Tableau Public FAQ

What is Tableau Public?

Tableau Public is a free platform to explore, create, and share data visualizations using publicly available data online. Visualizations (vizzes) that are published to Tableau Public can be embedded into web pages and blogs, shared via social media or email, and can be made available for download and exploration by other users. You can create vizzes using our free in-platform web authoring, the free Tableau Desktop Public Edition, or using Tableau Desktop Professional Edition. Click Create on Tableau Public to get started - no programming skills are required. To see some of the inspiring visualizations users create using Tableau Public, visit our homepage.

Who is Tableau Public for?

Tableau Public is for anyone interested in understanding data and sharing those findings as data visualizations with the world. Journalists, writers, bloggers, state and local governments, non-profits, companies, and more use Tableau Public to share data stories. Students, professors, analysts, and hobbyists use Tableau Public for learning and inspiration. As soon as a workbook is published to Tableau Public, the viz is accessible by anyone on the internet (with some restrictions - see below), so be sure to only use data that is suitable for a public audience. If you or your organization wants to analyze non-public data, check out other available Tableau products.

Frequently Asked Questions

If you have questions that aren't covered here, visit the Tableau Community Forums or Tableau Public Support.

Tableau Public Account Issues

I didn't activate my account in the 48 hours following receipt of the email. Can I still activate it now?

Yes, you can still activate your account. Follow these steps:

Select Forgot your password, and then enter your email address to get a reset password email.
Go to your email, open the “Tableau Software Account Activation” email, and then select the Activate Account link. You’ll be redirected to your profile page.
Enter a new password, and then re-enter it to confirm.
Select Activate.

I forgot my password. How do I reset it?

From the Sign In screen, select Forgot Password. Or, go directly to the Reset Password page.
Enter your email address to get a reset password email.
Go to your email, open the “Password reset” email, and click on the link to reset your password. You’ll be redirected to your profile page.
Enter your new password, re-enter it to confirm, and click Reset Password.

How do I change my email address associated with my account?

Sign in to your Tableau account. From your profile icon, select Edit My Tableau Account, and then click Edit Email.
Enter a new email address.
Select Change Email.

Help! I didn’t receive my activation email and/or password reset email.

For security reasons, we use an automatic service to send activation and password reset emails. If you don’t receive your email (and it’s not in your spam folder), it’s possible that it has been removed by a firewall filter. Try requesting your activation or password reset email again from a different device (for example, on your mobile phone instead of your laptop), and on a different network (for example, on your home wifi, instead of your work wifi). If you’re still having trouble accessing your account, contact public@tableau.com.

I’ve received notification that my Tableau.com and Tableau Public accounts have been integrated. What does this mean for my Tableau Public account?

All Tableau Public users will now be able to access both Tableau.com and Tableau Public using a single user account. Check for a verification email sent to the email address you use to sign in to your Tableau Public account. If you already have a verified account, sign in.

What if I didn’t receive a verification email after the Tableau.com and Tableau Public account integration?

If you didn’t receive a verification email and don’t have an existing Tableau account associated with the same email address, you can follow these steps to confirm your account:

Reset your password.
Enter the email address you were previously using to log into your Tableau Public account.
Look for the password reset email in your inbox.
Click the reset password URL.
Enter your new password.

Still have questions about your account? Contact public@tableau.com

What if I no longer have access to the email address that was linked to my Tableau or Tableau Public account?

To change the email address associated with your Tableau Public account, follow these steps:

Navigate to https://public.tableau.com/app/discover
Sign in to Tableau Public.
Click on your profile icon.
Select Settings.
Select Change Email.
Enter the new email address you'd like to use.
Select Change Email.

If you’ve followed the steps above and are not given the option to change your Tableau Public email address, your email may be connected to a Tableau Cloud account. Submit the Having a problem with your account? form and indicate that you are unable to change the email address you use to sign in to your Tableau Public account. Once a customer representative reaches out to you, they will do the following:

Send an email to your old email address to see if someone responds or if it bounces.
Request you to verify your identify by sending a scan of your ID or a utility bill from the new email address you'd like to use.

If you’re requesting a change to a corporate or institutional account, we will require you to send an email from the business domain and an image of your corporate credentials (e.g. work badge).

What if I want to delete my Tableau Public account?

You can delete your Tableau Public profile including your visualizations, favorites, follows, and profile data directly from your account settings page.

Sign in to Tableau Public.
From your profile icon, select Settings.
Go to the Delete Tableau Public Profile section, and then select Delete My Tableau Public Profile.
Enter the email address associated with your Tableau Public profile, and then select Delete.

If you navigate back to Tableau Public in the future after deleting your profile, a new blank account will be created that will be connected to your Tableau account. For more information about our privacy practices, see Privacy Information.

Will subscription offerings impact my Tableau Public profile?

Subscription offerings will not affect your Tableau Public profile. If you currently pay for other Tableau products, contact your sales rep to learn how this impacts you. If you are curious about the new offerings, you can learn more on our pricing page.

How much storage space do I get?

We provide ten gigabytes (10 GB) of storage space for your workbooks/vizzes.

Why does my session on Tableau Public keep expiring?

Tableau Public requires you to sign in frequently if you have not given consent for functional cookies. These are required to preserve your sign-in session. To configure your cookies on the Tableau Public site:

Scroll down to the bottom of the homepage and select Cookie Preferences.
Select Functional Cookies.
Select the toggle to turn on functional cookies.
Select Save Settings.

Using Tableau Public

How do I customize or edit my profile details, image, or banner?

When you sign up for Tableau Public, an account profile is generated for you that includes the name you entered when creating the account. Once you've verified your email address, you can edit your profile to add details about yourself including a bio, your title, location, and social media links. You can also upload a profile picture and customize your profile banner.

For all profile customizations, start by clicking your profile icon, and then click My Profile.

To edit your profile details, click Edit Profile. Make any applicable changes, and then click Save.

To add or change a profile picture, hover over the existing picture (this will be a placeholder image if you haven't added one yet), and then click Update profile picture. Select a picture, adjust the cropping, and then click Save.

To customize the color and style of your profile banner, click Customize Banner in the top right corner of the banner. Choose a color from the color picker, select a pattern, and then click Save.

How do I share the visualizations I’ve saved to Tableau Public with others?

Once you save your work to Tableau Public, you can share it by sending people the link to the visualization’s homepage via email, Twitter, Facebook etc. To embed the viz in your own website, selecting the viz homepage, click Share, and then copy the Embed Code.

What are the different ways that I can sort or filter my search results on Tableau Public?

When you search for vizzes or authors on Tableau Public, you can use sorting and filtering to surface results that matter to you.

For vizzes, you can sort by relevance, view count, or published date.

Relevant (Default): See vizzes that most closely match your search terms, that have been published recently, and that have high view and favorite counts.
View count: See results sorted by highest view count.
Recently published: See results sorted by the initial published date.

You can also filter results to only see vizzes that can be downloaded or copied.

For authors, you can sort by relevance, number of followers, or by recent activity.

Relevant (Default): See authors that most closely match your search terms and that have a high follower count.
Follower count: See results sorted by highest number of followers.
Recently active: See results sorted by authors who have recently published a workbook or updated the metadata for an existing workbook.

You can also filter results to only see authors that are available for hire.

Can I prevent people from finding the visualizations I've saved to my Tableau Public profile?

Tableau Public is meant as a platform for sharing data visualizations on the web. However, you can hide vizzes on your profile. This feature can be handy when, for example, you want to save a draft of your work in progress. You can find all of your hidden vizzes on your profile page under the Hidden tab. Visitors to your profile page can’t see your hidden vizzes.

Note: Anyone who knows (or stumbles across) the URL for the viz can see it, so be sure not to use this service for data that isn’t meant for sharing.

Can my viz or the data behind my viz be downloaded by others? What’s the Download link on the viz?

By default, any Tableau Public viz as well as the underlying data can be downloaded by clicking the Download link in the lower right corner of the viz. The workbook (TWBX file) can be opened by anyone with Tableau Desktop (Professional or Public Edition). You can toggle off the ability to download the workbook and the underlying data set in the viz settings. You can also set the default behavior for new vizzes in your profile settings.

I've made a viz that I'm really proud of. How can I advertise it?

First of all, congratulations on building this viz! Start by checking out a guest blog post written by Ryan Sleeper on Making Your Tableau Public Viz Go Viral.

We also welcome Viz of the Day submissions. To nominate a viz, click on the viz that you want to nominate, and then click the Nominate for Viz of the Day button.

What is the Hire Me button?

The Hire Me button allows Tableau Public authors to indicate to the community they are available for hire and allows customers to see which authors are available. Customers can fill in a form to contact the author. The author will receive an email inquiry from the customer that they can choose to respond to.

How do I activate the Hire Me button on my profile?

Sign in to your Tableau Public account.
From your profile icon, click My Profile.
Click Edit Profile.
Check the Available for Hire box.
Confirm your preferred contact email address.
Click Save.

What email address will my Hire Me inquiries go to?

All Hire Me email inquiries and responses will be delivered to the email address that you specified in your profile details.

How do I contact an author?

Authors who are available for hire can be identified by a Hire Me button on their profile. To contact an author:

From the author's profile page, click Hire Me.
Enter your message in the text field.
Click Send.

How can hiring managers find talent with Tableau skills?

You can share your listing on the Job Listings Community Forum.

How do I report spam or phishing emails on Tableau Public?

If you receive an email you believe to be spam or a phishing attempt, forward the email to public@tableau.com.

Where can I see stats about my vizzes and profile?

Sign in to Tableau Public, go to your profile page by clicking your profile icon, and then select My Profile. Select the Stats tab to see how many times your visualizations were viewed or favorited, how often your vizzes or your profile were credited as inspiration for another author, and how many authors followed you. All stats show activity over the last 30 days, and you can see a chart displaying the progression of each stat over time. You can also see a list of top vizzes contributing to the Viewed, Favorited, and Inspired stats.

Why don't I see any stats on my profile?

The stats tab provides insights when others view or favorite vizzes that you create, credit your vizzes as inspiration, or follow you. If you don't see any stats on your profile, create and publish more visualizations for others to explore. You can create and publish vizzes for free using in-platform Web Authoring or by downloading Tableau Desktop Public Edition.

Why did the view count for my viz decrease or reset to zero?

A view count on Tableau Public represents the number of times your workbook is viewed, including views on the Tableau Public platform and on other websites where the viz is embedded. Workbooks are composed of sheets, which can be in the form of worksheets (also referred to as views), dashboards, or stories. The view count for a viz on Tableau Public is counted at the sheet level (a worksheet, dashboard, or story), and aggregated per workbook. So deleting or adding a sheet in a workbook will impact your total view count.

Events that decrease view count include:

A worksheet, dashboard, or story that has been viewed on Tableau Public or embedded in another site is removed from the workbook.
A worksheet, dashboard, or story that has been viewed on Tableau Public or embedded in another site is renamed.
From Tableau Desktop, you save a workbook to your profile with the same name as an existing workbook and click Yes to overwrite an existing workbook when saving. This overwrites the existing workbook on your profile, which Tableau Public treats as a brand-new workbook with a view count of zero.

Events where view count will not decrease:

From your browser, you edit an existing workbook on your profile without deleting or renaming any worksheets, dashboards, or stories that have been viewed on Tableau Public or embedded in another site.
From Tableau Desktop, you edit an existing workbook on your profile without deleting or renaming any worksheets, dashboards, or stories that have been viewed on Tableau Public or embedded in another site.

Do I need to use Tableau Desktop Public Edition if I already have access to Professional Edition?

No, Tableau Desktop is available as part of a Creator license. With Tableau Desktop Professional or Public Edition, you can save your workbook to the Tableau Public platform or save locally. Instructions on how to publish a workbook to Tableau Public or save locally can be found on the Save Workbooks with Tableau Public page.

Are Tableau Public vizzes responsive?

When embedding vizzes in your website, you can optimize them for use across different devices and screen sizes:

Set the dashboard size to automatic or range.
Build different dashboards of different sizes (e.g. a large one for desktop computers and a small one for mobile devices). Then, save the dashboards under different names, and have your content management system (CMS) swap out the embed code according to the size of your browser or screen. You can also define different dashboard sizes and the respective content within the app before publishing the viz. You can then save your viz as per normal and use a single embed code in your CMS. The Tableau Public server will serve up the dashboard that is most suitable for the size of the browser window.

Are any plug-ins required to view a Tableau viz?

No plug-ins are required. All you need is a web browser with JavaScript activated.

How can I delete a viz from Tableau Public?

To delete a viz from Tableau Public, go to your profile page, click the More Actions icon for the viz you want to delete, and then click Delete This Viz.

What happens if I delete a workbook from Tableau Public and there are links to it in blogs or other web locations?

Once a workbook is deleted from Tableau Public, it can’t be retrieved from Tableau Public by anyone. All links or other references to it that may have been shared will not be able to load the viz and will display an error message on the page. This also applies to vizzes embedded in other websites.

How can I make my viz load faster?

To maximize the probability of fast load times and interactivity, take these steps and make any necessary modifications:

Simplify your data
- Use only data relevant to analysis. Cut useless rows and columns, and use data source filters.
- Aggregate data to the highest level of detail possible for the desired visualization. For example, if a viz only shows data by year but your data source has records by day, then aggregate data in the source file to year.
- Pre-build complex calculations into the data source as much as possible.
- Normalize tables with relationships. If you have data with different levels of detail resulting in repeated values, split the data into separate tables and define a relationship between tables in the Tableau Desktop data source pane. More info on normalization and relationships.
Limit the number of filters
- Excessive filters on a view will create a more complex query, which takes longer to return results. Double-check your filters and remove any that aren’t necessary.
- Use include filters. Exclude filters load the entire domain of a dimension, while include filters do not. An include filter runs much faster than an exclude filter, especially for dimensions with many members. Use continuous date filters. Continuous date filters (relative and range-of-date filters) can take advantage of the indexing properties in your database and are faster than discrete date filters.
- Use Boolean or numeric filters. Computers process integers and Booleans (t/f) much faster than strings.
- Use parameters and action filters. These reduce the query load (and work across data sources).
Minimize the number of marks (data points)
- Similar to data aggregation, can the marks in the visualization be grouped together in any way? For example, instead of showing the dollar amount of every single customer order in a bar chart, can they be grouped together into just product category or region?
Delete unused sheets, stories, and dashboards

Here are additional resources to optimize your workbook for performance:

Optimize Workbook Performance
Make Visualizations Faster
Streamline Your Workbook
Tableau Performance Optimization (on the Medium website)
6 tips to make your dashboards more performant
Designing Efficient Workbooks

How can I see what's new since I last visited Tableau Public?

The Recent Activity channel helps you keep up with the latest updates from your network. See vizzes that have been published or favorited by authors that you follow since you last visited the site so you don't miss anything. Sign in to Tableau Public to see your personalized Recent Activity channel on the homepage.

I’m not able to view the thumbnails for certain vizzes. Is this a bug on Tableau Public?

We’ve had reports from a few users that thumbnails for some vizzes are either blocked or don’t show up on Tableau Public. This is likely due to the use of an ad blocker on your browser. If you’re experiencing this issue, we recommend turning off the ad blocker and reloading the web page. To remedy this issue, you can allowlist public.tableau.com.

How can I make my Tableau Public viz more accessible?

To make your digital content accessible, it should follow the four Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG): perceiveable, operable, understandable, and robust.

Here are three ways to make your viz more accessible to users using assistive technologies:

Allow Access

Enable the ability to Let others download or make a copy of this viz on Tableau Public. This is one of the most important things you can do for user accessibility. This step lets users access the View Data page, which has a table of data that assistive technologies, like screen readers, can read.

Select the Settings icon in the toolbar. Under Allow Access, switch the option to Let others download or make a copy of this viz to on.

Add more text

Provide descriptive text in titles, captions, headings, legends, and filters to provide context to users who are using assistive technology. Think about your views as a supplement to the text you use to describe it.

Use these guidelines to adapt the visual nature of Tableau to meet the needs of all of your users.

Use text in titles and captions to describe your visualizations and what you are showing.
Use text in headings on legends or filters to describe the control and what it does.
Add alternative text (alt text) to visualizations.
Use simple, easy-to-understand language. Avoid jargon, acronyms, or abbreviations.

Use accessible color and contrast

Using color on your viz helps distinguish marks in your view. However, for users with visual impairments, using color alone doesn’t provide enough of a distinction.

Use these guidelines when using color in your views:

Use a color palette with enough contrast and assign colors that differ from each other on the light-dark spectrum. Tableau provides a color-blind palette that you can use to help you select suitable colors for your view.
Use additional differentiators such as shapes, size, and labels to distinguish line marks.
Make sure that the color contrast for text is strong and meets the contrast ratio standards of 4.5:1 (3:1 for large text). Use contrast analyzer tools to select the best text colors and backgrounds with sufficient contrast ratios.

Replace this text with content of your own.

What resources are available to help me create or enhance visualizations?

Tableau Exchange offers extensions that add new dashboard functionalities and viz types to your visual analysis for free. Use the filters to find dashboard and viz extensions that work with Tableau Public.
Access sample data sets and data sources.
Explore Tableau Public community resources to share your work, learn from others, and participate in skill-based challenges.

How can I add viz extensions to my Tableau Public visualizations?

From your worksheet, expand the Mark type dropdown on the Marks card. Under Viz Extensions, select Add Extension.
- To add a new extension, select Works with Tableau Public. Search for and select an extension, and then select Open.
- To add a .trex file you previously downloaded, select Access Local Viz Extensions.
Open the extension you want to use. For more information, see Add Viz Extensions to your worksheet.

How can I add dashboard extensions to my Tableau Public visualizations?

From your dashboard sheet, drag Extension from the Objects section to the dashboard.

To add a new extension, search for and select an extension, and then select Add to Dashboard. Verify that Works with Tableau Public is selected.
To add a .trex file you previously downloaded, select Access Local Extensions. For more information, see Use Dashboard Extensions.

Data and Tableau Public

What kind of data can I use?

Tableau Public supports data in a variety of formats including Microsoft Excel, multiple text file formats, statistical files, Google Sheets, and web data connectors. For more information, see Creators: Connect to Data on the Web.

Can I save to Tableau Public a workbook with a live connection to a data source?

Tableau Public only supports extracted data sources, and does not support live connections to data. However, authors have the option to allow Tableau Public to automatically refresh data sources connecting to Google Sheets every 24 hours. For all other data sources (for example, Excel or a CSV), automatic refresh on Tableau Public is not supported. For more information, see How is data from Google Sheets refreshed on Tableau Public?

How is data from Google Sheets refreshed on Tableau Public?

When you publish a workbook to Public, an extract of the data sources is created, including any data sources that connect to Google Sheets. Every 24 hours, Tableau Public will automatically refresh Google Sheets data sources, meaning any changes in the Google Sheet will be reflected in the data source of the connected workbook on Tableau Public. If your data source uses relationships, all logical tables must be a Google Sheets connection for the data source to automatically refresh. To help balance the load of refreshing the many workbooks and data sources connecting to Google Sheets, Tableau Public will automatically assign a workbook to one of three time frames when the refresh will occur daily. Although you can’t customize the refresh schedule to a different frequency or time-of-day, the author can initiate a refresh by clicking Request Update. Tableau Public will refresh the data source connecting to Google Sheets, and any changes will automatically be reflected in the workbook.

Does Tableau Public support .tde files?

2024.2 is the last version of Tableau Desktop that supports any .tde-based workbooks, data sources, or bookmarks. Versions 2024.3 and beyond only support .hyper format. For more information, see Extract Upgrade to .hyper Format.

Embedding Tableau Public

I have my own blog or website. Can I embed my Tableau Public viz there?

Yes. Once you have saved your data visualization on Tableau Public, you can look up the embed code and use it in your own webpage or blog. Be sure you use the generated embed code and not just the URL of the visualization’s homepage, so as to only embed the viz without the borders around it.

What blog services is Tableau Public compatible with?

Blogger by Google (blogger.com)
Typepad (typepad.com) – Make sure to edit your posts in HTML mode rather than Rich Text, otherwise the Tableau Public embed codes aren’t preserved.
Wordpress (wordpress.org) – WordPress is completely customizable and can be used for almost anything. Web host required.
Squarespace (squarespace.com) – Make sure you use a code block.

Where do I get the embed code for a viz from?

You can get the embed code for any viz by clicking the Share icon in the viz footer.

About Tableau Public

What kind of technology is a Tableau viz?

A Tableau viz is essentially an AJAX-based JavaScript application.

What are the system requirements for Tableau Public?

For a complete list of specs and system requirements, see the Tableau Public Technical Specifications page.

What is the difference between Tableau Desktop Public Edition and Tableau Desktop Professional Edition?

When using Tableau Desktop Public Edition, note the following:

Tableau Desktop Public Edition gives you the option to either share workbooks publicly to your Tableau Public profile or save workbooks locally. Workbooks and data published to your Tableau Public profile are not private and are freely accessible to anyone.
Tableau Desktop Public Edition automatically saves your work for you every few minutes. This feature is turned on by default, but you can turn it off from the toolbar under Help > Settings and Performance < Enable Autosave.
Tableau Public is limited to 15M rows of data per workbook. For more information about logic tables and data sources, see The Tableau Data Model.
You can’t connect to other servers such as Tableau Online or an Internal Tableau Server. You can only connect to Tableau Public.
Data connectors are limited.

Is Tableau Desktop (Public Edition) available for Mac?

Yes! Check out our download page for more details. Download the latest version and give it a try.

Where do I check to see if Tableau Public is down?

You can check the status of Tableau Public on the Tableau Trust site.

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