Because a cube allows Excel to retrieve only the data it needs for the current view of the report, creating and updating a report is usually faster for large amounts of data than if you retrieved the entire set of records from the database. You also predefine the summary values for the reports, which speeds up report calculation.Ĭreate an OLAP cube when you want to provide a large amount of external data for use in Microsoft Excel reports, especially if you have more records to analyze than you can return to Excel without running out of system resources. When you create an OLAP cube from a query, you turn the flat set of records into a structured hierarchy, or cube, that allows reports to focus on the desired level of detail. On-Line Analytical Processing ( OLAP) is a way of organizing data to fit the way you analyze and manage it, so that less time and effort is needed to create your reports. Refreshing and changing a cube What is an OLAP cube? This topic provides reference information about the following: To understand and use this capability of Microsoft Query, you should be familiar with managing databases and using Microsoft Query to retrieve data for Microsoft Excel PivotTable reports or PivotChart reports. You do not need an OLAP server product to create and use this type of OLAP cube. This topic explains how you can create an OLAP cube from a query that retrieves data from a relational database, such as Microsoft Access or Microsoft SQL Server. Show All About creating an OLAP cube from relational data