Databricks Metric Views

---
name: databricks-metric-views
description: "Unity Catalog metric views: define, create, query, and manage governed business metrics in YAML. Use when building standardized KPIs, revenue metrics, order analytics, or any reusable business metrics that need consistent definitions across teams and tools."
---

# Unity Catalog Metric Views

Define reusable, governed business metrics in YAML that separate measure definitions from dimension groupings for flexible querying.

## When to Use

Use this skill when:
- Defining **standardized business metrics** (revenue, order counts, conversion rates)
- Building **KPI layers** shared across dashboards, Genie, and SQL queries
- Creating metrics with **complex aggregations** (ratios, distinct counts, filtered measures)
- Defining **window measures** (moving averages, running totals, period-over-period, YTD)
- Modeling **star or snowflake schemas** with joins in metric definitions
- Enabling **materialization** for pre-computed metric aggregations

## Prerequisites

- **Databricks Runtime 17.2+** (for YAML version 1.1)
- SQL warehouse with `CAN USE` permissions
- `SELECT` on source tables, `CREATE TABLE` + `USE SCHEMA` in the target schema

## Quick Start

### Inspect Source Table Schema

Before authoring a metric view, inspect the source tables. Use `discover-schema` as the default — one call returns columns, types, sample rows, null counts, and row count. If you only know the schema, list tables first with `query "SHOW TABLES IN ..."`.

`databricks experimental aitools tools discover-schema catalog.schema.orders catalog.schema.customers`

For dimensions and measures, probe distribution beyond sampling — cardinality of candidate dimensions, min/max/percentiles for measures, top categorical values. Write aggregate SQL through `databricks experimental aitools tools query --warehouse <WH> "..."`. Both commands auto-pick the default warehouse; set `DATABRICKS_WAREHOUSE_ID` or pass `--warehouse <ID>` to override.

### Create a Metric View

```sql
CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WITH METRICS
LANGUAGE YAML
AS $$
  version: 1.1
  source: catalog.schema.orders
  comment: "Orders KPIs for sales analysis"
  filter: order_date > '2020-01-01'
  dimensions:
    - name: Order Month
      expr: DATE_TRUNC('MONTH', order_date)
      comment: "Month of order"
    - name: Order Status
      expr: CASE
        WHEN status = 'O' THEN 'Open'
        WHEN status = 'P' THEN 'Processing'
        WHEN status = 'F' THEN 'Fulfilled'
        END
      comment: "Human-readable order status"
  measures:
    - name: Order Count
      expr: COUNT(1)
    - name: Total Revenue
      expr: SUM(total_price)
      comment: "Sum of total price"
    - name: Revenue per Customer
      expr: SUM(total_price) / COUNT(DISTINCT customer_id)
      comment: "Average revenue per unique customer"
$$
```

### Query a Metric View

All measures must use the `MEASURE()` function. `SELECT *` is NOT supported.

```sql
SELECT
  `Order Month`,
  `Order Status`,
  MEASURE(`Total Revenue`) AS total_revenue,
  MEASURE(`Order Count`) AS order_count
FROM catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WHERE extract(year FROM `Order Month`) = 2024
GROUP BY ALL
ORDER BY ALL
```

## Reference Files

| Topic | File | Description |
|-------|------|-------------|
| YAML Syntax | [references/yaml-reference.md](references/yaml-reference.md) | Complete YAML spec: dimensions, measures, joins, materialization |
| Patterns & Examples | [references/patterns.md](references/patterns.md) | Common patterns: star schema, snowflake, filtered measures, window measures, ratios |

## SQL Operations

### Create Metric View

```sql
CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WITH METRICS
LANGUAGE YAML
AS $$
  version: 1.1
  comment: "Orders KPIs for sales analysis"
  source: catalog.schema.orders
  filter: order_date > '2020-01-01'
  dimensions:
    - name: Order Month
      expr: DATE_TRUNC('MONTH', order_date)
      comment: "Month of order"
    - name: Order Status
      expr: status
  measures:
    - name: Order Count
      expr: COUNT(1)
    - name: Total Revenue
      expr: SUM(total_price)
      comment: "Sum of total price"
$$;
```

### Query Metric View

```sql
SELECT
  `Order Month`,
  MEASURE(`Total Revenue`) AS total_revenue,
  MEASURE(`Order Count`) AS order_count
FROM catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WHERE extract(year FROM `Order Month`) = 2024
GROUP BY ALL
ORDER BY ALL
LIMIT 100;
```

### Describe Metric View

```sql
DESCRIBE TABLE EXTENDED catalog.schema.orders_metrics;

-- Or get YAML definition
SHOW CREATE TABLE catalog.schema.orders_metrics;
```

### Grant Access

```sql
GRANT SELECT ON VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics TO `data-consumers`;
```

### Drop Metric View

```sql
DROP VIEW IF EXISTS catalog.schema.orders_metrics;
```

### CLI Execution

```bash
# Execute SQL via CLI
databricks experimental aitools tools query --warehouse WAREHOUSE_ID "
CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WITH METRICS
LANGUAGE YAML
AS \$\$
  version: 1.1
  source: catalog.schema.orders
  dimensions:
    - name: Order Month
      expr: DATE_TRUNC('MONTH', order_date)
  measures:
    - name: Total Revenue
      expr: SUM(total_price)
\$\$
"
```

> **Avoiding heredoc escaping**: the `\$\$` token-quoting above is fragile (it interacts with bash variable expansion, sed, and JSON encoding). For long DDL, prefer the Statement Execution API which takes the SQL as a JSON string:
>
> ```bash
> databricks api post /api/2.0/sql/statements --json '{
>   "warehouse_id": "WAREHOUSE_ID",
>   "statement": "CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics WITH METRICS LANGUAGE YAML AS $$\nversion: 1.1\nsource: catalog.schema.orders\ndimensions:\n  - name: Order Month\n    expr: DATE_TRUNC(MONTH, order_date)\nmeasures:\n  - name: Total Revenue\n    expr: SUM(total_price)\n$$"
> }'
> ```
>
> JSON-escaped strings are easier to template programmatically than shell heredocs.

### Convert an Existing View to a Metric View

To migrate a regular view to a metric view, treat its `SELECT` source as the metric view's `source`, then promote `GROUP BY` columns to `dimensions` and aggregations to `measures`. The new metric view does not replace the original — it sits alongside it as a governed metric layer.

```sql
-- Existing regular view (keep as-is or drop later)
-- CREATE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_summary AS
-- SELECT DATE_TRUNC('MONTH', order_date) AS month,
--        SUM(total_price) AS revenue,
--        COUNT(*) AS order_count
-- FROM catalog.schema.orders
-- GROUP BY 1;

-- Equivalent metric view (new artifact, governed)
CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW catalog.schema.orders_metrics
WITH METRICS
LANGUAGE YAML
AS $$
  version: 1.1
  source: catalog.schema.orders
  dimensions:
    - name: Order Month
      expr: DATE_TRUNC('MONTH', order_date)
  measures:
    - name: Revenue
      expr: SUM(total_price)
    - name: Order Count
      expr: COUNT(1)
$$
```

After verifying parity (`SELECT ... FROM <orders_metrics>` returns the same numbers as the original view), update downstream consumers and drop the original view.

## YAML Spec Quick Reference

```yaml
version: 1.1                    # Required: "1.1" for DBR 17.2+
source: catalog.schema.table    # Required: source table/view
comment: "Description"          # Optional: metric view description
filter: column > value          # Optional: global WHERE filter

dimensions:                     # Required: at least one
  - name: Display Name          # Backtick-quoted in queries
    expr: sql_expression        # Column ref or SQL transformation
    comment: "Description"      # Optional (v1.1+)

measures:                       # Required: at least one
  - name: Display Name          # Queried via MEASURE(`name`)
    expr: AGG_FUNC(column)      # Must be an aggregate expression
    comment: "Description"      # Optional (v1.1+)

joins:                          # Optional: star/snowflake schema
  - name: dim_table
    source: catalog.schema.dim_table
    on: source.fk = dim_table.pk

materialization:                # Optional (experimental)
  schedule: every 6 hours
  mode: relaxed
```

## Key Concepts

### Dimensions vs Measures

| | Dimensions | Measures |
|---|---|---|
| **Purpose** | Categorize and group data | Aggregate numeric values |
| **Examples** | Region, Date, Status | SUM(revenue), COUNT(orders) |
| **In queries** | Used in SELECT and GROUP BY | Wrapped in `MEASURE()` |
| **SQL expressions** | Any SQL expression | Must use aggregate functions |

### Why Metric Views vs Standard Views?

| Feature | Standard Views | Metric Views |
|---------|---------------|--------------|
| Aggregation locked at creation | Yes | No - flexible at query time |
| Safe re-aggregation of ratios | No | Yes |
| Star/snowflake schema joins | Manual | Declarative in YAML |
| Materialization | Separate MV needed | Built-in |
| AI/BI Genie integration | Limited | Native |

## Common Issues

| Issue | Solution |
|-------|----------|
| **SELECT * not supported** | Must explicitly list dimensions and use MEASURE() for measures |
| **"Cannot resolve column"** | Dimension/measure names with spaces need backtick quoting |
| **JOIN at query time fails** | Joins must be in the YAML definition, not in the SELECT query |
| **MEASURE() required** | All measure references must be wrapped: `MEASURE(\`name\`)` |
| **DBR version error** | Requires Runtime 17.2+ for YAML v1.1, or 16.4+ for v0.1 |
| **Materialization not working** | Requires serverless compute enabled; currently experimental |

## Integrations

Metric views work natively with:
- **AI/BI Dashboards** - Use as datasets for visualizations
- **AI/BI Genie** - Natural language querying of metrics
- **Alerts** - Set threshold-based alerts on measures
- **SQL Editor** - Direct SQL querying with MEASURE()
- **Catalog Explorer UI** - Visual creation and browsing

## Resources

- [Metric Views Documentation](https://docs.databricks.com/en/metric-views/)
- [YAML Syntax Reference](https://docs.databricks.com/en/metric-views/data-modeling/syntax)
- [Joins](https://docs.databricks.com/en/metric-views/data-modeling/joins)
- [Window Measures](https://docs.databricks.com/metric-views/data-modeling/window-measures) (Experimental)
- [Materialization](https://docs.databricks.com/en/metric-views/materialization)
- [MEASURE() Function](https://docs.databricks.com/en/sql/language-manual/functions/measure)