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Which Image Displayer Is The Best?

Lately, I have needed an image displayer for my Power BI report and I have decided to do a little research before I choose which one to use.  After all, Power BI offers many of them at App Source, and the more choice I have, the pickier I become. Here is the full list of image displayers that I could find, and they are all free.

  • Table and Matrix: These are between the options that let me display visuals on Power BI's visualization pane. The advantage is they come with Power BI. You don't need to download anything from App Source and they support URL. It doesn't require encoding the image's URL to base64, meaning you need to find an encoder tool, doubling your work. They might be preferable because they don't have the risk of simply disappearing as they are Power BI's own tools. It's possible to change the size of images but it's not possible to fit the image 100% to the frame. When I tried to small the frame, they both created a scroll-down menu which doesn't look good.
     Table Matrix
  • Slicer: Our good old friend Slicer might come in handy too for displaying visuals. The thing is Slicer supports URL but not base64. Not supporting base64 might be a problem if you need to create your own link to have a more reliable source. You can make your image smaller but not bigger. If you try to make the image bigger, it creates an empty background that you can only change its color. 
       
  • Multi-row Card: This is the last option that Power BI's visualization pane offers. This one supports URL but not Base64. The thing which makes Multi-row Card difficult to love for image displaying is, resizing is not an option. Even if it's not, when you try to fit them with each other, like in Table and Matrix it creates an unwanted scroll-down menu. The advantage of it might be displaying more than one visual. Other than that it doesn't offer anything special for image display. 
      
  • Image Grid: You can download this one from App Source, and it's certified by Power BI. It means it has passed testing and is supported in additional scenarios such as export to PowerPoint. You don't need to encode the image's URL to base64 but there is something that I don't like about it. When you hover on it, the image gets bigger and that's why you can't fill the displayer completely with your image, it always has an empty background and in my opinion, doesn't look well. But if it is used with multiple images like it's designed to be, it looks fantastic, getting bigger on hovering makes perfect sense. Long story short, this one is good for displaying multiple images at once.
       
 
  • Image by CloudScope: This one has no problem with sizing the image or with its URL but it's not Power BI certified. It means one day it can disappear from App Source and leave your report and image with a broken heart, despite it is the editor's pick.
     
  • Simple Image: This one has no problem with sizing either. It also supports both the image's URL and base64 encoding, but it also has the risk of getting disappeared or having update compatibility problems in the future. The other thing I noticed, it's ellipses to drag it sometimes disappears when you're resizing the image.
     

    

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