Admin settings - Self-service Explores

With the Self-service Explores feature, your Looker users can upload CSV, XLS, and XLSX files to Looker and then query and visualize the data in a Looker Explore without needing to configure a LookML model or set up Git version control.

Looker admins can select the Self-service Explores option from the Looker Adminmenu to configure the Self-service Exploresfeature and view data uploads on the instance.

Before you begin

To use self-service Explores, your Looker instance must meet the following requirements:

• Running Looker 25.18 or later.
• Has a connection to a BigQuery database (see the Google BigQuery documentation page for information about setting up a BigQuery connection on your Looker instance), and the connection must be configured in the following ways:
  • The connection must be configured with the All projectsscope. To verify the connection's scope, see the Scopecolumn in the Databasestab of the Connectionspage in the Looker admin menu. The connection's Project Scopevalue cannot be edited once the connection is created.
  • The connection must be enabled for persistent derived tables (PDTs). To verify that PDTs are enabled on the BigQuery connection, open the Looker Connections page, click the Editbutton for the BigQuery connection, click to open the Optional Settingstab, and then verify that the Enable PDTs toggle is turned on.
• For any user who will be creating self-service Explores, their Looker user account must have the upload_data permission, which allows a user to upload CSV files to your instance.

Enabling self-service Explores

• To support the Self-service Explore feature, upon upgrade to Looker 25.20, your Looker instance adds the upload_data permission to any role or permission set that contains the explore permission, including custom permissions sets. If you enable data uploads on a Looker instance, any user with the upload_data permission will be able to upload data to create self-service Explores on your instance.
• Be mindful of changing the settings on the Self-service Explores admin page if your instance has existing self-service Explores:
  • If you disable data uploads, your users will no longer be able to access existing self-service Explores from the Explore menu, and any Looks or dashboards that rely on the data may be affected.
  • If you change the BigQuery connection, any existing self-service Explores on your instance can be affected, along with any Looks or dashboards that rely on their data.

Before your users can create self-service Explores, a Looker admin must configure the feature by performing the following steps:

1. From the Generalsection of the Looker Adminmenu, select the Self-service Explores admin page.
2. On the Self-service Explores admin page, from the Default BigQuery connectiondrop-down menu, select the BigQuery connection to use for storing the data for self-service Explores. Looker will save the data to this BigQuery database for the self-service Explores on your instance.
3. Click the Test connectionbutton to verify that the BigQuery connection is valid and that it has PDTs enabled so that it can support data uploads. (See the Before you begin section for information on the requirements for connections to support data uploads.) If the test fails, you won't be able to enable data uploads. You can go to the Connectionsadmin page to see more details about your connection and to further test the connection to see where the connection is failing.
4. Click the Enable data uploadsbutton.
5. If you want your Looker instance to support uploading data from Google Sheets , you must also use the Google Cloud console to enable the required APIs. See the Enabling the APIs to support Google Sheets uploads section on this page.

Enabling the APIs to support Google Sheets uploads

To support uploading data from Google Sheets, the following APIs must be enabled in the Google Cloud console by an IAM user with the IAM roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin permission:

• This API must be enabled in the Google Cloud project that houses the BigQuery connection that is specified in the Default BigQuery connectiondrop-down menu of the Self-service Exploresadmin page:

  • BigQuery API: Required for all BigQuery operations

• These APIs must be enabled in the Google Cloud project that is associated with the service account used to upload data (the service account that is used for PDT processes on your BigQuery connection , which may or may not be the same as the Google Cloud project that is specified in the Default BigQuery connectiondrop-down menu of the Self-service Exploresadmin page):

  • BigQuery API: Required for all BigQuery operations
  • Google Sheets API: Required for retrieving the names of each sheet in a Google Sheets document
  • Google Drive API: Required for BigQuery to read files from Drive

Perform the following steps to enable the APIs:

1. From the Google Cloud console Open project picker, select the project that houses the BigQuery connection that is specified in the Default BigQuery connectiondrop-down menu of the Self-service Exploresadmin page.

2. In the Google Cloud console navigation menu, go to APIs & Services > Libraryand open the BigQuery API.

   Go to BigQuery API

3. On the BigQuery API page, if the API isn't already enabled, click Enable.

4. Still on the BigQuery API page, from the Google Cloud console Open project picker, select the Google Cloud project that is associated with the service account used to upload data (the service account that is used for PDT processes on your BigQuery connection ).

5. On the BigQuery API page, if the API isn't already enabled, click Enable.

6. In the Google Cloud console navigation menu, go to APIs & Services > Libraryand open the Google Sheets API.

   Go to Google Sheets API

7. On the Google Sheets API page, if the API isn't already enabled, click Enable.

8. In the Google Cloud console navigation menu, go to APIs & Services > Libraryand open the Google Drive API.

   Go to Google Drive API

9. On the Google Drive API page, if the API isn't already enabled, click Enable.

Viewing the data uploads on your Looker instance

If self-service Explores are enabled on your instance, a Looker admin can use the Data uploadstable on the Self-service Explores admin page to view the data that your users have uploaded on the instance.

The Data uploadstable shows the following information about the data uploads on your instance:

• The name of the self-service Explore
• The owner of the data upload
• The date that the data was uploaded
• A Deletebutton that allows Looker admins to delete the file upload and its associated self-service Explore

Removing a data upload

The owner of a data upload can remove their upload from the Edit Self-service Explore page . In addition, a Looker admin can remove a data upload from the Self-service Explores admin page by following these steps:

1. From the Generalsection of the Looker Adminmenu, select the Self-service Explores admin page.
2. In the Data uploadstable, click the Deletebutton for the data upload that you want to remove.
3. Click Deletein the confirmation dialog.