Commonly associated with online analytical processing (OLAP) technology, a cube is a multidimensional data structure that is optimized for analysis and reporting. A cube organizes data into dimensions and measures. Measures represent values that are counted or aggregated, such as costs or units of products. Dimensions are categories, such as products, customers, or sales periods, by which measures are aggregated. For example, a retail cube might contain data that supports viewing sales volume and cost of goods, which are measures, by store location, time period, and product lines, which are dimensions.

Dimensions can be hierarchical and contain multiple levels. For example, a region dimension can contain a region-country-state hierarchy. Similarly, a time dimension can contain a year-quarter-month-week hierarchy. Most cubes include a time dimension because, for most reports, showing measures by day, week, month, quarter, or year is essential to analyzing data. The time dimension is a special dimension. The cube groups dates stored in a field into any time period of your choice.