What is the best way to import tabular data from a website into Power BI?

Selecting "Get Data" and pointing to the URL is the most efficient way to import tabular data from a website into Power BI. This method directly connects Power BI to the web source, allowing the application to fetch the data in real time. When using this approach, you simply provide the URL of the web page containing the data, and Power BI can parse the HTML and convert the tabular data into a data model. This allows users to avoid manual downloads or intermediary steps, resulting in a more seamless data import process.

Additionally, connecting directly to the URL helps maintain a dynamic link between the dataset in Power BI and the source data, ensuring that updates on the web page can be easily reflected in the Power BI reports whenever the data is refreshed. This is particularly beneficial for data that changes frequently or requires regular monitoring.

While other options might involve importing data, they introduce unnecessary steps, making the process less efficient and more complex. For example, downloading data can lead to outdated information or several additional steps to upload it back to Power BI. Similarly, transferring data to OneDrive requires additional management of the file, which may not be necessary if the direct URL import works effectively. Using the Query Editor can be useful for data transformation and cleaning but does not