Business Central has powerful built-in reporting, making it easy to report on data from all areas of the system.
Examples include
- Fixed asset list
- Aged accounts receivable
- Customer list
- VAT statement
- and even employee birthdays!
What reports are there in Business Central?
There are a lot! Take a look at the full list for your system. You’ll see it includes things like invoices (which are treated like traditional business reports in Business Central)
- Search for report layout selection in Business Central (press Alt+Q to bring up the search bar)
- You’ll see the full list, often 500+ reports
Where to find reports in Business Central
In the All Reports section
- From the home page click All Reports
- You’ll see a categorised list of all the reports in your system
- Many of the headings have sub-categories – look for the down arrow beside each item as you hover your mouse over
For example, if you wanted to find the Aged Accounts Payable report, look in Finance > Payables
On a list page
Pages like Customers, Vendors and Items all have built-in reports.
Here’s an example on the Customers pages
And if you can’t find the report you’re looking for, try a search (Alt+Q) or
Look for a report in Report Layout Selection
- Search for report layout selection
- Select or search for the report name
- Click Run Report
Running reports in Business Central
When you choose a report, you’ll have to fill in a few details on the report request page before running the report.
Most of these details are self explanatory, but here’s a few pointers
- Each report request page is different, but many will ask for a dates or periods. You can enter these using this shorthand
Period Length – you can specify date periods like
1D = 1 day
1M = 1 month
3Q = 3 quarters
Dates
Enter t for today’s date
Enter mon25 for the Monday of week 25
Enter 25 which will be interpreted as the 25th of the current month and year
There’s many more date input shortcuts here
- For some reports you can choose an alternative layout. Look in the Report Layout section
Report filters
Every report request page offers filters to pinpoint the exact data you need. For each property, click into the box beside it to see your choices
You can add extra filters by clicking the +Filter… button
To narrow the filtering more precisely you can use search operators:
- Use the ’..’ notation to specify a range of numbers. So for example, to choose all customers with reference numbers between 10000 and 30000, write 10000..30000 in the filter box. You can also use this on alphabetical entires, so Apples..Pears would display everything alphabetically between the two words
- Use > and < for greater and less than – e.g >5000 will show records (or amounts) greater than 5000
- See the full list of operators on this Microsoft learn page
The print details switch allows you to toggle between grouped data and a full list of data
Printing reports
At the bottom of the report request page, you have 3 choices
- Send to which lets you choose a report format (usually Word, Excel or PDF)
- Print which sends the report to your choice of printer
- Preview which opens the report in Business Central
You can also choose for the report to be created in the future using the schedule option on the Send to screen (more about this later)
Scheduling regular reports
You can schedule a single report for the future from the send to screen as described above
If you want to schedule a report to be run regularly, here’s how:
- First of all go to the Job Queue Entries page (Alt+Q and type job queue)
- Click +New
- In the General area, make sure that Object Type to Run is set to Report
- In the Earliest Start Date/Time box enter the date and time you’d like the report to start – for most instances you’ll want them to start as soon as possible, so just type t to enter today’s date and time
- In the Object ID to Run box, choose the report you’d like to run.
- The list is long, so use the search box to help
- Check the Report Request Page Options switch if you want to specify options on the report request page – things like dates, ranges and data filters.
Recurrence
In the recurrence area, choose the days of the week you’d like the report to run.
You can optionally choose a recurrence pattern for more precise control. Specify a date formula, like 10D meaning 10 days from today and WD4 – the next Thursday (4th day of the week). See the full list of date formulas on Microsoft Learn
Note: Running reports may impact the speed of your system. For small, infrequent reports, this isn’t a problem. Reports which select huge amounts of data and run frequently can slow your system down for all users. Try to schedule reports less frequently and / or for quiet times of day
Other types of reporting
Exporting to Excel in Business Central
There are 2 main ways of getting report data into Excel.
Send to Excel
As described above, when you open a report request page and click Send to…, you can choose to export the report to Excel. Select data and layout for a printable spreadsheet or data only for a spreadsheet which you can manipulate or import to another application
Share
Use the share button on most pages to download a copy of the data to Excel or Edit the data in Excel. There’s more about Editing Business Central data in Excel on Microsoft Learn
Using Copilot in Business Central to report on data
Microsoft’s AI assistant, Copilot is integrated within Business Central. If you have Copilot enabled, you’ll see the icon (1). Click it and the Copilot pane will appear. You can use Copilot to find quick answers to reporting questions and more.
To run reports with Copilot
Use Copilot to find reports
Ask where is the aged accounts receivable report?
Use Copilot to run simple reports
Ask show me the 5 most recent sales orders
Speak to Copilot like a colleague
Ask What was the quote we sent to xyz PLC about a month ago?
This is just a small example of what Copilot can do. Find out more on Microsoft Learn
Reporting Business Central data in Power BI
If you’re experienced in Power BI, it’s easy to begin reporting on Business Central data
- In Power BI Desktop, choose Get Data.
- Choose Online Services then Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, and click Connect .
- Go through the wizard to log in to Business Central
- Specify the data you want to report on and then click Load.
You’re ready to start using Power BI to report on Business Central data
