delay decisions; no settings changes are required. For more information, see Surge protection. |
Mobile
| Feature | Description | Currently in preview |
|---|---|---|
| Mobile page indicator | Report page tabs display an icon when a page has a mobile layout. Report creators can identify mobile-ready pages and pages that still need a mobile layout directly from the report footer. For more information, see Identify report pages that have a mobile layout. |
Other
| Feature | Description | Currently in preview |
|---|---|---|
| Artifact info header for Power BI tabs in Microsoft Teams | Power BI tabs in Teams display the content name, most recent data refresh time, and sensitivity label. The header is available for reports, dashboards, scorecards, apps, and org apps. For more information, see Embed Power BI content in Microsoft Teams. |
Resources
Want to learn about Power BI through videos and other engaging content? Check out these video sources and content:
- See all Power BI playlists on YouTube.
- Power BI YouTube channel: Official Microsoft Power BI channel.
- Follow Power BI on X @MSPowerBI.
- Go to the Power BI forums in the Microsoft Fabric Community.
Note
Some resources use earlier versions of Power BI Desktop or the Power BI service.
If your organization needs an earlier version, download it. Use the most recent version of Power BI Desktop when possible. Earlier versions have these limitations:
- Previous releases of Power BI Desktop aren't serviced. Use the most recent release for the latest features and updates.
- Previous versions can't open files created or saved in newer releases of Power BI Desktop.
- If you load a report from a newer release, get a warning, and then save it in a previous version, you lose information related to new features.
- Only English versions of Power BI Desktop are archived.
Download the October 2026 version of Power BI Desktop.
Past updates
Find previous monthly Power BI updates in the Power BI monthly updates archive.