The intelligence sheet includes a best-in-class Gantt chart for Microsoft Fabric that provides a clear, interactive view of project timelines, task dependencies, and resource allocation. Build a Gantt chart directly on your semantic models or import project management data from file sources. The fully customizable Gantt chart enables you to:
Organize work into tasks with defined start and end dates.
Identify task dependencies and anticipate potential delays.
Assign resources to tasks and balance workloads across teams.
Track key deliverables, approvals, and project milestones.
In this article, you learn how to assign data to plot a Gantt chart, add milestones and references, configure timeline zoom, and customize the appearance of the Gantt chart.
Assign the dimensions that define the task hierarchy to the Task data well. The chart uses the order of the assigned fields to build the hierarchy, displaying parent tasks and their nested subtasks.
Assign the fields containing the start and end dates for each task to the Start Date and End Date data wells. The Gantt chart uses these values to render the task bars along the timeline.
Select the drill-down icon to expand the hierarchy and show the sub-tasks.
Assign the measure that defines the completion percentage for each task to the Progress data well. The chart displays the completed portion of each task based on this value.
Assign the measures that identify milestone tasks to the Milestone data well. The chart uses this value to distinguish key project milestones from regular tasks and display them with milestone markers on the timeline. In this example, the black diamond symbols represent milestones.
Assign the field that captures interdependencies between tasks to the Connect to bucket. You see connector lines rendered between tasks that have dependencies.
Capture phases or project sprints with reference lines or reference bands. Go to References > Analytics and select Add new reference.
Plot a reference line for the current date ("Today") to quickly determine whether tasks are on schedule, overdue, or planned for the future.
Use reference lines to emphasize significant dates on the timeline. Mark the current date, project end date, or a custom date or date range. Set Date(s) to Custom Date, and use the calendar icon to select the date. Edit the Label to a name relevant to your project.
Adjust the Offset to change the default position of the label.
Change the line format to a dashed line. Select Apply. This action adds a reference line indicating a custom holiday in the Gantt chart. Add multiple reference lines and bands as required.
Select Gantt Options > Data colors to customize the colors, style, and border of the progress bars.
Assign colors to clearly demarcate the completed and pending segments in the Gantt bars. In the Color by section, the fill colors indicate the pending segments, and the track colors represent the completed segments in each bar. Set different track and fill colors to visually distinguish between parent and child bars.
Go to the Connector section to change the appearance of the connector lines. Customize the line and arrow colors, line style, and thickness.
Go to Gantt Options > Timeline to customize the multi-level timeline by setting the background, font color, and selecting the header and date formats. Each level in the timeline has dedicated customization options. Adjust the default padding on either side of the Gantt chart as needed.
Similarly, go to Gantt Options > Grid to customize the grid font and background colors and configure the grid line thickness and color.
Go to Gantt Options > Columns to rename the task and subtask column header. To display the duration for each task, enable Actual duration and select the Duration unit (Hours, Days, Weeks, Months, or Years).
Zoom in and out on the Gantt timeline for high-level project overviews and detailed task status tracking. Go to Gantt Options > General and set Zoom Option to Button.
To configure zoom intervals, go to Settings > Zoom levels and turn on the Enabled toggle. Create yearly, quarterly, monthly, or weekly timelines by configuring zoom levels.
The Max level is the highest-level summarized Gantt chart - for example, at the year level.
The Min level is the lowest-level Gantt chart for detailed tracking - for example, at the day or hour level.
Set the interval to determine the number of years/quarters/months/days to show at each level.
Use the Zoom in and Zoom out buttons to change the timeline scale. The following screenshot shows the timeline displayed at the Month > Week > Day level.
In the Gantt ribbon, select Milestones to configure milestone settings. You can customize the color and icon used to represent a milestone. Additionally, you can upload custom icons. Set the Icon configuration to Individual to use different icons for each milestone field.
Go to Settings > Data Labels to customize the position and appearance of data labels. Place data labels outside or inside the Gantt progress bars. You can also set the background color, font, and offset position.
The following screenshot shows the final Gantt chart:
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