Export Data from Tableau: 6 Critical Methods

Tableau is a robust Business Intelligence tool that helps users visualize data simply and elegantly. Tableau has helped numerous organizations understand their Customer Data better through their Visual Analytics platform. Tableau is the pick of the lot owing to its simplistic design, interactive and intuitive User Interface (UI), ease of use, and easy integrations with numerous data sources and ETL tools such as Hevo Data.

This blog talks about the different methods you can use to implement Tableau Export seamlessly. These include exporting data from the source, Tableau Views, as a PDF File, like images, like a PowerPoint presentation, and using a third-party tool, Hevo. It also gives a brief introduction to Tableau and the importance of downloading data from Tableau in a format suitable for your use case.

Table of Contents

• What is Tableau?
  • Key Features of Tableau
• Why & When do you need to Export Data from Tableau?
• How to Export Data from Tableau?
  • Method 1: Export Data from Tableau from the Source
    • Export your Data Source
    • Extract your Tableau Data Source
    • Export Tableau Data as CSV Files
    • Key Considerations/Limitations to Keep in Mind
  • Method 2: Export Data from Tableau Views
    • Export Tableau View Data to Microsoft Access
    • Export a Crosstab of your Tableau View to Excel
    • Copy/Export Data in Tableau View to Clipboard
    • Key Considerations/Limitations to Keep in Mind
  • Method 3: Using Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline to Export Data from Tableau
  • Method 4: Export Data from Tableau as a PDF File
  • Method 5: Export Data from Tableau as a Powerpoint Presentation
  • Method 6: Export Data from Tableau as Images
• Conclusion

What is Tableau?

Tableau is a BI Tool, that helps simplify data in an understandable format. With Tableau, users can try their hand at creating customized dashboards due to its intuitive and easy-to-understand user interface. Tableau has been widely sought after by people from various sectors since it doesn’t require any programming skills or technical knowledge to operate.

The data analytics in Tableau can be classified into the following two types:

• Sharing Tools: The purpose of these products is to share the visualizations, dashboards, and reports created using the developer tools. Tableau Online, Tableau Server, Tableau Reader are the sharing tools that form a part of the Tableau suite.
• Developer Tools: These tools are used for development. This refers to the process of creating Charts, Reports, Dashboards, and Visualizations. Tableau Desktop and Tableau Public fall under this category.

Once the data has been pulled from a Data Warehouse, it can be extracted to Tableau’s data engine, Tableau Desktop, or connected live. This is where the Data Analysts and Data Engineers come in to develop visualizations. Dashboards that are created can be shared with the users in a status file. To view these dashboards, users can leverage Tableau Reader.

You can use Tableau Server to publish the data from Tableau Desktop. Tableau Server supports governance, distribution, security model, collaboration, and automation features. It enables the users to have a better experience through easy access to the files from any location.

Key Features of Tableau

• Tableau Dashboard: Tableau dashboard has an intuitive dashboard with self-explaining wizards, allowing non-technical users to create visualization easily. Dimensions, charts are simple drag and drop on drawing space to perform analysis.
• Collaborative Sharing: Tableau allows users to collaborate with their peers for collaborative work or review. Users can also share to the cloud, which makes the dashboard accessible from anywhere.
• Flexibility: Using Tableau, you can extract data from databases like pdf, excel, text documents, R, Hadoop, Python, or SAS to cloud databases like Flipkart, Google sheet, Netflix, Amazon.
• Data Sources in Tableau: Tableau has more than 200+ connectors that help users connect to external data sources like RDBMS, Cloud, spreadsheet, etc., securely. Tableau also provides several monitoring features such as data connectivity, auto-refresh, etc. 
• Advanced Visualizations (Chart Types): Tableau has a vast collection of advanced visualization techniques. Some of them are:
  • Charts
  • Tables
  • Graphs
  • Maps

Why & When do you need to Export Data from Tableau?

After you have joined the tables from one or more sources and made general customizations (for instance pivot fields, extract filters or apply data source, create groups, or create a calculated field, etc.) to your Tableau data source, you might wish to reuse or share the data in its new format.

You can export the data in numerous formats like exporting your data into a .CSV file, exporting the data source, or simply extracting your data for future use, each of which will be covered in detail in subsequent sections.

How to Export Data from Tableau?

Here are the methods you can use to export data from Tableau:

• Method 1: Export Data from Tableau from the Source
• Method 2: Export Data from Tableau Views
• Method 3: Using Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline to Export Data from Tableau
• Method 4: Export Data from Tableau as a PDF File
• Method 5: Export Data from Tableau as a Powerpoint Presentation
• Method 6: Export Data from Tableau as Images

Method 1: Export Data from Tableau from the Source

Export your Data Source

After you’ve established a connection to your data, you can save and export your data source as a Tableau data source (.tds) file. By saving the data source you can generate a shortcut to your remote data that allows you to avoid having to create a new connection to a specific data set every time. If you wish to understand more about how to export data from Tableau from the source, you can take a look at Save Data Sources.

Extract your Tableau Data Source

Another way to migrate all of your data or a subset of your data within the data source is to generate an extract (.hyper) file. Extract would function as an independent data set which can then be used to connect directly from Tableau. If you want to dig in deeper, you can refer to Extract your Data.

Export Tableau Data as CSV Files

Since the .CSV format is considered as one of the simplest structured formats for data, it is supported by a wide range of programming languages, tools, and databases. There are two main ways in which you can export your data in the data source to a .CSV file in Tableau: from the view and the Data Source page.

• From the View: On the sheet tab, you can drag a field to the Rows or Columns shelf, click on the View Data icon in the Data pane, and click on the Export All button.

• From the Data Source Page: On the Data Source Page, choose Data > Export Data to CSV to migrate all the data within your data sources to .CSV file.

Key Considerations/Limitations to Keep in Mind

Here are a few key considerations to keep in mind when exporting data from Tableau source to .CSV file:

• You can export a CSV file using Tabcmd, but that won’t be too useful for the average dashboard consumer.
• Users can click on a specific sheet on a dashboard and then export that through the tiny button on the toolbar, but that might lead to a few problems of its own:
  • You would have no control over the output of the CSV
  • You might not want to show the toolbar, hence making the export impossible.
  • People would have to be trained to know exactly where to click to get it just right.
•  You can add .CSV to the tail-end of the URL similar to http://[Tableau Server Location]/views/[Workbook Name]/[View Name].csv. However, you might not know what the output would look like.

Method 2: Export Data from Tableau Views

After you generate a view, you can also export just the data needed to create that view. The fields that are migrated come from the fields on the shelves of the sheet. However, fields that double as external filters, or, the fields that show up only on the Filters shelf, are not included in the export. If you wish to include other fields with the exported data without modifying the baseline view, you can place those details in the Detail shelf yourself.

Export Tableau View Data to Microsoft Access

You can export the data that can be leveraged to generate the view as a .CSV file (Mac only) or an Access database (Windows only). Here are the steps for the same:

• Step 1: In Tableau Desktop, you can choose Worksheet > Export > Data.
• Step 2: Choose a location and type a name for your .CSV file or Access database and click on Save.
• Step 3: If you’re on Windows, the Export Data to Access dialog box will be depicted to give you the option to instantly use the new Access database and continue working in Access without interrupting your workflow.

Export a Crosstab of your Tableau View to Excel

You can export directly to Excel the data needed to generate the view formatted as a crosstab. When you migrate your view as a crosstab, Tableau automatically opens up the Excel application and pastes a crosstab version of the current view into a new Excel workbook.

Even though this option provides a direct method for moving your data to another application, the performance of the export can be impacted because it is copying and formatting the data at the same time. If the view you are exporting contains a lot of data, a dialog box pops up asking if you wish to export the formatting. In this case, if you want to exclude the formatting from the export, the performance of the export might be enhanced.

• In Tableau Online or Server, open a dashboard or view and select Download > Crosstab. You can choose which sheets from the workbook to export your data from.
• In Tableau Desktop, select Worksheet > Export > Crosstab to Excel. If you’re using a Mac, this option opens up a dialog box allowing you to save the file. You will then have to manually open the file in Excel.

Copy/Export Data in Tableau View to Clipboard

Here, you need to copy the data needed to create the view so that you can paste it into another application:

• Step 1: Create a view and select Worksheet > Copy > Data.

• Step 2: Open up another application, such as Word, and paste the data into the document. In this instance, the fields placed on the Rows, Columns, and Color shelves are copied into the document. However, the Customer Segment field isn’t copied since it is an external filter because it appears only on the Filters shelf.

Key Considerations/Limitations to Keep in Mind

Here are a few key considerations to keep in mind:

• To copy a crosstab, you need to copy all the records present in the view. You cannot copy a subset of records.
• You cannot copy a crosstab if the view possesses continuous dimensions such as continuous times and dates.
• Copying a crosstab works only for aggregated views. It cannot be used on disaggregated views of data since a crosstab is by definition an aggregated view of data. Therefore, the Aggregate Measures option on the Analysis Menu needs to be selected to copy a crosstab to work properly.

Method 3: Using Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline to Export Data from Tableau

Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline helps to transfer data from 100+ sources such as Tableau to a Data Warehouse/Destination of your choice and visualize it in your desired. Hevo is fully managed and completely automates the process of not only loading data from your desired source but also enriching the data and transforming it into an analysis-ready form without even having to write a single line of code. Its fault-tolerant architecture ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss.

It provides a consistent & reliable solution to manage data in real-time and always have analysis-ready data in your desired destination. It allows you to focus on the key business needs and perform insightful analysis by using a BI tool of your choice.

Get Started with Hevo for Free

Check out what makes Hevo amazing:

• Secure: Hevo has a fault-tolerant architecture that ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss.
• Schema Management: Hevo takes away the tedious task of schema management & automatically detects schema of incoming data and maps it to the destination schema.
• Minimal Learning: Hevo, with its simple and interactive UI, is extremely simple for new customers to work on and perform operations.
• Transformations: Hevo provides preload transformations through Python code. It also allows you to run transformation code for each event in the Data Pipelines you set up. You need to edit the event object’s properties received in the transform method as a parameter to carry out the transformation. Hevo also offers drag and drop transformations like Date and Control Functions, JSON, and Event Manipulation to name a few. These can be configured and tested before putting them to use.
• Connectors: Hevo supports 100+ Integrations from sources to SaaS platforms, files, databases, analytics, and BI tools such as Tableau. It supports various destinations including Amazon Redshift, Firebolt, Snowflake Data Warehouses; Databricks, Amazon S3 Data Lakes, SQL Server, TokuDB, DynamoDB databases to name a few.  
• Hevo Is Built To Scale: As the number of sources and the volume of your data grows, Hevo scales horizontally, handling millions of records per minute with very little latency.
• Incremental Data Load: Hevo allows the transfer of data that has been modified in real-time. This ensures efficient utilization of bandwidth on both ends.
• Live Support: The Hevo team is available round the clock to extend exceptional support to its customers through chat, email, and support calls.
• Live Monitoring: Hevo allows you to monitor the data flow and check where your data is at a particular point in time.

Sign up here for a 14-Day Free Trial!

Method 4: Export Data from Tableau as a PDF File

To generate a vector-based file that consists of the Tableau fonts, you would have to print to PDF. After tailoring the layout of page elements using the File > Page Setup dialog box, you can choose File > Print to PDF. For a more in-depth analysis, you can refer to Print Views from Tableau Desktop.

Method 5: Export Data from Tableau as a Powerpoint Presentation

When you export a workbook to Microsoft PowerPoint format, the chosen sheets become static PNG images on separate slides. If you choose to export a story sheet, all the story points can be exported as separate slides. Any filters applied currently in Tableau get reflected within the exported presentation. To export a workbook in PowerPoint, you can execute the following steps:

• Step 1: Choose File > Export as PowerPoint.
• Step 2: Select the sheets you wish to include in the presentation. The exported PowerPoint file reflects the file name of your workbook, and the title slide states the workbook name along with the date the file was created.

Method 6: Export Data from Tableau as Images

To generate an image file you can reuse, you can export the view instead of copying it. You can select JPEG, BMP, or PNG format on macOS, with the supplementary option of EMF on Windows. However, a point to note here is that EMF format substitutes Tableau fonts with a similar font. Here are the steps involved to export data from Tableau like images:

• Step 1: Choose Worksheet > Export > Image.
• Step 2: Within the Export Image dialog box, choose the elements you wish to include in the image. If the view consists of a legend, under Image Options, choose the Legend Layout and click on Save.
• Step 3: Within the Save Image dialog box, mention a file name, location, and format. Then click on Save to finish this step.

Conclusion

This blog talks about the different methods you can use to download data from Tableau seamlessly. These include exporting data from the source, as a PDF File, like images, like a PowerPoint presentation, and much more. It also gives a brief introduction to Tableau and the importance of exporting data from Tableau in a format suitable for your use case.

Extracting complex data from a diverse set of data sources to carry out an insightful analysis can be a challenging task and this is where Hevo saves the day! Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline can seamlessly transfer data from a vast sea of 100+ sources to a Data Warehouse, BI Tool like Tableau, or a Destination of your choice. It is a reliable, completely automated, and secure service that doesn’t require you to write any code!  

Visit our Website to Explore Hevo

If you are using Tableau as your Data Analytics & Business Intelligence platform and searching for a no-fuss alternative to Manual Data Integration, then Hevo can effortlessly automate this for you. Hevo, with its strong integration with 100+ sources and BI tools such as Tableau (Including 40+ Free Sources), allows you to not only export & load data but also transform & enrich your data & make it analysis-ready in a jiffy. Want to take Hevo for a ride?

Sign Up for a 14-day free trial and simplify your Data Integration process. Do check out the pricing details to understand which plan fulfills all your business needs.