Reference: Reporting Tools in Workday

Workday offers a variety of reporting tools to help you analyze and report on your data to make informed decisions. The table below lists some of the features of these reporting tools:

Properties	Report Writer	OfficeConnect	Discovery Boards	Worksheets
Description	The original Workday reporting tool. Accommodates different reporting use cases, including tabular and summarized data. See: Report Writer Tool Guidance. Helpful Reports For Report Writers.	A Microsoft Excel add-in that enables you to sign in using your Workday credentials and query on financial data. You can use it to build reports utilizing a curated portion of your Workday financial data or planning data from Adaptive Planning. See: Concept: OfficeConnect and Reporting on the Financial Modeled Data Source. Concept: How OfficeConnect Works.	A visual data analysis tool in Workday that enables you to perform ad hoc, self-service analysis with an interactive drag -and-drop interface. See:Concept: The Discovery Board Workflow	A spreadsheet tool within Workday that enables you to work with live secure data, with the ability to share and collaborate across your organization. See: Set Up Worksheets. Concept: Data Analysis with Worksheets Functions.
Use case examples	HCM: Headcount trends Staffing events Financials: Statutory reporting Revenue plan vs. Actual	Financials: Financial statements Ad hoc reporting Average daily reporting	HCM: Skills gaps Benchmarks Training effectiveness Expense analysis Financials: Past due receivables by root cause DSO drivers Ledger balance analysis	HCM: Model compensation changes Financials: Invoice management Cash flow General Ledger reconciliation
Supported data sources	All Workday-delivered report data sources (RDSs), including Prism and business view data sources.	Modeled data sources, such as: Journal Lines for Financial Reporting Plan Lines for Financial reporting Adaptive Planning See: Concept: Modeled Data Sources.	Most indexed Workday-delivered data sources and all Prism data sources. See Data Sources For Discovery Boards.	Connects to Workday data through Advanced, Matrix and Composite reports. See Concept: Creating Reports to Insert into Workbooks.
Typical report creator	Centralized report writers.	Accountants, FP&A, financial analysts. Requires limited Workday knowledge.	Centralized report developers, analysts.	Centralized report developers, analysts.
Typical report consumer	Analysts, employees, managers, business leaders,HR and finance professionals.	Accountants, FP&A, financial analysts. Requires limited Workday knowledge.	Analysts, managers, executives.	Analysts, employees, managers.
Security for creating	View and Modify permissions on the Custom Report Creation domain and access to the specific data sources.	User must have OfficeConnect installed on their machine, with access to the Access Workday Financials OfficeConnect domain and 1 of the domains securing journal line data. See Concept: Enforcing Security in OfficeConnect.	View and Modify permissions on the Discovery Boards: Create and Drive domains; access to the specific data sources. See: FAQ: Drive Item Storage and Integrations. How to: Setup Discovery Board Security.	View and Modify permissions on the Worksheets and Drive domains. To pull in data from a Report Writer report, user must also have access to the report.
Security for sharing	Can be shared with individual users or with security groups. Can only select users or security groups that have access to the data source used in the report.	Reports are Microsoft Excel files and can be shared through all channels used for sharing files. A security option in OfficeConnect is also available that automatically clears data on save, thereby requiring users of the spreadsheet to sign in and refresh with their own permissions.	Leverages the Drive sharing model. Can be shared with Can View or Can Edit permission with individual users or security groups. For Can View permission, the user or group must have View and Modify permissions on the Drive domain and at least 1 of the data sources used in the board. For Can Edit permissions, the user or group will need the same permissions in addition to View and Modify permissions on the Discovery Boards: Create domain. See also: Concept: Sharing Discovery Boards. How to Share Discovery Board With Security Groups.	Leverages the Drive sharing model. Can share with Can View, Can Comment, or Can Edit permission for individual users or security groups, or through a link. In all cases, the end user must have View and Modify permissions on both the Worksheets and Drive domains. Review the FAQ: Drive Item Storage and Integrations for more details around access and sharing in Drive.
Accessing the report, data visualization, or Worksheet	Can be accessed through the search bar, a worklet on a dashboard, or a direct URL. Can be added to the Home screen as a worklet. Can also be accessed through Worksheets when enabled.	Can't access through the tenant. User must open the file on their machine with Microsoft Excel for full functionality.	Can access through the Search bar, Drive, or a direct URL. Can add to the home screen as a worklet. You can't add visualizations from a discovery board as a worklet to a dashboard. For more details, see Concept: Discovery Board Security.	Can access through the Search bar, Drive, or a direct URL. You can't add it to the Home page as a worklet. You can't add charts created in a workbook as a worklet to a dashboard.
How does user security affect the data displayed?	Workday returns values based on the user’s contextual security.	When you open the Excel file, you can view all the data in the state it was saved, unless you select the Always clear data upon save option. When you select this option, the elements remain in place, but the data itself is cleared. See Reference: Workbook and Selection Properties Fields.	For visualizations where the user has access to the data source, Workday returns values based on the user's contextual security. For visualizations where the user doesn't have access to the RDS, the user can't view that visualization. For more details, see Concept: Discovery Board Security.	Worksheets respects a user's contextual security when live data is brought in or refreshed. After that, all users can view all data in the workbook, regardless of their access to the data. For more information, see: FAQ: Collaboration and Security in Worksheets . Reference: Workbook Actions Available Based on Permissions. To ensure a user can view only data they have access to, you can leverage the Workbook Templates feature.
Can include fields from a related business object	Yes; on Advanced reports only.	No	No. Possible with calculated fields.	Yes
Calculated fields support	Yes; on all calculated fields. See: Concept: Calculated Fields. Setup Considerations: Calculated Fields.	None	For details, see Reference: Supported Fields in Discovery Boards.	All
Can include data external to Workday	Yes; only with subscription to Prism Analytics using a Prism data source.	The modeled data source you connect to in Workday does not contain external data. However, you can include external data in the Excel file.	Yes; only with subscription to Prism Analytics using a Prism data source.	Yes. Limited to the guidelines in the FAQ: Workbook Performance topic.
Can schedule report for delivery?	Yes	No	No	No
Supports down stream business processes (embedded analytics) and integrations (report-as-a-service, RaaS)	Yes	No	No	No
Supported chart types	Multiple chart types, such as column, bar, donut, line, bubble, area, and scatter. See Reference: Chart Types.	Anything supported in Excel.	Multiple chart types and tables, such as line charts, scatterplots, heatmaps, and waterfall charts. For details, see Concept: Visualization Types.	Multiple chart types, such as area and stacked area, stacked bar and 100% stacked bar, bubble, column, stacked column, combination, donut, line, and heatmap. For a description of each chart type, see Reference: Chart Types.
Can customize chart colors	No	Anything supported in Excel.	Yes	No