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Business Intelligence Master’s Degrees
Broadly speaking, business intelligence (BI) is the extraction of insights from raw data to aid in business decision making. BI has traditionally involved cataloging and examining data from past actions, and developing a consistent set of metrics to both measure past performance and guide business planning.
Today, business intelligence analysts use a variety of technologies, processes, and software to identify, extract, combine, and analyze the abundance of data that is produced by—and can inform—day-to-day business. Functions of BI technologies may include development of dashboards, online analytical processing, data mining, querying, complex event processing, business performance management, benchmarking, predictive analytics, prescriptive analytics, and reporting. O*NET OnLine’s profile for business intelligence analysts lists tasks such as querying data repositories, generating reports, and creating and maintaining BI tools, databases and dashboards (O*NET OnLine, Business Intelligence Analysts (15-2051.01), updated 2026-08-25).
A degree in business intelligence focuses on technological and analytical skills, such as database management, data visualization and data mining (MSU Denver, program page, accessed 2026-10-01).
Business Intelligence versus Business Analytics
The distinction between business intelligence (BI) and business analytics (BA) is neither clear cut nor agreed upon (Coursera, updated 2025-12-30). The fields of study are related enough that some programs combine the two, offering degrees or concentrations in “Business Intelligence and Analytics.”
Still, it’s helpful to have some idea of the difference. BI looks to the past, basing business strategies on insights gleaned from historical data (Coursera, updated 2025-12-30). BI answers questions such as “what happened,” “how many,” and “how often.”
BA, in contrast, uses modeling techniques to predict future events (UT Tyler Online, updated 2026-08-18), tackling questions such as “why is this happening,” “what if these trends continue,” “what will happen next,” and “what is the best that can happen.”
Courses
Course requirements vary by program. For example, Metropolitan State University of Denver’s 30-credit Master of Science in Business Intelligence has ten required courses, including Database Management and Warehousing, Data Visualization and Dashboard Design, Data Mining for Business Intelligence, Generative AI for Businesses, and Data Governance, Security and Ethics (MSU Denver, program page, accessed 2026-10-01).
Course topics in BI and BI/BA programs may include:
- Data Mining
- Data Warehouse Design and Implementation
- Decision Support Systems
- Database Tools
- Balanced Scorecards and Performance Dashboards
- Predictive Analytics
- Data Pre-Processing and Exploration
Data mining, data warehousing and dashboards also appear in the titles of Metropolitan State University of Denver’s required courses (MSU Denver, program page, accessed 2026-10-01).
Admission requirements
Admission requirements vary by program and are set by each school. Metropolitan State University of Denver requires a bachelor’s or graduate degree from an accredited college or university. Applicants must also meet one of two additional criteria: successful completion of at least 15 credits of relevant coursework from an accredited institution, such as statistics, calculus, computer science, information systems or related quantitative fields, or submission of GMAT or GRE scores (MSU Denver, program page, accessed 2026-10-01). Saint Joseph’s University asks applicants for a bachelor’s degree from a regionally accredited institution with a demonstrated record of academic success, and its program page does not list a required field of study (Saint Joseph’s University, program page, accessed 2026-09-30). Check each program’s admissions page for current requirements, including the full list of application materials.
Credits, length and format
Both programs above list 30 credits. Saint Joseph’s University lists a program length of one to two years and offers the program on campus, online or hybrid (Saint Joseph’s University, program page, accessed 2026-09-30).
New Developments
Self-service BI lets business units create their own reports and dashboards. Microsoft’s adoption guidance notes that self-service report creators need to produce analytical content at a pace faster than a centralized team can accommodate, and that ownership models differ. In business-led self-service, creators and subject matter experts within a business unit own and manage the content, which Microsoft calls a decentralized approach. In managed self-service, a centralized team owns and manages the data while business units own the reports and dashboards (Microsoft Learn, Fabric adoption roadmap: content ownership and management, updated 2024-12-30).
In a decentralized model, that raises questions for organizations: Does the analytics empowerment and reduced time-to-answer these tools provide come at the expense of cost control and data quality management? Is the trade-off worth it?
School Listings
Browse the universities in our directory that offer Business Intelligence programs below.
If you represent a university and would like to contact us about editing any of our listings, or adding new programs, please send an email to info@mastersindatascience.org.
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Information last updated: October 2026