Skip to main content
cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Earn the coveted Fabric Analytics Engineer certification. 100% off your exam for a limited time only!

Timeline slicer using UTC instead of local time

The timeline slicer in PowerBI is is filtering on UTC on both the desktop and online server. As I am based in Australia, this is a huge issue as UTC is currently 11 hours behind. This means that the timeline slicer does not show the current date until 11am, essentially meaning that any report with a timeline slicer is behind by a day for the first 11 hours of the day.

 

This is also an issue when creating calculated columns/measures that use the formula =today() or =now(). These return the local system times when used in the Desktop version, but return UTC when the report is uploaded to the server.

 

I know that there are workaround solutions for this issue including converting the imported data's datetime to UTC or only importing the data I wish to use and just displaying that data, but this is frustrating to do for every report, and defeats the purpose of including the timeline slicer as a filter option in PowerBI. It also doesn't offer the flexibility and simplicity that PowerBI should be able to offer to the end user.

 

Can you provide an option to either change the timezone that the server uses at a global/report level (to account for people who work in different time zones), or simply apply the timezone that is used when creating the report?

Status: Needs Info
Comments
v-qiuyu-msft
Community Support

Hi @lsharp,

 

1. I'm not very clear about the description "The timeline slicer in PowerBI is is filtering on UTC on both the desktop and online server ", can you share some screenshots to clarify it? 

 

2. There is a known gap for the time zone displayed in Power BI Service. The time zone in the service is effectively always set to UTC. See: https://community.powerbi.com/t5/Community-Knowledge-Base/Time-in-PBI-Service-is-inconsistent-with-t...

 

Best Regards,
Qiuyun Yu 

Vicky_Song
Impactful Individual
Status changed to: Needs Info
 
lsharp
Regular Visitor

Hi @v-qiuyu-msft

 

Below are some screenshots showing the issues we are having when uploading reports to the online service. I've included screenshots of both before and after UTC midnight from the desktop reports and online service.

 

This image shows that the timeline slicer filters the date on UTC, not local time on desktop Power BI

Power BI Test Desktop AM.png

 

This image shows that the timeline slicer continues to filter on UTC when uploaded to the online service.

 Power BI Test Online AM.png

 

This image shows that the timeline slicer changes to the next day on desktop Power BI when UTC passes midnight

Power BI Test Desktop PM.png

 

This image shows that the timeline slicer aligns with UTC on the online service.

Power BI Test Online PM.png

 

 

We would really like the ability for the relative filter on the timeline slicer to filter on local time not on UTC on the online server.

lsharp
Regular Visitor

Hi @v-qiuyu-msft

 

Any update on this? The status is still marked as "needs info". Is there anything more that you need from my end?

 

Thanks

v-qiuyu-msft
Community Support

Hi @lsharp,

 

It's a limitation that slicer relative mode based on UTC time, see: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/desktop-slicer-filter-date-range#limitations-and-considera...

 

Best Regards,
Qiuyun Yu

roselilly23
Advocate V

I am having the same issue. The limitations and considerations suggest you should convert the field to UTC. This does not help. 

This shows I have two records which happened on the 11th of July New Zealand timeThis shows I have two records which happened on the 11th of July New Zealand timeThis shows that after converting the field to UTC and applying last 1 day slicer, 1 of my records is filtered out despite occurring on the same date NZ time.This shows that after converting the field to UTC and applying last 1 day slicer, 1 of my records is filtered out despite occurring on the same date NZ time.

Basically this means people in different time zones can't use the relative date slicer.