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Dashboards are free-standing views your firm uses to track whatever matters — fund performance, pipeline health, portfolio KPIs, weekly metrics. Unlike the pipeline or per-record dashboards, a top-level dashboard isn’t attached to a specific deal, company, list, or user. You build it once, share it with the people who need it, and everyone sees the same data.
Dashboards are rolling out gradually. If you don’t see Dashboards in your sidebar, reach out to support@metal.ai to have it enabled for your firm.
Dashboard showing deal details, actions, timeline, key metrics, similar deals, and revenue trends

A dashboard brings deal details, actions, milestones, and key metrics into one view.

Select Dashboards in the left sidebar to open the gallery. It’s split into two sections: Each card shows the dashboard’s name, description, and whether it’s shared. Click a card to open the dashboard.

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Create a dashboard

1

Open the gallery

Select Dashboards in the sidebar.
2

Start a new dashboard

Click New dashboard next to the My Dashboards heading.
3

Name and describe it

Give the dashboard a Name and an optional Description (for example, Q3 Portfolio Review). Click Create.
The new dashboard opens empty, ready for widgets.

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Add widgets

Widgets are the individual charts, tables, and metrics on a dashboard. You add them from the Add widget gallery, edit them from the widget’s header, and view a dashboard full screen from its header. Click Add widget in the dashboard header. On an empty dashboard, the same picker opens automatically. The gallery has two paths:
  • Compose a new widget — describe what you want and let Metal build it.
  • Pick from the widget library — start from a ready-made widget curated for this dashboard’s context (canvas, pipeline, deal, or company).

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Compose a new widget

1

Choose how the widget gets its data

Pick one of two kinds:
  • Data — Metal writes a script that pulls directly from your Metal and CRM data. The widget refreshes on every load. Best for numbers, charts, and lists you want to keep current.
  • Research — an AI agent researches your prompt across your Metal data, documents, and the web. Best for summaries, themes, and open-ended questions.
2

Describe what you want to see

In What do you want to see?, describe the widget in plain language — for example, “Deals by sector this year” or “Which deals look stalled and why?”. The placeholder shows an example tailored to this dashboard’s context.
3

Create the widget

Click Create widget. A placeholder tile lands on the dashboard immediately, chat opens, and Metal starts building the widget from your description. You can keep refining it in the same chat thread.

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Pick from the widget library

Under Examples in the same dialog, Metal shows a curated set of pre-built widgets scoped to this dashboard’s context. Click one to drop it straight onto the dashboard — library widgets arrive fully configured, so there’s no chat hand-off.
The library is curated per dashboard context. Canvas, pipeline, deal, and company dashboards each get their own set; other dashboard types show no library entries yet, and you compose from scratch.

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Arrange the layout

Click Edit layout in the header. Drag widgets to move them, drag their edges to resize, and use the delete control on a widget to remove it. Click Done to save.

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View full screen

Canvas, Deal Pipeline, and IR Pipeline dashboards have a Full Screen button to the right of Edit layout. Click it to expand the whole dashboard in place. To focus on one widget, click the expand control in the widget’s header. This also works from inside a full-screen dashboard. The expand control appears only on the same dashboards, and not while you’re in Edit layout. Full screen keeps the widget’s live state, including tabs, filters, search, carousel position, and HTML widget inputs. It doesn’t change the saved layout. Click Minimize or press Escape to exit one level. Opening a preview or navigating away also exits full screen.
Only Canvas, Deal Pipeline, and IR Pipeline dashboards have Full Screen. Home dashboards, entity dashboards such as deals, companies, funds, people, limited partners, and fundraising processes, and Settings previews leave full screen off.

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Inspect or edit a widget’s source

Most widgets are backed by either a script (for data queries) or a prompt (for AI-generated content). Click the pencil icon in a widget’s header to open the source dialog, where a Script or Prompt badge (with a matching code or bot icon) tells you which kind it is. From there you can view — or inline-edit — the underlying script or prompt. Read-only widgets show an eye icon instead. Widgets you customize are marked with a Custom badge.
Because these dashboards aren’t scoped to a single deal or company, widgets resolve against your whole organization’s data. Any entity filter has to be part of the widget’s own query.

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Run workflows from a widget

HTML widgets — widgets whose body is custom HTML rather than a script or a prompt — can include buttons that start a workflow without leaving the dashboard. Use this when your team regularly runs the same workflow while reviewing a dashboard, for example a weekly portfolio analysis. To add a run button, use Compose a new widget or ask chat, and name the workflow. For example: “Add a button to this widget that runs the Portfolio analysis workflow.” The workflow must support manual runs. When someone clicks the button:
  1. Metal opens the workflow’s Run workflow dialog on top of the dashboard. Clicking the button never starts a run on its own.
  2. They review or fill in the workflow’s inputs and submit.
  3. The dialog closes and they stay on the dashboard. A Workflow run started confirmation appears with a View run link that opens the new run.
Run buttons work from widget tiles, carousel panels, and the expanded widget view, on any page that shows a dashboard. They’re disabled while you’re in Edit layout, and in the read-only preview on Settings → Firm Guidance → Default Dashboards. If the workflow is unavailable, deprecated, or can’t be run manually, the dialog says so instead of showing the form. When chat adds a run button, it may also offer to add a recent-runs table for that workflow. It only creates the table if you agree, and it doesn’t offer one if the dashboard already has a suitable widget. The table updates on the dashboard’s normal schedule. It follows automatic refresh if you’ve turned it on, or a manual reload otherwise. Adding a run button doesn’t change your refresh settings.

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Preview workflow files from a widget

HTML widgets can also include buttons that open a file a workflow run produced, such as a generated memo or report. The file opens in the file preview without leaving the dashboard. Use this with a recent-runs table so viewers can open each run’s output in one click. To add preview buttons, use Compose a new widget or ask chat. For example: “In the recent runs table, add a button to preview each run’s report.” Metal links each button to a specific file from a specific run. It doesn’t guess the “latest” file or match files by name. If Metal can’t identify the exact file, it keeps the row and leaves its preview button inactive. When someone clicks a preview button, Metal shows Opening workflow file… while it checks their access, then opens the file. Preview buttons work from widget tiles, carousel panels, and the expanded widget view, on any page that shows a dashboard. They’re disabled only while you’re in Edit layout. Access is checked for the person viewing the dashboard, not the person who built the widget. If they can’t open the run — because they don’t have access to it, or it no longer exists — Metal shows Workflow file is unavailable. If the run opens but Metal can’t resolve the exact file it linked to, it shows Could not open workflow file.

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Duplicate a dashboard

You can copy a dashboard you can open — including one shared with you — without changing the original.
1

Open Duplicate

In the gallery, open the dashboard card’s menu and choose Duplicate. Or open the dashboard and click Duplicate in the header.
2

Name the copy

Give the copy a Name and optional Description, then click Duplicate.
The copy is yours. Sharing, widgets, and layout start from the original, and you can change them independently.

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Restore an earlier version

If you can edit a dashboard, the header includes Version history. Open it to see earlier revisions, newest first. The live layout is marked Current. Click an older revision and confirm Restore version. Metal creates a new revision from that snapshot and keeps your current layout in history, so you can undo the restore the same way. Version history is available on dashboards you can edit. Read-only viewers do not see the control.

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Share a dashboard

You control who can see a dashboard from the Share dialog in the dashboard header.
1

Open the share dialog

On the dashboard, click Share in the header.
2

Add users or teams

Under Shared with, add individual Users or whole Teams. Everyone you add sees the dashboard under Shared with me in their gallery.
3

Make it org-wide (optional)

Set Visibility to Org-wide to make the dashboard visible to everyone in your organization. Org-wide dashboards show an Org-wide badge in the gallery.Publishing a dashboard org-wide is reserved for Admin and Power roles. Members don’t see the Org-wide option in the share dialog. If a Member owns a dashboard that’s already org-wide, they can still switch it back to Restricted and share it with specific users or teams. To publish org-wide, add an Admin or Power user under Shared with and ask them to change the visibility.
The dashboard creator and anyone listed as an Owner can edit the layout, edit widgets, and delete the dashboard. People with edit access can manage sharing — adding users or teams and, for Admin and Power roles, org-wide visibility. Everyone else has read-only access.

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Refresh a dashboard automatically

You can set a dashboard to reload its data on an interval so the numbers stay current without a manual reload. Ask the assistant to turn on automatic refresh and give it an interval, for example “Refresh this dashboard every 5 minutes” or “Turn off automatic refresh.” Metal saves the setting on the dashboard, so anyone viewing it sees the same schedule. The setting carries over when you clone the dashboard.
  • Minimum interval. 180 seconds (3 minutes). Shorter intervals are rejected.
  • What refreshes. Script-backed widgets (charts, tables, KPIs powered by dashboard data queries) and the panels inside carousels. Agent-authored and narrative widgets keep their existing content and do not re-run on the schedule.
  • While a refresh is in flight. The last loaded data stays on screen so the dashboard doesn’t blank out. Newly resolved widgets replace the cached values when the refresh completes.
  • When a refresh fails. A banner appears above the grid — “Couldn’t refresh this dashboard. Showing the last loaded data.” — with a Retry button that runs the refresh again. Individual widgets that failed keep their previously loaded values instead of showing an error state.
  • When refresh pauses. Automatic refresh stops while the browser tab is hidden or offline, and resumes when the tab is visible and online again.
Automatic refresh applies wherever the dashboard renders — the standalone dashboard page, entity pages (deals, companies, funds, people, LPs, fundraising processes), the home and pipeline views, the IR pipeline, and the settings preview.

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Dashboards vs. Default Dashboards

Metal has two related surfaces. Use this table to pick the right one: If you want a firm-wide reporting view, use a top-level dashboard. If you want every deal (or every company, person, pipeline, limited partner, fund, or fundraising process) to open with the same widgets by default, configure that under Settings → Default Dashboards.

Workspace settings

Where admins configure Default Dashboards and other firm-wide preferences.

Adding & managing users

Set up teams so you can share dashboards with a whole group at once.