Use MDX for Advanced Analysis

Use MDX when you need precise, repeatable multidimensional queries and calculations that go beyond interactive Essbase analysis.

Smart View is useful when you want to explore cube data interactively in Excel. AI can provide a conversational way to explore your data in Essbase. MDX provides a query language for explicitly defining the members, sets, dimensions, and calculations that an analytical query requires.

MDX can be useful when you need to:

• Repeat the same multidimensional query consistently.
• Select members based on hierarchy relationships.
• Construct sets of members for analysis.
• Perform calculations as part of a query.
• Embed multidimensional queries in automated or application workflows.
• Precisely control the rows, columns, and point of view returned by a query.
• Define member formulas in an aggregate storage (ASO) cube outline.

For example, an MDX query could request Sales and Margin for each region for FY26, returning exactly the members and dimensional intersections required by an application or recurring analysis.

MDX is an extensive language. This topic introduces where it fits in an Essbase analytical workflow; use the MDX Reference for functions, syntax, and additional examples. See MDX.