Getting Started with Icon Map Lite

From an empty report to a map that filters it, in three steps.

Install it

  1. Open your report in Power BI Desktop or the Power BI service.
  2. In the Visualizations pane, choose the ... button, then Get more visuals.
  3. Search for Icon Map Lite.
  4. Choose Add.

If your administrator has approved Icon Map Lite for your tenant, it will also appear under Get more visuals > My organization.

Icon Map Lite makes no network requests, so there are no domains to allow-list. See Add Icon Map Lite to a report for more.

Icon Map Lite runs in Power BI Desktop and the Power BI service. For Power BI Report Server, Publish to web, Power BI Embedded and the government clouds, use Icon Map Pro or Icon Map Slicer.

Build your first map

  1. Add your data

    Drag fields into the Fields pane of the visual:

    • ID (required) - a unique value per item on the map. This is what selection and cross-filtering are based on. More than one field here creates a drill-down hierarchy.
    • Longitude (X) and Latitude (Y).
    • Circle Size - a number that sets each circle's size, such as sales or a count. Circles are drawn only for rows that have a value here.

    Until your rows have everything a layer needs, the map shows the guide What kind of map are you making?. It ticks off the fields you have added and shows what is still missing for each layer type.

    Set longitude and latitude to Average. Power BI defaults numeric fields to Sum, which collapses every point into one impossible coordinate. This is by far the most common reason a first map looks wrong.

  2. Choose your layers

    Circles are on to start with, so as soon as your rows have an ID, a position and a Circle Size, a circle appears at every coordinate. To draw something else, pick a tile in the layer guide, or open the Layer Manager (the first card in the Format pane) to add, edit, reorder and hide layers. See choose a layer type.

    Which layer a given row draws depends on which fields that row has populated, not only on the layers you have switched on. A row with an ID, longitude, latitude and Circle Size draws a circle; add a destination longitude and latitude and it draws a line instead. See combining multiple layers.

  3. Filter the report

    Click an item on the map and the rest of the report page filters to it. Hold Ctrl to add to the selection.

    There is more than clicking: draw a lasso, drag a radius, click a boundary to select everything inside it, or simply pan the map and let the report follow what is in view. See selection and filtering.

Then make it look right

Pick a background style Seven built-in styles, including a transparent one Strip the map back Fourteen toggles for labels, borders, land and water Add street-level detail Upload an .imbase custom basemap for your area Add data labels With halos, containers and collision avoidance Add a legend And a layer control users can toggle Control the zoom Auto zoom, limits, and where the map opens Make it fast What to change when a map feels slow

When something does not appear

First check that every row you expect has a Circle Size (or the field the layer you want needs), and that longitude and latitude are set to Average. Then open the Layer Manager and look at Your data: it shows which of your rows are drawn, which layer each one reached, and why a layer draws nothing. See check your data, or troubleshooting.

Keep going