Build a dashboard from your app's data
Updated Aug 9, 2026
A dashboard answers your Monday-morning questions without a fresh pivot table: how much did we spend this month, which supplier is over budget, where are the open orders. In Sheetward, you describe the dashboard once in your workbook, and the app keeps it up to date with live data.
Dashboards come from a `Report_` sheet in your workbook — the same App Specification you already author in Excel or Google Sheets. Sheetward reads that sheet and builds KPI tiles, charts and an interactive pivot inside the app.
Build your first dashboard
- In your workbook, add a sheet named `Report_<name>` — for example
Report_Spending— and describe the widgets you want on it. - On the app tile, click Change app and upload the workbook. Sheetward regenerates the app with the dashboard included.
- Open the app's Dashboards and explore: filter, drill down, and resize or reorder the widgets.
What can go on a dashboard?
A dashboard is made of widgets — its building blocks. You define each widget in the Report_ sheet. Sheetward supports these widget types:
| Widget | What it gives you |
|---|---|
| measures | Calculated measures the other widgets can use — for example a total or an amount net of tax |
| kpi | Headline number tiles, such as "Total spend this quarter" |
| filter | Filters for the dashboard, so viewers can narrow to one department, supplier or month |
| chart | Charts of your data — line, bar, pie, donut and area types are supported |
| pivot | An interactive pivot table for slicing and dicing, much like the one in Excel |
| table | A plain tabular list of records |
In the pivot widget, viewers choose the rows, columns and measures themselves, and pick how each measure is calculated:
| Calculation | What it shows |
|---|---|
| sum | The total of the values |
| average | The mean value |
| minimum / maximum | The smallest or largest value |
| median | The middle value |
| count | How many records there are |
| distinct count | How many different values appear |
Add more dashboards
One app can have several dashboards — for example one for spending and one for supplier performance. Each dashboard is its own sheet:
- In your workbook, add a new sheet named `Report_<Dashboard Name>`.
- Define the widgets for that dashboard on the new sheet.
- On the app tile, click Change app and select your workbook to regenerate the app.
- Click the app tile, then click the Dashboards button.
- The new dashboard appears in its own tab.
Good to know
- Every widget on a dashboard follows the filter widget: pick "March" or "Warehouse B" once and all tiles, charts and pivots narrow together.
- You can edit the dashboard layout in the app — resize and reorder widgets until it reads the way you want.
- You can save the dashboard view, which keeps your layout and navigation so it looks the same next time you open it.
- How many dashboards each app can have depends on your Sheetward plan's allowance.
- Dashboards can speak your team's languages. Keep translated values for the widget labels in the Translation_ sheet, and Sheetward shows them in the viewer's language.