Visualize data with the new hierarchy control

Previously there was a legacy hierarchy control for model-driven apps that allowed users to view N:1 (many-to-one) self-referencing relationships of a table. I always felt it is important to able to view relationships between rows using a hierarchy control because it provides clear visibility to users on how data is connected, making it easier to understand complex structures at a glance. Instead of having to navigating through multiple views or forms, users can quickly see these parent-child relationships (I.E. parent and child accounts) in a single view. For organizations, the hierarchy control is an important tool in ensuring everyone has a consistent understanding of how records are related. Unfortunately the legacy hierarchy control was deprecated in October 2024, but makers still had the ability to use the control through October of 2025. Microsoft announced that at this time the control will be removed from the product. I wasn’t the only one that was disappointed to find out that at the time of the announcement of deprecation there was no plan for a replacement control. (Several folks in the community created their own hierarchy controls.) BUT, as part of 2025 Release Wave 2, the new Hierarchy Relationship Visualizer is currently in public preview, with a general availability of October 2025! Microsoft is saying this is not a replacement for the legacy control, but a completely new feature. Let me tell you all about it!

What is it?

First of all, its important to understand that this hierarchy control is part of Dynamics 365 Sales. The previous control wasn’t really tied to any of the Dynamics 365 apps, but it seems that this one is. As I stated above, keep in mind that this is completely new feature! It’s important to understand that once an administrator has configured and published a hierarchy visualization it will become available for ANYONE that has access to the org, no matter if they have a Dynamics 365 Sales license or not!

Microsoft stated this first version of the control (v1) will support single-table hierarchies, meaning only one table at a time. For example account-to-account relationships or contact-to-contact relationships, etc. Version 2 (v2) will have support for multi-tables, meaning the ability to view relationships between different/multiple tables I.E. contact-to-account like contacts to their parent account. Depending on which region your tenant is in, the preview should be available on September 29th at the latest.

How does it work?

It’s important to understand that the configuration of this control doesn’t happen in the Power Platform Admin Center, but in the app settings of the Sales Hub. Once the feature has been deployed in your environment administrators will see the ‘Visual Hierarchy’ navigation item on the sitemap in the ‘App Settings’ area. This is the place where administrators can create and publish hierarchy configurations. They’ll need to create a hierarchy configuration for each table they want to use this new hierarchy control, but don’t worry, it’s very easy to create these hierarchy configurations!

Administrators can create a new hierarchy configuration by clicking the ‘+New’ button on the command bar. This will load a new window where they have to enter the hierarchy name and select the table they want to use. After the table is added, more configuration options will appear on the right side of the screen. Let’s first discuss the ‘General’ configurations for the control. The ‘select the column with the parent ID‘ is pretty self explanatory. This is the column that represents the relationship (with the same table) that will be used in this configuration. In this example I will explain how to configure this for the account table. In the ‘select the column with the parent ID‘ I populate the parentaccountid column.
Below the ‘select the column with the parent ID‘ setting it shows ‘Which view should be used?’. I like having the option to select a view, as it allows admins to filter the data based on the view that is selected. By default the ‘Active…’ views are populated here. Since I only want to show active accounts in this control, I won’t change the default ‘Active Accounts’ view here. The next setting is called ‘Which form should be shown as a tile‘. With the previous control, only quick view forms like the ‘Account Hierarchy Tile form’ could be used to visualize the data. There forms also only showed the first 3 columns in the control. You could’ve dragged more columns on the form, but only the first 3 would show up in the control. The new hierarchy control allows makers to choose the form they want to be used for the tile. This form is not restricted to a quick view form. A maximum of 7 columns can be displayed on a form, but keep in mind that only basic data type columns will be supported (strings, dates and numbers).

The ‘Which form should be shown as details‘ option allows users to pick a form that opens when a user clicks on a tile in the hierarchy control. I really love this option, as it allows users to view the row details in a sidepane rather than have to open it in a different window. However, if the user wants to expand to full screen, this is possible. Admins can also configure the ‘Tile display option’ settings where they can select whether or not to show the image of the row. This is also the place where they can select the color for the table and the width and height of the tile.
Once the configuration is completed, the administrator can click ‘Preview’ to get an idea of what the hierarchy configuration will look like to the end users after publishing. Once the hierarchy configuration looks good, it can be saved and published. Any hierarchy configurations that are not published, will not be visible to users. Published hierarchy configurations can not be edited. If a change needs to be made the hierarchy configurations needs to be unpublished first. I hope you enjoyed this article! Be sure to check in again next week or subscribe here to never miss another post!