Using the Cloud Console

The Google Cloud Console provides a graphical interface that you can use to create and manage BigQuery resources and run SQL queries.

See the Cloud Console quickstart for a working introduction to using the Cloud Console.

Before you begin

Before you can use the Cloud Console, you must create or select a Google Cloud project.

1. Sign in to your Google Account.

   If you don't already have one, sign up for a new account.

2. In the Google Cloud Console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

   Note: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.

   Go to the project selector page

3. BigQuery is automatically enabled in new projects. To activate BigQuery in a preexisting project, go to Enable the BigQuery API.

   Enable the API

4. BigQuery provides a sandbox if you do not want to provide a credit card or enable billing for your project. The steps in this topic work for a project whether or not your project has billing enabled. If you optionally want to enable billing, see Learn how to enable billing.

Opening the BigQuery page in the Cloud Console

To open the BigQuery page in the Cloud Console:

1. Open the Cloud Console.

   Go to the Cloud Console

2. In the navigation pane, click BigQuery.

You can also open the BigQuery page directly by entering the following URL in your browser.

https://console.cloud.google.com/bigquery

Or, click here to open the BigQuery page in the Cloud Console directly using your most recently accessed project:

Go to the BigQuery page

Cloud Console overview

The Cloud Console has three main sections:

1. The left side of the page (the navigation panel):

   The navigation panel contains a list of BigQuery resources you can view.

   • The Query history section displays your project's query jobs.

   • The Saved queries section displays your saved and shared queries.

   • The Job history section displays your project's load, export, and copy jobs.

   • The Transfers section opens the BigQuery Data Transfer Service page.

   • The Scheduled queries section displays your scheduled queries.

   • The BI Engine section displays the BI Engine console.

   • The Resources section contains a list of pinned projects. Expand a project to view datasets and tables that you have access to. A search box is available in the Resources section that allows you to search for resources by name (project name, dataset name, table name, or view name) or by label. The search bar finds all resources that match, or contain matches, within your current and pinned projects.

   • To use search and autocomplete powered by Data Catalog (beta), in the Try search and autocomplete powered by Data Catalog dialog, click Enable. With this feature enabled, BigQuery loads your results on demand for searches in the Resources panel and for autocomplete in the Query editor. If you have a large number of resources, Data Catalog improves the Cloud Console's performance. It also lets you search for resources outside of your current pinned projects.

2. The details panel:

   Contains information appropriate to the selected action in the navigation panel. For example, if you click a dataset in the navigation panel, the details panel displays information about the dataset.

3. The query editor:

   When you click Compose new query, the query editor appears above the details panel. Click Hide Editor to hide the editor when you no longer need it.

Displaying resources

The navigation panel lists datasets that you can browse in the current project. Click the icon next to your project to display the datasets in that project. Click the icon next to any dataset to expand it and to show the tables within that dataset.

Clicking a dataset or table will show information about the resource in the details panel. When you click a table in the navigation panel, you can then click the Query Table button on the right side of the details panel to populate the query box with a basic query for that table. You can modify the query by hand to specify fields or customize the query however you like. You are not limited to querying the currently selected table. For more information on querying tables, see Running interactive queries.

Working with projects

All of your BigQuery work is done within a project. This project's name can be seen in the navigation panel below the filter datasets box. You can also view the current project by using the platform bar at the top of the page.

All of your work within the project is charged to the billing account attached to the project. For more information on BigQuery charges, see the pricing page.

In the Cloud Console, you can:

• Switch to a different project
• Add (or pin) additional projects
• Remove pinned projects

Switching projects

To switch projects in the Cloud Console:

1. In the platform bar at the top of the page, click your project.

   

2. In the projects dialog, click the name of the project in the list. This replaces your previous project in the Cloud Console with the one you chose.

Pinning (adding) a project

You can add or "pin" a project in the Cloud Console by using the pin project option.

You can pin a project in one of the following ways:

• Switch to the project, then pin it.
• Use the Pin Project option in the navigation panel.

Option 1: Open a project then pin it

To pin a project after opening it:

1. Switch to the project you want to pin to the navigation panel.

2. In the navigation panel, click the project ID.

3. In the details panel, on the right side, click Pin Project.

   

Option 2: Use the Pin Project option

To pin a project using the Pin Project dialog:

1. In the navigation panel, in the Resources section, click Pin Project.

2. In the Pin Project dialog, click the Select a project list. You can choose a project from the Recently selected projects list, or you can use the Filter by box to quickly scan the All projects list.

3. After choosing the project, click Pin Project to close the Pin Project dialog.

Removing a project from the Cloud Console

To remove a project you previously added (or "pinned"):

1. Click the project ID in the navigation pane.

2. In the details panel, on the right side, click Unpin Project.

Viewing job and query history

As you run jobs and run queries using the Cloud Console, your history is preserved in the navigation panel. Queries are also a type of job, but your query history is preserved separately for ease of use.

The job and query histories in the Cloud Console include all load, export, copy, and query jobs you submitted in the past 6 months (up to 1,000 entries). The limit of 1,000 jobs is cumulative across all job types.

To list all available jobs in the history, use the jobs.list API method or the bq ls command in the bq command-line tool.

Viewing job history

To view your job history, click the Job History link in the navigation panel.

In the job history details panel, click an individual job to see the details or to repeat the job. You can repeat a load job by using the Cloud Console, but you cannot repeat an export or copy job.

Viewing query history

To view your query history, click the Query History link in the navigation panel.

In the query history details panel, click an individual query job to see the details or to open the query in the query editor. When you open the query in the query editor, you can repeat the query by clicking Run query.

Cloud Console display limits

The Cloud Console has the following display limits:

• Only 1,000 datasets can be displayed in the navigation panel.
• Up to 30,000 tables are displayed in the navigation pane per dataset. You can display a cumulative total of 1,000,000 tables across all datasets (including datasets in pinned projects).

Keyboard shortcuts

The following keyboard shortcuts are supported in the Cloud Console:

Key combination (Windows/Linux)	Key combination (Mac OS)	Action
Ctrl+Enter	Cmd+Enter	Run current query
Tab	Tab	Autocomplete current word
Ctrl	Cmd	Highlight table names
Ctrl+click table name	Cmd+click table name	Open table schema
Ctrl+E	Cmd+E	Run query from selection
Ctrl+/	Cmd+/	Comment current or selected line(s)
Ctrl+Shift+F	Cmd+Shift+F	Format query

Examples

You can find Cloud Console examples throughout the How-to guides section of the BigQuery documentation.

To see examples of loading data and querying data using the Cloud Console, see the Quickstart using the Cloud Console.

What's next

• See the Cloud Console quickstart for a working introduction to using the Cloud Console.