Power Query

Power Query is a powerful data transformation and data preparation engine. It comes with a graphical interface for sourcing data and a Power Query Editor for applying transformations. Business users often spend a significant amount of time on data preparation, and Power Query addresses this by enabling connectivity to a wide range of data sources. It provides a consistent and intuitive experience for data connectivity, allowing users to shape and transform data rapidly and iteratively. With Power Query, users can define a repeatable process for accessing and transforming data, ensuring that they can easily refresh the data to stay up-to-date. The transformation engine includes many prebuilt functions that can be used through the graphical interface of the Power Query Editor. These transformations range from simple operations like removing columns or filtering rows to more advanced options such as merge, append, group by, pivot, and unpivot. Additionally, Power Query offers the ability to work with a subset of the data set to manage large volumes, velocities, and varieties of data. Currently, there are two Power Query experiences available: Power Query Online and Power Query for Desktop. Despite some differences in integration, they both provide a similar user experience. In cases where the graphical editor doesn't meet specific transformation needs, the Power Query engine uses the M formula language, which allows for advanced customizations. Power Query can be used in various Microsoft products and services, as shown in the provided table.