How to show DOT DENSITY in Power BI Desktop

Question

Suppose I have a table with Cities and population columns. I want to visualize a dot density map using this table. For example I want to show 1 dot per 1000 people in every city in google or bing map (not via Heat map) using Power BI. How can I do this in Power BI Desktop?

The image below is for a better understanding for I want to do.

Answer 1

If there is more than 1,000 people in any one city, you want to show an additional point? How so, the city would be the same, and thus, so would the coordinate/location on the map, so the dots would overlap and one would cover the other. You would either need to offset each dot of 1,000 by some distance so you can eventually see it, or modify your logic to something like "only show a dot if there is a population of more than 1000 people". Without offsetting or modifying the logic, you will just end up with a dot density map of cities, and not population density.

If you want to do the offset approach, you would likely need to do some pre-processing of your data first, determine how to offset the data, and then create a table of the offset points.

Alternatively, it may make more sense to look at a more advanced visualization, such as scaling the radius of the dots based on the population or using a weighted heat map.

For scaled circles, simply add your population column to the "Size" field of the maps visual.

I don't believe the maps visual has a heat map option at this time. However, take a look at the Azure Maps visual for Power BI. It is in preview, but has some more advanced features: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-maps/power-bi-visual-get-started