Question
In what situation should I put the filter on the report and when should I put the filter on the dashboard?
Answer
A report filter is an attribute added to the Filters section of a report. These filters allow you to focus on the dataset you're pulling from or remove unwanted information. For example, if you're making a report about the performance of a certain support team, use a filter to only show data related to that team. Learn more about report filters in this article: Filtering a report.
A dashboard filter is a widget you can add to your dashboard. These filters affect many or all of the reports on your dashboard and are used to manipulate the data range or type of data you're viewing. For example, if you have a lot of reports about agent activity, add a data filter for Agent name to pick which agent you want to view data about. Learn more about dashboard filters in this article: Best practices for using dashboard filters.
Generally speaking, put most filters at a dashboard level. That way you can access the filters and manipulate the data quickly and easily, without having to leave the dashboard and edit the reports themselves. In situations where you never want to manipulate that filter, or that filter is fundamental to the report's design, put the filters at the report level. These questions will help you decide:
- Do you want to be able to manipulate this characteristic of the data, or is it set in stone?
- Does this filter apply to this report only, or do you want the same filter to apply to all the reports on the dashboard?
Example
You are a support manager and you created a dashboard with reports that help you monitor your team's performance. One of the reports shows how well your team supports a specific important customer. For this report, use a filter on the report level to help focus the data to only show activity related to that one important customer.
If you want to adjust the date range for all the reports on your dashboard, add a time filter at the dashboard level. This way, you can see trends in the short term and the long term.
2 Comments
Unfortunately i have experienced the filter in the query doesn't limit the data can be view from the same query in the dashboard.. For example the follow query is filtered with ticket created data from the last month:
and in the kpi dashboard is the same until the date filter is identical (ticket created data from the last month):
But if i expand the range date in the dashboard the kpi data is update with the new date selection, even if the date in the query filter is still filtered with ticket created data from the last month:
Why do i have managed filter at the query level if in the dashboard they can be override?
That's right, that is the expected behavior – if the same attribute filter is present both on the dashboard and on the query, then the dashboard filter will override the query-level filter. The filter selection within the query will be disregarded when you load the report through the dashboard. Just like what's discussed in the article above, if you don't need to give the viewers the option to adjust date ranges or data filters applied to a query when viewing the dashboard reports, then it would be better to have the filter only at the query level. You can read more about dashboard filters here.
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