Feature Inquiry and Enhancement Request – Export & Reporting Capabilities

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1

Dear Team,

I hope you’re doing well.

First, I’d like to say that Holistics has been a great tool for us so far, and we truly appreciate its capabilities. However, there are a few areas where my team is currently facing limitations, and I’d really appreciate your guidance or support on them.

1. Excel Export Formatting
When exporting reports to Excel, most of the formatting (such as styling, layout, and structure) is not retained. The output is mainly raw data, which requires additional manual work on our end.

2. Pivot Table Filters
When exporting pivot tables to Excel, the filters are not included. This limits our ability to further analyze or interact with the data directly within Excel.

3. Multiple Reports in a Single Sheet
Currently, exports allow one report per sheet, but in many cases, we need to combine multiple reports (e.g., a table alongside a chart) within the same sheet for better presentation and usability.

4. Styling and Visual Formatting
Custom styling (colors, formatting, etc.) applied within Holistics is generally not reflected in the Excel export. Notably, some formatting appears in pivot table exports, which suggests that this capability may already be partially supported.

5. Scheduled/Email Reports (Excel Format)
These limitations also apply when reports are sent via email in Excel format. Ideally, recipients should receive fully formatted reports, including pivot filters, styling, and the ability to combine multiple reports in a single sheet.

If these features are not currently supported, I would greatly appreciate it if you could suggest any possible workarounds or alternative approaches.

Additionally, since I have a strong background in JavaScript, I’d be very interested to know if there are any extensibility options (such as APIs, scripting capabilities, or custom integrations) that would allow us to enhance or customize the export functionality to better fit our needs.

Thank you in advance for your support, and I look forward to your recommendations.

Best regards,

2

Hi @Hamza_Rashed1

Thank you for the thoughtful feedback.

From your note, my understanding is that you’re mainly looking for three improvements to Excel exports:

  • Preserve formatting/styling​ in Excel exports
  • ​Include pivot table filters
  • Allow multiple reports/components in a single worksheet

To help us better understand the request and evaluate possible solutions, I have a few follow-up questions:

General use case:

  • What is the main use case for exporting dashboards to Excel?
  • Do your users generally prefer continuing their analysis in Excel rather than in Holistics dashboards?

Preserve formatting/styling:

  • Which elements are most important for you to preserve in Excel? For example, would you expect:
  • Chart type​ to stay the same (e.g. a line chart remains a line chart)
  • Number formatting​ to be retained (e.g. thousand separators, decimal places)
  • Styles/colors​ to carry over (e.g. dashed line, pink color)

Pivot table filters:

  • When you mention including filters, do you mean filters should be available directly within the pivot table’s column and row headings in Excel, so users can interact with them there?
  • Would you also expect filters for fields that are not currently shown in the pivot table?

Thanks again, any additional detail you can share will help us better assess the request.

3

Hi @Phuong,

Thanks for your follow-up and for taking the time to better understand our requirements. Please find my responses below:

General Use Case:
The main use case for exporting dashboards to Excel is to allow our team to perform further analysis, share reports with stakeholders, and maintain a visually clear presentation. Users generally prefer continuing their analysis in Excel, especially when dealing with pivot tables or combining multiple datasets, rather than only using the Holistics dashboard.

Preserve Formatting/Styling:
While there are no extremely strict formatting rules, the following elements are most important for us:

  • Charts: Mostly bar (vertical) and pie charts; it would be helpful if chart types remain consistent when exported.
  • Tables: A visually appealing layout is preferred. This includes simple styling like bold headers, merged cells for sections, and clear separation of rows and columns.
  • Number formatting: Retaining thousand separators, decimals, and general readability in Excel is useful, but exact colors are not critical.

Pivot Table Filters:
Yes, we expect filters to be fully interactive in Excel. For example, when exporting, we should get:

  1. One sheet containing the pivot table with all its filters intact so that users can manipulate rows, columns, and filter fields directly in Excel.
  2. Another sheet containing the raw dataset used to build the pivot table.
    This way, users can freely adjust the pivot table within Excel, including using filters, adding/removing columns, and updating values without going back to Holistics.

Additional Notes:
We would also appreciate any guidance on possible workarounds, APIs, or scripting capabilities that might allow us to enhance the Excel export functionality, particularly for styling and combining multiple reports into a single sheet when needed.

Thank you again for your support, and I look forward to your recommendations.

4

Hi @Hamza_Rashed1,

Thanks for the detailed breakdown - this is really helpful.

To be transparent: our current Excel export is designed for ad-hoc data exploration, not full report reproduction. Preserving chart types, interactive pivot table filters, and combined sheets in Excel isn’t supported today - partly a technical limitation, partly a deliberate stance on data integrity (once data is in Excel, it tends to drift from the source).

For your particular use case, our team is actively looking into what’s feasible. We’ll follow up once we have something concrete :pray:

In the meantime, may we touch more on: Which specific Holistics features are missing that push your users back to Excel? Knowing that would help us improve our product and their experience.

Best regards,
Phuong.