Table of contents
1.
Introduction
2.
What are Hierarchies and their uses in Tableau?
3.
Creating a Hierarchy in Tableau with Examples
4.
Drill Down and Drill Up in Tableau
5.
Frequently Asked Questions
5.1.
What is Tableau?
5.2.
What are Hierarchies in Tableau?
5.3.
What do you mean by Drill down in Tableau?
5.4.
What are the different ways of creating hierarchies in Tableau?
6.
Conclusion 
Last Updated: Mar 27, 2024

Hierarchies in Tableau

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Introduction

Hierarchies in Tableau play a very important role in organizing the data fields in a database. They provide a very flexible way to analyze data allowing users to easily jump to different levels of detail in the datasets. 

Hierarchies in Tableau

In this article, we will discuss Hierarchies in Tableau in detail. We will learn how to create Hierarchies in Tableau with drill down and drill up, respectively, with proper examples.   

What are Hierarchies and their uses in Tableau?

Hierarchies in Tableau refer to organizing data fields into tree-like structured relationships that represent the nesting of data elements in a level-order fashion. Hierarchies in general are the logical structuring of distinct data in a dataset. 

Hierarchies is a powerful feature in Tableau that allows users to drill down and drill up to analyze data at different levels of detail, thus providing a way to study the data in a more structured manner. Analyzing different levels of granularity in a bar chart or a line chart becomes easier with hierarchies. Thus hierarchies make data a filtration and visualization better in Tableau. 

For example, a geographic dataset may have a hierarchy of regions, countries, states, cities, etc.

Creating a Hierarchy in Tableau with Examples

There are multiple ways of creating hierarchies in Tableau. They are:

1. Manual Hierarchy Creation: Hierarchies in Tableau can be created manually by selecting multiple fields. 

Manual Hierarchy Creation

Now, right-click on one of them and select the "Hierarchy" option. You can rename the hierarchy as per your preference. 

Manual Hierarchy Creation

You can also add more fields to your hierarchy.

2. By simple drag and drop: You can also drag and drop the fields onto each other in the data pane to create a hierarchy.

creating hierarchies by simple drag and drop

3. Automatic Hierarchy Detection: Tableau features can automatically detect and create hierarchies based on the data types of the fields, such as different time attributes or geographic information.

In some cases, you can also use the hierarchy icon that appears next to a field to create a hierarchy by clicking on it and selecting the desired level to add.

4. Removing Hierarchies

Removing hierarchies is as simple as creating them. You can just right-click on the field from which you want to remove the hierarchy and select "Remove Hierarchy."

remove hierarchy

Drill Down and Drill Up in Tableau

Drill down and Drill up are actions performed in a hierarchy in Tableau to navigate or move between different levels of detail.

Drill Down: Drill down is moving from a higher to a lower level in the hierarchy, for example, going from the "country" level to the "state" level in a geographic hierarchy.

drill down in tableau

Drill Up: Drill Up is moving from a lower to a higher level in the hierarchy, for example, going from the "city" level to the "Country" level in a geographic hierarchy.

Drill Up and Drill Down help analyze data at different levels of detail as per the user's requirement.

drill up in tableau

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Tableau?

Tableau is an efficient data visualization tool that is widely used by businesses and analysts. It allows users to connect different databases and Excel sheets. Tableau offers different types of maps to represent data and spot patterns in them.

What are Hierarchies in Tableau?

Hierarchies in Tableau is the process of organizing data fields into tree-like structured relationships that represent the nesting of data elements in a level-order fashion. This provides a flexible way to analyze data allowing users to easily navigate to different levels of detail in the datasets.

What do you mean by Drill down in Tableau?

Drill down and Drill up are actions performed in a hierarchy in Tableau to navigate or move between different levels of detail. Drill down is moving from a higher level to a lower level in the hierarchy, for example, going from the "country" level to the "state" level in a geographic hierarchy.

What are the different ways of creating hierarchies in Tableau?

There are multiple ways of creating hierarchies in Tableau. They include Manual Hierarchy Creation, Using simple drag and drop, Automatic Hierarchy Detection, or using the hierarchy icon. These methods provide flexibility in creating hierarchies.

Conclusion 

Congratulations, Ninja, on finishing this article! Hierarchies are an important feature in Tableau that organizes the data fields in a tree-like structure. This blog has covered all the important aspects of Hierarchies in Tableau.

We hope this blog has helped you understand the concept of Hierarchies in Tableau better. Keep learning! We suggest you read some of our other articles on Data Analytics: 

  1. Introduction to data analysis
  2. Analytics and Big Data
  3. Big Data Analytics Example 
  4. State space search in artificial intelligence

 

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